Mick Foley Calls His Cameo Work "A Sticky Point With WWE"

The Wrestling Inc. Daily podcast welcomed WWE Hall of Famer Mick Foley onto a recent episode of the podcast where he discussed his current work doing Cameo videos. Wrestling Inc. exclusively reported that WWE would be cracking down on talent's Twitch and Cameo accounts which prompted Wrestling Inc. Managing Editor Nick Hausman to ask Foley what the status of his Cameo account is.

"It's a sticky point," Foley admitted. "They're kind of letting me be for now. I just did The Bump for WWE. I'm doing a watch along on Sunday night. So we're all getting along. I think it's somewhere they don't want to rock the boat. I love doing them. One of the things about this pandemic is its kind of brought on loneliness as its own pandemic of sorts.

"People all alone so I found when I was given this opportunity–because my wife has a pre-existing condition, so any time I go anywhere, when I come back, I've got a isolate for two weeks. We have not been without masks around each other since this whole thing started, so it's been difficult, and when you're sitting alone in a hotel room or your house, I've got no contact with the outside world. Stopped by my mom's a couple days, a week [ago] and then when I had a chance to do these videos all of a sudden, I'm not just going to be, 'hey, shout out from The Hardcore Legend.' If anyone's seen my Cameos, I go all out.

"I did Dude losing his composure in a log flume, which I really enjoyed. Just yesterday, I did a rap battle between Dude Love and man in a Mankind mask. I'm not Mankind. I'm man in a Mankind mask, but I just had a lot of fun doing it. I feel like I'm performing as opposed to phoning it in. Technically, I am phoning it in, but you know what I'm saying. I go all out. I try to exceed expectations, and don't get me wrong, I do appreciate the idea of the first time that I don't have to travel hundreds of miles to make a little money, but I also I love doing them."

Hausman brought up one of Foley's one-man show from SummerSlam weekend last year where he channeled Mankind on-stage. Foley explained how the show did not go as smoothly as he would have liked it to be.

"You know what that does for me... I remember doing the '20 Years of Hell' tour where they all went really well as far as attendance was concerned, and then we had one added in as part of Wizard World where they only booked me the night before," Foley recalled. "How do you do a show with eight hours notice? It's one thing if you're sitting by yourself at Wizard World doing the 'lonely Virgil' because you're only booked the day before.

"It's another thing when you have a one-man show, so I asked Glenn Jacobs, Kane, if he would be my special guest for the Q&A, and as we're walking, he goes, 'how many people do you think will be there?' I said, 'Glenn, there might be 500. There might be five. I don't really know,' and as I walk into the room, let's just say it was a lot closer to five than it was 500. It's everything you don't want in a venue. Not with COVID now. You don't want low ceilings, tight crowd, but you want lower ceilings, good lighting, dark mood lighting, seating with fans around the stage, and instead, I walk into a massive ballroom with 40-foot ceilings, every light in the place is on.

"It's like 23 people in a 500-seat room, and all I could think of is, 'okay good' because it's so much more fun to tell stories about a show where everything did go wrong. You can come out and go, 'wow, man, let me tell everything how the show was packed.' There's no fun in that. A lot of the boys, they are the guys, they like to tell stories about the time it was so loud. And I like to tell the story of Polk, West Virginia with 26 people, and I could tell because I counted them when I had Shane Douglas in a rear chinlock.

Despite things not going smoothly, Foley pointed out that those are the fun stories to tell. He recalled the audience reaction to him going full into character, and he said that is part of why he likes doing Cameo videos.

"Those are the fun stories for me to tell, but going back to what you said about Mankind. There's 23 people in there, and that's kind of like my wake up call," Foley said. "Instead of being like, 'oh God, let me just get through this.' If I can get into that character in front of people, I can bring them the best show I can no matter who's in front of them.

"So I remember on that specific show doing that thing where I break out the Mankind story and I look at some of the audience, 'you didn't think I was bringing my A-game did you?' And they went, 'no.' I always bring my A-game. People get goosebumps. It's kind of crazy. That's not something I've seen on video. I never did that for a show.

"I've never seen what I look like when I do that, but I do know that I really enjoy it. In that case it was 23 people, when I'm doing the Cameos now, the Mankind you get is usually lighter hearted if he's singing love songs or what not. He's not quite as intense, but I still love the idea of getting it to character and entertaining."

Indie star Frank The Clown came up near the end of Hausman and Foley's conversation as Frank is dating Foley's daughter Noelle Foley. Mick praised Frank and discussed his viral spot at Warrior Wrestling.

"Frank's doing really well," Foley stated. "I think subjecting himself to Joey Janela's moves... I saw Joey leg dropping Frank off of a goal post and so he's down there–I worry about Frank, that someone won't take care of him, and he said he's known Joey. He's confident, but Frank gets heat. And he takes bumps. He's really doing well. He's a good promo guy. Good guy. So I'm happy he's getting some attention."

You can follow Mick on Twitter @RealMickFoley or get a personalized video from him on Cameo via Cameo.com/MickFoley. Mick's full interview aired as part of a recent episode of our podcast, The Wrestling Inc. Daily. Subscribe to get the latest episodes as soon as it's released Monday – Friday afternoon by clicking here.