Johnny Gargano On Texting With Shawn Michaels About Cookies And Movies, WWE NXT Being Live
Since last fall, NXT has been live on Wednesday nights on the USA Network competing with AEW. NXT had previously been a taped show, and a new live format will unexpectedly bring changes to the roster. Johnny Gargano was a guest on the latest episode of After The Bell and spoke to Corey Graves aabout the differences that live TV brings.
"Things are just a whole lot faster I think," Gargano explained. "Before, you'd kind of have a week where you'd have all your TV prepped. You'd do maybe, I'd say, three to four episodes in one Full Sail taping. Now you kind of have to be on every single week now. Now it's just not OK I'm gonna do this TV, film four episodes and you're disconnected for a month. Here, every single Wednesday night you have to go out there and give our all every week and be prepared for anything. I think that's the biggest change.
"Before, you kind of knew what was coming. Now things can kind of change on a week-to-week basis, so things are a whole lot faster and changing every time."
Shawn Michaels has taken on a more active role in NXT. He has helped write NXT and has been involved in writing for Adam Cole. Michaels and Gargano work closely together, and Gargano talked about how crazy it is for him to work with someone that he was a fan of since he was a kid.
"I literally just saw him. Right before this interview I said hey to him. It's so weird. It's weird now that I just get text messages from Shawn Michaels asking me about cookies. I remember I saw Captain Marvel, and I get a text like, 'Captain Marvel. Thumbs up or thumbs down?' He would ask me movie reviews now. It's a weird life I live now that I just talk to Shawn Michaels about cookies and movies reviews and life. Me and Candice talk about all the time how, 'is it gonna be weird someday one day when we have a child and I'm just like yeah go play with Uncle Shawn and Uncle Hunter over there. Go hang out with Uncle DX.' Yeah, you know your dad used to dress up like Uncle Shawn like put up flamboyant attire and dance around his house to 'Sexy Boy' no big deal.
"It's a weird life man. It leaves me speechless sometimes when I sit back and think about it. I think about how that man was painted on my wall, and now he's a text message conversation away. It's wild."
Gargano also talked about the differences between WWE main roster and NXT and how NXT has a more family atmosphere. Graves also had on comedian Ron Funches who talked about being invited to Ric Flair's birthday party. You can listen to the podcast by clicking here. If you use any quotes from this article, please credit After The Bell with a h/t to Wrestling Inc. for the transcription.