WWE SmackDown Women’s Champion Charlotte Flair recently spoke with NBC Sports to promote this weekend’s WrestleMania 39 pay-per-view event.
During the interview, the “Queen” commented on the evolution of her character, what this year’s WrestleMania means to her, and so much more.
You can check out some highlights from the interview below:
On what this WrestleMania means to her: “I want to say it gets easier with experience, but it doesn’t. I think pressure and expectation–all of it kind of adds up. You’re having to rise to the occasion that many times and on the grandest stage. I’ve always either been a contender, or a champion and here I am going into my seventh with the performances and the rivalries I’ve already had. With experience, I know what it’s like to be out there. But with my own personal pressure, my own goals, and my own expectations for myself and my performance–I feel like the weight of the world is on my back right now. I love proving people wrong so I love the pressure.”
On the evolution of her character: “The People’s Queen. For so long, I told everyone else to bow down. Whereas now I’m just embracing the journey. I wouldn’t say that Charlotte is good. I wouldn’t say she’s bad. I think she just knows that she’s given her all for so many years and this is what she loves. She just wants the audience to know that, whether she’s acting up–whether she’s being bad or whether she being good–she’s here to be the greatest of all time. She’s going to give you that consistency, that passion, that love for the business every time she goes out there. And I think that’s very likeable.”
On her heightened emotions for WrestleMania: “Specifically, what WrestleMania means to me… obviously, to the world, it’s a pop culture extravaganza. It’s our Super Bowl. The biggest show of the year, the biggest rivalries, and the biggest stars. But for me, when my brother Reid died in 2013, it was the day before WrestleMania, and he was coming home for the first time to see me wrestle. I wasn’t on WrestleMania [at the time], I was still in developmental, but I was at Axxess where we put on exhibition matches. Every WrestleMania week, all those emotions are hitting me where I’m walking into WrestleMania and I’m here because of him. 100% it was for him in the beginning and now I will always carry him with me. But now it’s still like how did I get this far? How do I get this opportunity? I guess I feel closest to him around this time because WrestleMania is such a big deal to the superstars. Everyone dreams of a WrestleMania and I’m living his dream so when I’m out there WrestleMania I’m like, we did it.”
On what legacy she wants to leave behind: “Male or female, it doesn’t matter, she was one of the greatest of all times, I want to be in the conversation, gender aside. This applies to men too, but I want women in any industry to know that you can make it to the top and stay at the top and be at the top in any boys club and it’s so important.”
