By No Leaf Clover, writer for http://www.cagesideseats.com:
So here’s the thing about CJ Perry, who works for WWE under the name Lana; she gets it.
For all intents and purposes, she is not a lifelong wrestling fan. In another time, she’d be one more in the endless line of fitness models who come in the door, wrestle for a little while, than realize that it’s either not for them or that the company doesn’t particularly care about it’s women performers, and leave quietly, like a host of others.
She’s an actress, a dancer, a former singer in an all girl group, and model. She wasn’t in developmental for very long before she was put in front of big crowds and asked to cut promos to an audience that has been trained to treat all women as eye candy and disregard them talking. She was bought into an era where there’s a huge disparity between the women who have characters and motivations (the NXT girls) and the girls who don’t (basically all the main roster Divas), and put in a position of prominence, to help build the next unstoppable juggernaut for John Cena to defeat.
She had every reason to bomb. But she didn’t. Because she gets it.
CJ Perry gets the character of Lana. She understands her role. She may not be a wrestling fan, but she totally gets the idea of acting. She knows that she has to channel Bridgette Nielson and make it into her own thing. She knows that Lana could be as one note a character as anyone, but she’s imbued her with life and made Lana a thing. A real thing.
Lana is a woman who gets booed not because she’s a woman, or not because the crowd knows she’s heel and they’re supposed to boo her. They boo her because she understands how to generate heat. She knows when to put on that big gorgeous smile, she knows when to glare at the crowd, she knows when to speak quietly and she knows when ramp up the ham to 11. She gets it.
What the WWE creative team has done to Lana is an abomination. It’s the worst thing they’ve done in a long time, at least from a creative standpoint. At long live last, the WWE had accidentally created what they always called the WWE Divas. “Strong, sexy, and powerful”. That’s the tagline that was born in a corporate board room somewhere that the powers that be in the WWE never really believed.
The Divas are something the WWE has to deal with. Read the rest of the article here!