Chris Jericho isn't just wrestling legend and future Hall of Famer. No, Y2J is also the lead singer of Fozzy, a band he helped form, an author, a podcaster, and even an actor.
You might be wondering what movie or show was Jericho in, and we've got the answer. Back in 2013, the first season of 'But I'm Chris Jericho!' debuted and the second season is finally here as it premiered Thursday.
'But I'm Chris Jericho!' is a CBC original comedy series and season 2 begins streaming on Thursday, Dec. 7 on the CBC TV app and cbc.ca/watch. Before you watch season 2, though, catch up on Season 1 now on the CBC TV app and cbc.ca/watch.
Before the second season of the hilarious comedy premiered, we had a chance to speak with Jericho about the show, what it's like acting in this environment, his latest WWE run, hockey, and much more. Enjoy!
Luca Celebre: 'But I’m Chris Jericho!', what can fans expect from season 2?
Chris Jericho: Well, a surprise for me because we did season 1 in 2013 and it took us 6 years to get it made from when I had the initial concept, so it took 6 years for season one, 4 years for season two, so now we’re planning on season three for 2019. It’s getting closer and closer, but the whole concept of this show was always just a fun idea that I had when I left wrestling and went to Los Angeles to study acting and some of the stupid stuff that happened to me at the time where it didn’t matter if I was Chris Jericho. I would still go in for an audition with forty other guys that looked just like me for one line in "CSI Shiboigan" or something along those lines and it’d be like, “I’m Chris Jericho. I’ve got a worldwide fan base,” but I realized nobody cared. You go into acting, it’s a whole different thing, especially at that level, you’re starting from scratch, so I thought it would be really cool if Jericho got blackballed, got kicked out of wrestling and decided his only option was to go into acting, but he’s got nothing so he has to start from scratch and that’s kinda where the whole concept for season one came from. I hooked up with some really talented people here in Toronto and we created this brilliant ten episode web series. It’s funny, I just saw the big poster for it in Insight, the production studios, and it was like seven of those “selected by the web council of America” or won the award at the France web awards and it’s like we won a lot of awards, we’re actually really good, so when you do something that cool and it goes away, you wish you could have done more and I got this call that CBC wanted to pick it up and do more with it and now here we are with this huge promotional push and this continuation of Chris Jericho in this ridiculous world that he lives in. If you watched season one, it’s a continuation of that, a lot of the same characters, but a lot of new ones as well. If you haven’t watched season one, go and watch it because you’re missing out on a real fun piece of Canadian comedy that’s right up there with Schitt's Creek or Corner Gas or something along those lines. I’m excited.
LC: What’s the most challenging part about acting in this environment?
CJ: It’s actually very easy, actually I shouldn’t say easy. It’s very natural, like if I was doing another show, I would have pretty much everything “off book” as we say and have it all memorized and learned, but here it’s not like that. It’s more of a vibe and it’s more of a loose, really written script, but a lot of room for improv because basically I’m playing an offshoot of me and that’s why I can basically do anything that I want because it’s me. It’s not exactly me, but it’s like Jerry Seinfeld playing Seinfeld on Seinfeld. It’s not the same guy, but there’s a lot of elements of the real person, so it’s really, really natural and fun and I can’t think of another project that I did where I had as much fun as I did in season one or right along the lines here on season two as well.
LC: I have a couple of questions for you about your recent WWE run. There were a lot of highlights, but I have to start with ‘The List,’ was there a moment that you realized it was huge?
CJ: Well, there was a guy I was working with there, Jimmy Jacobs, he’s an ex-independent wrestler who started writing with WWE and we just had really good chemistry and he was very easy to write with, bouncing ideas and one day he just said, “What if you had like a list?” I’m like what do you mean. He said it’s like your shit list and I thought that’s pretty funny, so we did it and it got a good reaction, so I’m like well what if I actually make a physical list, so I had this orange clipboard and then that got over the next week and with something like that you can tell instantly when something gets over in wrestling because people bring signs and have them in the crowd. You just never know what’s going to click, but people just love the f***ing list. It’s like if I never wrestle again, my legacy will be a flashing jacket and a clipboard with a list written on it, but hey man, I could do worse.
LC: And the scarf, too!
CJ: Scarves as well. Like I said, I find when you get to a certain level and you have confidence, you can get anything over. I started wearing a headband because I’m growing my hair out a bit and I was like if I was on TV right now, fans would be wearing headbands. You would be wearing one. It’s just one of those things where I found if someone can dress up as you on Halloween, then you know you’ve got something going because then you have a distinctive look. I get pictures everyday of like some kid with a vest and a scarf or there’s a list or there’s a painted on goatee. Whatever it may be, that’s how you know you’ve done something right and I think for Jericho, you can dress up on Halloween for 2000 Jericho, people would know who it is. You could do 2016 Jericho and people would know who it is and that’s a cool thing for me because I always think that reinventing yourself breeds longevity and that’s why I’ve had a 17-year career in WWE because it’s never the same thing twice.
LC: What was your favourite part about working with your former best friend Kevin Owens?
CJ: Just the chemistry and I could see that from the start. We did something in England in April of 2016 and after I said to somebody, maybe even Vince (McMahon), that guy’s got great personality, we have good chemistry just as people, you could tell like very sarcastic and same sense of humour and I found over the years that you work with hundreds, thousands of guys and there’s only a handful that you have that great, true chemistry with and Kevin was one of those guys as an ally, as a foe, but we really knew we had something going and I knew in April we could do something at WrestleMania the following year if we did it right and at first Vince didn’t feel that way, but after a while he agreed and we had this amazing, classic rivalry.
LC: With our website being called BarDown.com, I’ve got a couple of hockey related questions for you. Who do you want on your team if you’re putting together a hockey team of wrestlers? Who are you taking and who are you avoiding?
CJ: They’re too big, they can’t skate. I always loved questions like that because if they were good hockey players, they’d be playing hockey.
LC: What about any of the Canadian wrestlers? Sami? Kevin?
CJ: I don’t think Sami knows how to skate. I don’t think Kevin knows how to skate. Kevin’s like a bumblebee. He’s aerodynamic, he shouldn’t be able to fly or skate and somehow he does. I never played hockey with anybody in WWE which is really strange. I did play hockey in Madison Square Garden four years in a row. Christopher Reeve had this celebrity foundation and I played with Tim Robbins, he was really good, Chad Smith from the Red Hot Chili Peppers was a good goaltender, David Boreanaz was good, Dennis Leary, so there are a lot of celebrities that can play, but none of them are really WWE guys.
LC: Last question we ask all of your guests, can you go BarDown?
CJ: Oh dude, I’m not that good. I did score a goal on Kirk McLean when he was playing with the Rangers in the Garden for real.
LC: Really?
CJ: I was not a good hockey player, that’s why I got into music and wrestling even though my dad played in the NHL for ten years, I was kind of like the, “That’s Jericho’s kid? He’s the shits,” but in the Garden I took this big slapshot and it looked like a drunken bat, like one of those ones that’s kind of looping and he went like that and kinda just went out of the way and there’s no reason why it went in, but it was just one of those fluke goals. For the rest of my life, I scored a goal on the Rangers’ goaltender on Madison Square Garden ice for real and after that I don’t even bother playing hockey anymore. Where else are you going to go from there? Nowhere else to go, no higher than that!
Again, But I'm Chris Jericho is a CBC original comedy series and season 2 is live on the CBC TV app and cbc.ca/watch. Catch up on Season 1 now on the CBC TV app and cbc.ca/watch.
