John Cena, the WWE wrestler turned actor, has built an enviable Hollywood career by playing amiable dimwits with real heart. But the 49-year-old is obviously nobody's fool, and he is speaking to promote Matchbox: The Movie, a film extension of the Mattel toy car brand for Apple TV.
During a 45-minute interview, Cena is generous, funny, complimentary and elusive without ever being evasive. He volunteers unprompted that “a core value of mine is respect”. Having only recently retired from wrestling after 26 years, he is relaxed about being ridiculous, and in an age of joyless online strongmen, his buff charm is welcome.
Loyalty to Vince McMahon
Cena is a company man. The word “loyalty” comes up often, and about everything from his friends back home to the wrestling to the US itself. But his loyalty has drawn him into uncomfortable positions, and the conversation soon turns to Vince McMahon, the former WWE chairman and CEO who resigned in January 2024 following sexual assault allegations and pending lawsuits.
McMahon was a mentor to Cena, sponsoring his career and providing him a second family amid the travelling circus of 00s wrestling. “I have no guilt nor shame about my friendship and my relationship with Vince McMahon,” Cena says, swiftly followed by “you’re obviously going to put this in [your] article”. He is audibly proud of the association, revelling in the idea that he's abiding by his principles in the face of what he calls “the storm”. “It's OK to love somebody when they're not perfect,” he says.
From bullied kid to WWE superstar
Cena was born in West Newbury, Massachusetts, in 1977, one of five boys in a household that watched every dollar. He worshipped movie action men like Schwarzenegger, Stallone and Willis, but also loved hip-hop, which made him a target for bullies. Bodybuilding was the answer. “I didn't treat hostility with hostility,” he says. “I got bullied for the way that I dressed, so I dressed more outlandish.”
After college, he drove to California in 1999 with about $500. He worked at Gold's Gym in Venice Beach for six dollars an hour, and for a stretch, slept in the back of his 1991 Lincoln. A wrestler who worked out at Gold's steered him towards the industry and in 2000 he made his debut in WWF (now WWE) as The Prototype, a robotic character. He was paid $250 a week “which meant I spiralled into debt”.
What followed was a 24-year stint as a WWE superstar, a period Cena describes without irony as “service”. He stumbled on a character that stuck: a jersey-wearing, battle-rapping white kid from Massachusetts, who literally went by the name John Cena. The gimmick worked, leading to the slightly odd situation where Cena doesn't own his own name.
“John Cena is who I am as a human being,” he says, “and there is a company – WWE/TKO – that has invested hundreds of millions of dollars in the intellectual property of the character John Cena. And rightfully so; they have earned their share of ownership of that.” He read and understood the agreement and thought it was fair. He explicitly rejects the idea that he has had to make sacrifices. “I prefer to use the word choice … When we say yes to something, we say no to everything else.”
Hollywood reinvention and a Taiwan controversy
The miracle of Cena's career is that the man who spent a decade as the straight-faced embodiment of American masculinity proved equally good at sending it up. After a handful of underwhelming action roles, he was cast against type by Judd Apatow for the 2015 romcom Trainwreck, then as the pumped-up Peacemaker in The Suicide Squad (2021) and its comedy spin-off series. He also had a small but charming turn as a merman in Barbie, a commitment to the bit that was all the more admirable given his agents tried to talk him out of the role.
Matchbox, his latest film, is a vague attempt to recapture Barbie's magic in the more contained format of a traditional action comedy. Cena admits feeling relieved when he read the script and found the cars to be “so far down the list of things they were doing with the IP”. He plays Sean, an undercover operative whose entire life is a performance. When asked whether the part sits close to the bone, he says: “How does someone who thinks they're always being watched act in a public place? That I got a little bit of familiarity with.”
Cena's onscreen persona is an intriguing model of masculinity: the strongman remade as softie. But he is reluctant to assume the mantle. “Rather than trying to take the reins of a movement or be the poster child for something, I'm just trying to be me,” he says. “The appetite for a certain kind of manhood is just supply and demand,” he adds. To the people clamouring for it, “my advice would be: go get it”.
Cena's own heroism came into question in 2021 when, while promoting Fast & Furious 9, he referred to Taiwan as “a country”. The Chinese audience took offence, and he filmed a contrite apology in Mandarin, a language he had been learning for six years in an attempt to grow the WWE's presence in China. The fan backlash was so intense that he told James Gunn he'd understand if he had to be fired from Peacemaker. He takes full responsibility. “Just because you know the language doesn't mean you know the culture,” he says, admitting, “I got way too overconfident. I thought I was the smartest guy in the room.”
For a man who prides himself on saying yes, it is revealing what he has said no to. Cena does not want children, reasoning they'd require too much of him. From 2002 to 2015 he was home “about 15 days a year and even now it's maybe 70”, he says. “If I said yes to children, I have to say no to everything else.” His engagement to fellow wrestler Nikki Bella collapsed in 2018, in large part over whether to have them. He has granted more than 650 Make-a-Wish wishes, more than anyone alive. “If I have a family of my own, I don't have those 650 moments … I'm flying with just my partner on this one.” He married Shay Shariatzadeh in 2020.
He remains on the WWE's books as a “brand ambassador”. Next up, he will star in One Attempt Remaining, a comedy from Kay Cannon, playing one half of a divorced couple forced to team up with his ex to track down the lost password to a crypto account worth millions. Perhaps that's what it is to be a company man: a person so thoroughly committed to the brand it is simply who he is. Present, punctual, polite and perfunctory. The job is done and it's back to the gym.
Matchbox: The Movie premieres on Apple TV on 9 October.
