STACK Magazine April 2015 Issue 126

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“My goal was never to be the
loudest or the craziest. It was to
be the most entertaining.”
A number of professional wrestlers
have body-slammed their way into the
movies – Rowdy Roddy Piper, John Cena,
Hulk Hogan, Stone Cold Steve Austin – but
none have been as successful in making
the transition from ring to screen as The
Rock, aka Dwayne Johnson. “The only
film I’ve enjoyed starring a wrestler was
Mickey Rourke in The Wrestler,” says
Johnson, whose charismatic personality
cemented his position as “The People’s
Champion” of the WWE. “I never thought
one day I’d want to become a movie star. I
never thought that, but I did think one day
I would make the transition into acting in
film through our (WWE) television show,”
Johnson told Region 4 magazine’s Aaron
Goldberg in a 2002 interview. Prior to his
movie debut in 2001, as The Scorpion King
in The Mummy Returns, The Rock had
done some TV work, including episodes
of That ‘70s Show and Star Trek Voyager,
not to mention four hours a week of WWE
programming. “I was just waiting for the
right role, and I had the opportunity with
The Mummy Returns.” He may be known
as Dwayne Johnson these days but to
wrestling fans, he will always Rock.
The ‘00s
“The goal for me is always to have
the opportunity to work in different
genres.”
The Rock had already appeared as one of
the talking heads in the critically acclaimed pro
wrestling documentary Beyond the Mat (1999),
but the first time we saw him flex his acting
muscle was in The Mummy Returns (2001), as
supporting villain The Scorpion King. Although
it was pretty much a glorified cameo – with his
face unconvincingly grafted onto a CGI arachnid
for most of his scenes – the character proved
popular enough to spawn a spin-off feature a year
later.
The Scorpion King (2002) gave The Rock his
first leading role, and a whopping paycheque
of $5.5 million – the highest salary paid to a
fledgling leading man at the time, which was duly
noted by Guinness World Records. Relying on his
physicality to carry the Conan-like role, he left his
WWE persona in the ring, however the King was
seen to raise “The People’s Eyebrow” at one
point during the film. “The Rock has the authority
to play the role and the fortitude to keep a
straight face. I expect him to become a durable
action star,” wrote critic Roger Ebert.
And Ebert was correct. Following the success
of The Scorpion King (which continued as a direct
to video franchise without his involvement), The
Rock was on a roll. His next appearance was in
Peter Berg’s Amazon adventure The Rundown
(2003) – or Welcome to the Jungle as it was
known Down Under – playing a bounty hunter
sent to retrieve Seann William Scott from Brazil.
“The Rock has a flair for action and comedy; he’s
a real movie star,” noted Peter Travers in Rolling
Stone.
The following year he found himself filling Joe
Don Baker’s shoes in a loose remake of the 1973
film WalkingTall, as a US Special Forces soldier
who returns to clean up his home town after
corrupt casino operators move in.
Be Cool (2005) – a sequel to the 1995 crime
comedy Get Shorty and based on Elmore
Leonard’s novel – cast him against type as a gay
Samoan bodyguard; while video game adaptation
Doom (2005) put him back in combat gear
to lead a bunch of marines against monsters
infesting a Martian base. Predictably, being a
video game movie, Doom was terrible and The
DWAYNE JOHNSONThe People’s Action Hero.
Rock scored a Razzie nomination for Worst Actor,
but he did go on record as saying the film had
short-changed fans of the game.
As part of the ensemble cast of Richard
(Donnie Darko) Kelly’s self-indulgent genre
hodgepodge SouthlandTales (2006), he dropped
his wrestling moniker and was credited for the
first time onscreen as Dwayne Johnson.
But ‘The Rock’ wasn’t history just yet. For
his first dramatic role in inspirational sports film
Gridiron Gang (2006) – a sort of riff on The
Longest Yard, in which he plays a counsellor at a
juvenile prison who assembles a football team –
he was credited as Dwayne ‘The Rock’ Johnson.
Action superstars invariably find themselves
working with children at some point in their
careers (Arnie in Kindergarten Cop , Vin Diesel in
The Pacifier) and Dwayne ‘The Rock’ Johnson’s
first Disney film was The Game Plan (2007),
playing an NFL quarterback who discovers he
has an eight-year-old daughter. His affable screen
personality was the perfect fit for a kids’ film,
and it wouldn’t be his last. But it would be the
last time ‘The Rock’ was inserted into his screen
name.
For his next film, the actor formerly known
as The Rock appeared alongside Steve Carell
and Anne Hathaway in the big screen version
of ‘60s TV spy series Get Smart (2008), as the
duplicitous Agent 23.
Then it was back to Disney for the studio’s
“new chapter” in their Witch Mountain series
from the ‘70s: Race toWitch Mountain (2009).
Johnson was cast as a Vegas cab driver who
chaperones a pair of alien children back to their
spacecraft.
Johnson stuck with the kids and sci-fi theme
for his first animated gig, voicing an astronaut
who crash lands on another world and is
considered an alien invader in Planet 51 (2009).
The ‘10s
“Playing big, heroic characters with
heart is always a lot of fun. I enjoy
making movies like that...”
Johnson continued to drift away from the
action star status that had launched his film
career with a further foray into family fare in
Tooth Fairy (2010). Playing a hockey player who’s
magically transformed into a real-life tooth fairy
(complete with pink tutu) may not have helped
046 APRIL 2015 JB HI-FI
The Rock –WWE Superstar