Former WWE writer Brian Gewirtz has spoken about how Vince McMahon compared the Raw Guest General Manager era to being better than Saturday Night Live.
Following the departure of Eric Bischoff as Raw General Manager, WWE began to introduce guest hosts in the role from 2010 onwards in the form of celebrities such as Bob Barker, The Muppets, ZZ Top, The A-Team, Mike Tyson and even former WWF Champions Bret Hart and Stone Cold Steve Austin.
Though the idea was eventually phased out in favour of a mystery General Manager who would communicate through Michael Cole and a laptop, the celebrity guest host era of Monday Night Raw was said to be a favourite of WWE CEO and Owner, Vince McMahon.
Speaking to The Masked Man Show, former WWE writer Brian Gewirtz detailed how his former boss believed that it would be better than popular television comedy show, Saturday Night Live:
“Vince always shoots for the stars. You got to give him credit. When The Network came out, I think the phrase was ‘like Netflix, only better.’ Whoa! That is quite a bold claim. I think similarly when we were doing the guest host era, he said something backstage like, ‘This will be like Saturday Night Live, only better.’ And all of us are like, ‘No, this isn’t going to be,’ I mean, maybe the [Joe] Piscopo era before Eddie Murphy better? But I don’t think this is going to be better in any sense of the word.”
Currently, neither Monday Night Raw or Friday Night SmackDown have an appointed General Manager with former NWA World Heavyweight Champion and WWE Producer Adam Pearce fulfilling the same role on both shows.
Away from his WWE role, Gewirtz has also co-written the television series Jenny, Claude’s Crib and Big Wolf On Campus while serving as producer on The Rock’s Titan Games reality show and co-producer on Dwayne Johnson television series, Young Rock.
Credit for the interview: The Masked Man Show
h/t for the transcription: Wrestling Inc.