Bray Wyatt’s original entrance would have been different if WWE had moved forward with the initial pitch.
Following an underwhelming run as Husky Harris, Windham Rotunda was repackaged as Bray Wyatt in NXT. Wyatt made his main roster debut alongside Erick Rowan and Luke Harper (aka Brodie Lee) on the July 8, 2013, episode of RAW.
The Wyatt Family’s entrance became a huge hit with the WWE Universe, allowing fans to become part of the experience through the torches of their smartphones, resembling fireflies.
During a recent edition of Complex’s On Display, WWE’s Chief Content Officer Paul “Triple H” Levesque recalled working with Bray Wyatt on his original entrance. According to Hunter, the initial pitch involved the use of lasers.
“Yeah, the original lantern, which for me is really cool because Bray and I worked together on that very first moment of that entrance. There was a time when they were looking at having lasers and all this other stuff. I asked him, ‘Does this feel right to you?’ and he said, ‘No, it doesn’t.’
Triple H on how Bray Wyatt’s lantern entrance concept came to life
“I went back and talked to our team and said, ‘Look, this is the exact opposite. This guy’s a cult leader from the swamps. He shouldn’t have lasers. As a backwoods guy, what would scare me is him coming through the woods at night, carrying this lantern, with his face barely visible, and I can barely make out who he is.’ That’s how the concept came to be. Bray said, ‘I love that,’ and then we started riffing on it and figuring out how to do it.
“I can still picture him with Harper and Rowan behind him, while we tried to move the lantern so we could see his face and catch a glimpse of them, but not too much. Bray would be like, ‘This thing’s too heavy, I can’t hold my arm up this long,’ and all those bits and pieces that go into the creation make them, for me, even more special.”
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