Nine years ago, on April 11th, 2011, WWE superstar Edge stood in the center of the ring on Monday Night Raw and tearfully announced to a stunned crowd that his wrestling career was over. An MRI had revealed that Edge was suffering from cervical spinal stenosis in connection to a injury he suffered years prior, a condition that has ended the careers of several WWE stars, including Stone Cold Steve Austin. As the World Heavyweight Champion at the time, Edge was forced to relinquish his championship just 12 days after what appeared to be his final WrestleMania match.
Edge, whose real name is Adam Copeland, began a new career as an actor, and landed recurring roles in TV shows such as Haven and Vikings. A chance wipeout on a mountain bike, Edge told ESPN, eventually led to his comeback to the ring. After taking a hard fall and finding that his neck was unharmed, he began talking with doctors about a possible comeback to wrestling. In January, Edge delivered an unforgettable moment fans never thought possible, when he made a surprise entrance to the 2020 Royal Rumble – which set up a feud with old friend and rival Randy Orton.
This weekend at WrestleMania 36, Edge will wrestle in his first singles match since 2011 – a Last Man Standing bout against Orton.
With just a few days remaining until the most unique WrestleMania in history, Edge spoke with For The Win about his history with Randy Orton, and how he’s been dealing with our new global reality during the coronavirus crisis.
For the first time ever, WrestleMania will be held as a two-night event streaming Saturday, April 4 and Sunday, April 5 at 7:00 p.m. ET both nights on WWE Network and pay-per-view.
FTW: What was your first reaction to the news that WrestleMania 36 would be moved to the Performance Center?
Edge: I think we’re at a time where… everything’s so in flux and everything’s so strange right now. I guess if I’m looking at it purely from a performance aspect, you go ‘ahh.’ Because you love being able to be in front of an audience, feed of that, the adrenaline of that and all those things. Then I started looking at ‘OK, well this is where we are. This is normal for now. So what are the challenges here, and how can you adapt and still make a compelling story?’ I get off on the challenging aspect of it, and that’s how I started looking at it. So if I’m cutting a promo, well now I’m doing theater. I’m doing a monologue to a camera. And that was fun! That lets me explore my acting chops. So that’s how I tried to recalibrate my brain with it.
FTW: You moved into acting when you were forced to retire in 2011. Did that experience help you feel a bit more natural in what has been a very unnatural situation?
Edge: Without a doubt. It wasn’t until I came back, really the night after the Rumble, that’s when I felt the difference in all the reps I’ve done on sets over these last nine years. Because in that time I ended up filming 99 episodes of television, doing movies. You don’t fully grasp the comfort that that gives you until you bring it into a different arena to see how it plays out there. It really, really helped. Just more natural, more conversational. Less of that… yell-y wrestling promo thing.
… I think you can tell the people who have some acting chops and the ones who don’t. I’ve always, when asked advice on what to do, I tell anyone in the industry ‘go take acting lessons.’ Should be the first thing you do once you train.
FTW: Obviously a major part of wrestling is playing to the crowd and responding to the emotion of the audience. How do you expect the flow of your match with Randy to be different with no one in attendance?
Edge: You know, out of all the matches, I truly thing it affects us the least. I think the story that Randy and I have told is so personal and so – I’ve been using ‘grit’ throughout this whole thing – but gritty and dark and kind of twisted, that I almost feel that it doesn’t affect us. And may actually help us, strangely? Because a Last Man Standing match in a football stadium, you know, I would want to take the thing everywhere. But you have the possibility of losing your audience when you take it backstage, away from the audience, now they’ve got to look up at the screen. Now they’re craning their necks.
Now we have the full freedom, it’s a blank canvas. Now we can do anything. And really, what I want to do is to continue to tell this story between two guys who know each other so well, that have so much history. And a lot of what you’re seeing and hearing is true, and I think that’s why it’s connecting with people so much, at least in the feedback that I’ve gotten. Between the promos, between our work together, there’s a lot of reality there. We go way back, and a lot of the things we’ve talked about, they’ve happened. And I think when there’s that much kind of raw truth, that’s what you can really sink your teeth into. So I don’t think the lack of audience will hinder us as much as it will other matches.
FTW: Do you remember the first time you got in the ring with Randy Orton, and your impressions of him afterward?
Edge: The first time I met him, I still remember it, I really do. That meeting where Bob [Orton] introduced us, and I just remember thinking ‘hey, he’s taller than me.’ And thinking that he’s got all the tools by just looking at him. You know, he’s a good-looking guy, all of those things – but you don’t know what they bring to the table from an in-ring aspect. The first time I saw him work, I went ‘OK, he’s special.’ And then the first time that we ever actually wrestled against each other was for the Intercontinental title, and pretty much from the get-go, from the first time we locked up there was just something different between us. And it’s either there or it’s not. You can work to get there with someone, but with him and I that spark was immediate. And I’ve had it like that with maybe one other person.
FTW: Who is that one other person?
Edge: Well, it’s neck-and-neck with Taker and Kurt Angle. I’ve got to throw Jeff Hardy in there too.
FTW: Drew McIntyre has said be believes your match should be the main event on one of the nights of WrestleMania. Does that honor matter to you at all?
Edge: I mean, not really. It really doesn’t. My mindset is our match is going to be tough to follow. It really is, and that’s what my job is, is to make it tough to follow. So if you want to put it on in the middle, if you want to put it on in the beginning, good luck following it. If it’s on last, great, but that doesn’t change my mindset going into it. My mindset is to continue to tell this story, and for my first singles match back in nine years, I want to start this second chapter since coming back at the Royal Rumble, I want to keep that momentum going. I want to show people I’ve taken this craft to a different level than I did it before.
FTW: This is always the most hectic time of the year for WWE stars, and everyone on the roster is trying to look their absolute best for the biggest stage of the year. With all the restrictions and recommendations surrounding the coronavirus crisis, have you had to make any changes to your training routine?
Edge: For me, no, because I use a company called Nutrition Solutions that has continued and they have their protocols. I’ve still been continuing to get my meals – a matter of fact, the CEO of the company has been really hands-on with me to dial me in. I almost feel more prepared than I ever have for a match ever, even within all of this. This is the most strict that I’ve ever dieted…. When everything happened, it kind of cut our [training] plan in half of what we had planned. We were planning for six weeks out, well now we’ve got three. OK, so we adjust accordingly. I’ve kind of built a compound where we have a gym, I have my own gym and was just able to keep training and keep doing my thing.
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