Cary Silkin details how Ring of Honor became involved with ‘The Wrestler’.
In 2008, the film ‘The Wrestler’ released starring Mickey Rourke and the likes of Cesaro, R-Truth, Necro Butcher, Jay Lethal and Nigel McGuinness made appearances in the film.
A portion of ‘The Wrestler’ was taped at Ring of Honor events and former ROH owner Cary Silkin detailed how the opportunity came about.
He appeared on Chris Jericho’s ‘Talk Is Jericho’ podcast and recalled meeting with the film’s director Darren Aronofsky and Nicolas Cage, who was initially considered for the ‘Randy The Ram Robinson’ role. Silkin thought that the buzz from ‘The Wrestler’ would translate over to Ring of Honor but said nothing changed.
And then we get approached by Darren Aronofsky, who’s doing ‘The Wrestler’ movie and Darren Aronofsky, his thought process was the closing scene, he wanted — obviously you’ve [Chris Jericho] seen the movie, right? He wanted that character to have that last match in what looked like a prestigious kind of independent. He couldn’t work with WWE. TNA, I guess — I don’t know if he spoke to them. But he’s based in Brooklyn so he wanted to do everything in the New York, New Jersey area and he approached us and they came to a show at the Hammerstein [Ballroom] and the movie wasn’t even a go yet and he wanted a — ‘Can we come and look around? Is it okay if we go in the back?’ I’m like, ‘Sure’ and then, his right-hand man calls the day of the show and says, ‘Listen, we’re coming and we appreciate it but we’re bringing someone and we don’t want the word to get out.’ ‘Fine.’ Well it was Nicolas Cage, and Nicolas Cage was slated to be in the Mickey Rourke role. The problem in the end was he wanted more money than the whole budget of the movie. So Nicolas Cage comes and there I am, little ‘ole Cary Silkin sitting in the back in the dressing room and I got Aronofsky on one side and I’m looking across from Nicolas Cage and I’m, you know, give me Al Pacino, give me Dustin Hoffman, give me Robert De Niro. I’m an older guy. Nicolas Cage is a great actor but I wasn’t like a huge fan [like], ‘I’m meeting frickin Mick Jagger. Holy sh*t.’ So there he is. So we’re in the back and Nigel [McGuiness is] there, everyone’s being cool and Nicolas Cage looks over at me, across the table in the back and he says — he points to like Nigel and he says, ‘Why is he a good wrestler?’ I go, ‘Well, I mean he’s got a great personality, he knows how to wrestle, he’s from Britain, he brings a different style.’ Then he points over at Necro Butcher, ‘Why is he a good wrestler?’ I go, ‘Well, he does like a hardcore thing, you know? It’s like a blood and guts style’ and he’s going around the room pointing at this one and pointing at that one and I’m running out of answers. Finally, he stands up and he’s very thin. He’s like 6’2 and thin, he goes, ‘So what would make me a good wrestler?’ And I’m like, ‘Well, you know, guys like Bret Hart and Chris Jericho and Shawn Michaels, they aren’t the biggest but you know, they have personality and they know how to work a crowd and I’m sure you can do that.’ So that was my experience with Nicolas Cage so they brought — so we got signed on to the movie when the budget got cleared, they brought Mickey Rourke in and that was a great experience doing that, and I thought, ‘Holy sh*t, Mickey Rourke gets nominated for an Academy Award.’ Then at the end of the movie, Bruce Springsteen did the walkout song. I’m like, ‘This is huge!’ And Ring of Honor logos and banners were everywhere in the movie. They didn’t [mind], it’s fine. But you know what Chris? Didn’t mean a damn thing, didn’t push the needle. I’m thinking the college kids are gonna come out, the hipsters. The movie got, you know — it was popular but, maybe if Mickey Rourke would have won the Academy Award [Silkin laughed].
Ring of Honor is currently on hiatus until April 2022. The company’s titles are being defended in other promotions and the next ROH World Title defense is at IMPACT Wrestling’s Hard To Kill pay-per-view where the champion Jonathan Gresham will defend against Chris Sabin.
If the quote in this article is used, please credit Talk Is Jericho with an H/T to POST Wrestling for the transcription.
