Undisputed WWE Champion “The American Nightmare” Cody Rhodes spoke with Billboard on a number of topics, including the viral FaceTime chat he ad with hip-hop music icon Jay-Z earlier this year.
Rhodes said, “I have to thank Michael Rubin at Fanatics for that. He was just having a normal, regular chat like he does with somebody like Jay-Z. That whole moment was incredible for me to go Fanatics Fest, first time ever, and to hear from the horse’s mouth himself what I only been told about some of WWE’s merchandising numbers and my own specifically. To be in the top five of all of the athletes represented, as a kid, trying to tell everyone around him, ‘Hey, wrestling is really cool. You should come over to my house, you’ll like it. Hey, come to the show with me, you’ll be a fan,’ to see it hit this mainstream level again. I don’t wanna take it for granted.”
On working with Metro Boomin for the ads for Bad Blood:
“With Bad Blood, Triple H and Nick Khan, they asked me to do the packages and sizzle reels with Metro Boomin. I’m thinking, “Yes!” This is what we do. This is what we want. To be able to have done the stakeout [with Metro] and hopefully it goes somewhere as we head towards Bad Blood, that was such a really sweet moment. It was really cool to connect with someone like that, not just an artist in a different medium, but with someone trying to tell stories like how we’re trying to tell stories.”
