Layla on backstage atmosphere: “It was a lot of stress to be honest with you”
Former WWE superstar Layla was recently interviewed on Excuse Me: The Vickie Guerrero Show, and she discussed a variety of topics, including what she misses about working for WWE, the women’s locker room during the Divas era, and much more. Here are some highlights (via Wrestling Inc.):
Layla on what she misses most about working for WWE: “I miss certain parts about working for WWE. There’s certain highlights that are great, and there’s certain things that I was like, I could never do that again,” Layla noted. “I would never be on the road driving five hours. All of that stuff, after a while, I don’t miss that, but I do miss some of the people, and I do miss some of the moments I had on TV. I was very privileged to work with you. I know you said that we let you come into LayCool. No, you were part of LayCool. You helped us so much, and I always looked up to you and admired you. It was such an honor. I look back now, and I’m just like, thank you. We had some really really great moments, and I remember we’re working with Mickie James, and I was in the room.
“Michelle McCool is going to be against Mickie. I’m in there, and all of a sudden, you come out and you’re just, ‘Excuse Me!’ I remember I was looking at Michelle. She was looking at me because it was going to be a handicap match, and you were going to make it LayCool vs. Mickie James. Michelle’s waiting. She’s like, ‘What’s she saying?’ I’m like, ‘I can’t hear a word’ because the crowd was roaring so loud. Not just for a split second. Your whole speech and Mickie’s like, ‘What is she saying?’ I don’t know. We’re all looking at each other. Michelle’s like, ‘Do I take my clothes off now?’ She was still in her street clothes, and we could never hear it. Finally, we heard the bell ring. Michelle jumped in or whatever. Every time I went out there with you, half the time I’m like, ‘I don’t know what she’s saying. I can’t hear her. What do I do?’ To be out there with you, somebody who’s so established and so over, you had to say one thing. You were the biggest heel in our company. You really were.”
On the backstage atmosphere of the women’s locker room during the Divas era in WWE: “It was a lot of stress to be honest with you, and you’re always fighting. That was the thing about that area that we were in, the Divas era. I’ve heard other wrestlers or Superstars, females in this generation that have said that the Divas didn’t have to fight for anything, and that things weren’t taken away from us and we weren’t given opportunities. No. This is the truth. There were two spots. This is it. There were two spots in our Diva era. Luckily, it used to be just on RAW. So then those two girls would come to SmackDown too. They were on RAW and SmackDown, and that was it. Everybody else was just whatever.
“Hopefully, you’ll find a guy you can be with or be on a pre-tape. That was it. So then finally, it became that it was two spots on RAW and two spots on SmackDown, and you got to remember, how many girls are in the locker room? There’s a lot of girls in the locker room. 10-15 in each locker room and all of us want to shine, and I get it. We all want the spot. We all want to shine. We all want to further ourselves. We’re not going to get any younger. We’re all getting older. So I totally understand that, but the fight in you sometimes, even the person who was fighting fighting fighting fighting, we still get no. And girls still came. Michelle and I got told no many a times. It wasn’t like we got what we wanted. We never did get what we wanted.”
