Freddie Prinze Jr. On What Kevin Dunn Looks For In Female Champions
On the latest "Wrestling with Freddie" podcast, former WWE writer Freddie Prinze Jr. explained why he's enamored by female wrestlers who are physical specimens, praising the likes of Jade Cargill, Nicole Bass, Chyna and Beth Phoenix.
"That's why I love that Jade Cargill in AEW," Prinze Jr. said. "She's like a greek god. That's what they look like in the books I read when I was a kid, that's legit Athena The Goddess of War. She's jacked, and that's why I loved Beth Phoenix, she was a bigger girl."
At this point, Prinze Jr. hearkened back to WWE creative/production meetings where WWE EVP Kevin Dunn would push back on the idea of pushing jacked-up women, and would insist on featuring "prettier girls with lots of makeup" as champions.
"Kevin Dunn had his opinions, which were wrong," Prinze Jr. continued. "She [Beth] could work and she was attractive too. It didn't matter if she was thick, broad and could benchpress you and your crew. Who cares, man? She looked badass. It's not like the Fabulous Moolah or Trish Stratus. People paid money to watch her wrestle. It was always frustrating working there with Dunn. The Bellas kinda broke through, but they had to break through while existing within that mold WWE demanded."
Earlier in the conversation, Prinze Jr. detailed the physical attributes Dunn looks for in a female WWE title holder.
"When Beth Phoenix was in her prime, Total Divas wasn't a thing yet," Prinze Jr. recalled. "Women didn't get that much love, so if she was going to get any [air] time as champion, which she should have had a lot of, they'd be like, 'oh, we have to pair her with Santino.' So then she had a thing with Santino where they both had a title.
"It was a weird time where we were all kinda held hostage by the whims of Vince [McMahon] and Kevin Dunn. One guy who loves wrestling with all his heart – more than his family, more than anything in the world. And this other guy who I never got the sense liked wrestling at all. He was trying to turn it more into the NFL or Tyson vs. Holyfield, which is cool, but it wasn't like wrestling.
"So, you just see this room of like 20 writers throwing sand against the tidal wave. Bro, you could pitch for 20 minutes, and Kevin will be like, 'I don't think she's pretty.' And all of a sudden, six weeks of story would just be gone. And Dunn would be like, 'Our champion has to be pretty.' I'd ask him, 'Did you think Mankind was pretty?'"
Prinze Jr. would then cite examples of "less-than-handsome male champions" that have existed in pro wrestling over the years, such as WWE Hall of Famer Vader.
Earlier this year, Lina Fanene (FKA Nia Jax) called out "certain higher-ups" in WWE who "can never see past their own perverted ways." Her comments were a response to AEW star Athena (FKA Ember Moon) disclosing in an interview that she was told to dress like Mandy Rose at WWE creative meetings.