Interview: Wade Barrett on Why He Left WWE, Choosing Acting Over WWE, Travel Schedule

A recent episode of the Sam Roberts Wrestling Podcast had Wade Barrett as the guest and some of the topics discussed included why he left the WWE in 2016, choosing an acting career over his WWE career, and his hectic WWE travel schedule.

On the topic of why he left the WWE in 2016, Barrett stated it was due to him feeling very miserable with the direction of his career in the company.

“I was miserable for a long time for the last few years I was in WWE. I have no beef or hate for them, but it was just how I was feeling at the time. Once upon a time if you go back to the early 2000s all the way to 2014 all I cared about in life was being a wrestler, going on the road, performing in front of crowds, getting big, climbing the ladder. But then at some point around 2015 it took a giant U-turn and thought to myself, ‘wait a minute? What am I doing here? This isn’t the direction that I want.'”

On the topic of choosing an acting career over staying in WWE, Barrett stated it was due to WWE rejecting movie offers he was getting at the time and had he signed a new deal with the company, his acting career would not have been possible.

“While I was working for the WWE in 2013 and 2014, TV deals had come to me, movie deals had come to me, sponsorship deals had come to me and they were all turned down by WWE because they would involve me being taken away from their shows. Their steam train is running all over the world and I would have to step out of that steam train and go film for four weeks, or go shoot a film for two weeks or even two days to go film a series of commercials or something like that. But they couldn’t afford to take me away from that time so I knew that if I wanted to go and do something else, the only way for me to do that is to first step away from WWE and figure out how I make contacts and how do I start speaking to people in the film world and finding agents and that sort of thing. So one had to come first, and that was to come first to get the curtain off of WWE.”

On the topic of his travel schedule in WWE, Barrett stated he was spending up to 275 nights a year on the road traveling to shows and promotional events for the company.

“It is a grind. It is a grind lifestyle and it never ends until you get hurt and then you sit home rehabbing for three months or whatever it is until you get back straight on that train grinding again, which is how you make your money in the pro wrestling world.”