Steve Corino Interview (May 2000)

Interview: Steve Corino
One of wrestling's fastest rising stars talks hardcore wrestling with IGN!

May 17, 2000

Steve Corino is one of the fastest rising stars in pro wrestling today. His fast track to success began last year when he entered a feud with ECW veteran Tommy Dreamer, and hasn’t let up since. Since then he’s feuded with former WCW champion Dusty Rhodes, a program which has really put him on the map. He also had a highly acclaimed bloodbath against Tajiri at Hardcore Heaven. Critics are calling him one of the hottest young prospects in wrestling, due to his ability to not only mat wrestle but also brawl and use the microphone.

IGN Wrestling Editor-In-Chief Blake Norton caught up with Corino at E3 last week to chat about Dusty Rhodes, hardcore wrestling and the next big step in his successful career.

Norton: How many people came out here?

Corino: There’s Dreamer, Rhino, me, Simon, Chetti, Nova, Doring and Roadkill and ref Mike Keener.

Norton: Are you a video game fan?

Corino: Not really. But my son is. I came to grab some free stuff for him (laughs)

Norton: Have you wrestled yet?

Corino: I wrestled against Nova for the Acclaim heavyweight tile.

Norton: Oh yeah, he was gloating about it earlier.

Corino: Let him brag. I’ll beat ‘em later.

Norton: How’s ECW treating you?

Corino: Excellent. Things are looking so up right now. The network thing has taken off, with Rhino as the TV champ, Jack Victory causing trouble. A few weeks ago I scored my big first victory over Dusty Rhodes.

Norton: We were all waiting for that.

Corino: I got taken out of the role as the comedy guy, getting everyone else to fight my battles. I’m being more serious now, doing business myself.

Norton: I was actually saying that, I write the ECW on TNN review for IGN Wrestling and I noted last week how you jumped right into a fistfight with The Sandman, and actually came out on the winning end of it, too. You’re as convincing as an offensive wrestler as you are a defensive one.

Corino: The torch has been passed to me from the American Dream Dusty Rhodes, so it’s time to stop fooling around. I’ve always had the ability, now it’s time to let people see it.

Norton: What’s going to be your next big program after Dusty?

Corino: There’s so many options, with Tajiri and the network. It’s all one big angle. I always have an issue with Dreamer, New Jack, Nova, Chetti, there isn’t really anybody on the babyface side I don’t have an issue with.

Norton: As your character grows stronger, is a face turn on the cards?

Corino: I hope not! I’d be terrible. I leave the babyface stuff for Dreamer! (laughs)

Norton: You’re too good at telling him he has to retire, I guess.

Corino: Yeah! The last four weeks I’ve been having my head pounded in.

Norton: You’ve done a hell of a lot of blade jobs lately.

Corino: Oh God, let me tell you.

Norton: Every match you’re bleeding like crazy.

Corino: It was one blade job that turned into four long ones, it kept getting broken open. It’s not the way I like to wrestle.

Norton: Speaking about your head, what made you go blonde?

Corino: It was something I wanted to do because I’m an old school character, and old school babyfaces were blonde. If you go back ten or fifteen years, I’d be a huge babyface. I don’t drink beer, smoke cigarettes…

Norton: And in the last ten years it’s all turned around.

Corino: That’s why unless I discover I have a drinking problem, I don’t see myself doing face at all (laughs).

Norton: Do you think it’ll stay this way? With Austin and Sandman being the good guys?

Corino: It keeps changing. I don’t think we’ll ever go back to a pure babyface kind of thing. Jerry Lynn may have been the last, and even he now has a bit of an edge to him. Wrestling is an extension of everybody’s personality. They want to cheer the stuff they see wrestlers do that they can’t do. Everyone wants to shout at their boss.

Norton: Where in the 80s, there were kids who wanted to be Superman.

Corino: Exactly. The days of the superhero is over. They’re dead and gone. Now the superheroes are the guys who get screwed. Except Nova, only the men do him (laughs).

Norton: What was it like working with Dusty Rhodes?

Corino: It was an unbelievable experience. Even being in the same ring, there was like an aura around the ring. Thirty years…

Norton: So much history…

Corino: Yeah. It’s one of those things that sticks in your mind, the seven or eight matches we had.

Norton: Was the win the most important thing?

Corino: Not really. For me it was the match at Living Dangerously.

Norton: I was front row for that one.

Corino: That was the biggest thrill of my life, because for one night, I got to go one on one with him. It proved that he still had “it,” and that I could hang with him.

Norton: What do you think is the next step for ECW? The Friday ratings on TNN are bouncing around like crazy.

Corino: We’re not worried about the ratings, it’s Friday night, if you look across the board then all the ratings on that night are bad. Hockey playoffs on ESPN got a .5! If you look at it that way, ECW on TNN is doing great. We definitely need a network that will support us, a new night would be great too. Down the line… we have success right now, getting a .9 or 1.0. I can’t imagine what a 2.5 or a 3.0 would be like on another night.

Norton: Is TNN like a launching point?

Corino: Yeah. They could promote us more, we’re looking for someone who will do that. We’re still… the TV company still makes money, ECW still makes money. We’re not making the money the WWF is, but everyone’s happy, everyone’s making money.

Norton: There’s still rumors of ECW jumping to the USA based on a lot of variables.

Corino: I don’t know, but in a perfect world that would be ideal. I’ve read and heard that the WWF gets 85% of the ad rates. ECW could come in and say hey, we’ll take 40% or 50%, just give us another night, and at the end of the day we’d make so much money at a 2.0. It’s a win-win situation for both companies. ECW builds on USA, everyone makes money. At the end of the day, I just do wrestling. Our job is to entertain the fans. The businessmen are the ones trying to make money. As long as they make money, they’re going to be happy.

Norton: You’ve been doing so much hardcore wrestling, is doing bladejobs a horrible thing?

Corino: Oh yeah. I go home and my three year old son looks at me like “dad, what are you doing?”

Norton: I actually trained to wrestle a few months ago up in Calgary, but that hardcore stuff is still beyond my comprehension.

Corino: My God, everybody thinks they can do it…

Norton: The perception is that all you need is a high threshold…

Corino: I have a high threshold of pain, but I’d rather work with Chetti, Doring, Nova, Tajiri any day of the week, instead of Sandman. That’s not to take away from what they do, but I don’t like the Hardcore stuff.

Norton: You want to get fans to pop for technical wrestling?

Corino: Exactly. Last weekend, Jerry Lynn and Lance Storm had a match. Anybody who knows me can tell you that I can’t stand Storm, but Storm and Lynn put on a clinic for everybody, and everybody really appreciated it. The boys in the back went “wow.” They didn’t have to kill each other to do it. They accomplished what they set out to do. The people bought it from them.

Norton: Thanks for the chat, we’ll catch up with you later. Anything else you’d like to talk about?

Corino: Well my cuts are doing horrible, my website’s doing well… that’s SteveCorino.com. And I’m having a lot of fun grabbing free stuff at E3! (laughs) Take care, guys.