Vince Russo: Violent J is ‘the closest to a Vince McMahon’ I’ve ever worked with
Vince Russo says Violent J of the Insane Clown Posse is the “closest to a Vince McMahon” he has ever worked with.
Last month, Russo was announced as the new head writer of Juggalo Championship Wrestling, the promotion run by the Insane Clown Posse. Russo appeared as a guest on The Ariel Helwani Show on Wednesday and spoke about what he enjoys about his new role.
Russo said:
“I have to say this because I want everybody to know this. I hadn’t seen (Violent) J in 26 years. I worked with him for four days. Violent J, out of everybody I’ve ever worked with, is the closest to a Vince McMahon, without a shadow of a doubt. This guy is a genius.”
“And let me tell you Ariel, how I know he’s a genius. When you are creative, you are not detailed-oriented. You’re not because your mind is out here, you’re always thinking outside of the box. You need somebody else to dot the Is and cross the Ts. That’s where Ed (Ferrera) and I worked so well together. Ed was a detail guy. I sat there and I watched Violent J for four days, this guy did both.”
“And this was unbelievable to me because whether people want to believe it or not, Vince McMahon was really not a creative genius. The genius of Vince McMahon was he could see things that nobody else could see. And what he used to call that all the time is the nuances. Vince would see the nuances that nobody else saw.“
“If I wrote a script that was a 9, Vince would tweak a nuance here, a nuance there, now the show was a 10. But you give Vince McMahon a blank piece of paper, Vince McMahon cannot write you a wrestling show.”
“And that’s why when I saw the creative genius of Violent J, I was like man, this is the guy I want to work with. There’s no politics, there’s no BS, this is a guy who knows we need to expand this and bring it to the world once again and that’s exactly what we’re doing.”
New episodes of JCW’s weekly show are published on Psychopathic Records’ YouTube channel on Thursdays at 7 p.m. Eastern. The most recent episode features Matt Cross vs. Mecha Wolf, Caleb Konley vs. Ninja Mack, Kerry Morton vs. Suicide, and appearances by Big Vito, Vampiro and Violent J.
Russo and the Insane Clown Posse previously worked together in WCW in late 1999 and early 2000. JCW was formed by ICP’s Violent J and Shaggy 2 Dope in December 1999. The duo had also finished a three-month stint with WWE in 1998, where they had a brief role as members of the Parade of Human Oddities. ICP also had a run in ECW in 1997.
Russo’s full appearance on The Ariel Helwani Show is available below:
The most recent episode of JCW Lunacy is below:
Ian Carey is a writer from Toronto, Ontario, Canada, whose work has been featured in NOW Magazine, The Huffington Post, and more. A lifelong wrestling aficionado born in Calgary, Alberta, Canada, he has covered the industry for a decade and a half. He joined the f4wonline.com team in 2019.