Road Warrior Joe Laurinaitis flexes his acting muscles in upcoming thriller

Pro wrestling superstar Joe “Road Warrior Animal” Laurinaitis might be retired, but his hands aren’t idle.

The former tag team champion is throwing a few punches and flexing his acting muscles in the upcoming thriller The Chair.

Joe joins American Horror Story star Naomi Grossman, horror familiar Zach Galligan of Gremlins and Hatchet III and fellow wrestling legend Roddy Piper in the prison-set movie based on the graphic novel of the same name.

“The Chair is a about a guy on death row who is wrongfully accused of killing his wife,” Joe says. “But the nightmare doesn’t end there.”

While an innocent Richard Sullivan (Timothy Muskatell of Dead Girl and The Ghouls) is locked up, he witnesses the torture and murder of other inmates at the hands of the pen’s sadistic warden. Richard’s sanity and code of ethics is challenged when the only chance at survival is retaliation with the same brutality and savagery he is being exposed to behind those bars.

In that hell Joe plays prison guard Officer Bell, a role he actually landed by chance.

“I was pretty lucky in getting the part. Basically a guy screwed up so they needed someone to fill in. It had to be someone who would fit, meet the requirements and really know how to be in front of a camera. So they called me.”

No convincing or negotiations were necessary. Joe jumped on the opportunity.

“I didn’t have to think about it. I was happy to step in,” he says. “I love acting. Hey, that’s all I did in wrestling. I acted for 32 years. If I would get contacted enough I’d act 24/7.”

Joe won’t choke hold just any script that comes his way though. Romcoms and feel good features, for example tales involving the tooth fairy that star the likes of Julie Andrews, are more of another wrestler’s kind of thing. #DwayneJohnson

“What I would love to do is an action movie like The Expendables where they’d get Stalone, Stone Cold, Ron Simmons and some well known old school athletes together. Now that would be a wild time.”

Animal is among the celebrity guests at the Montreal Comiccon running Friday, July 3 to Sunday, July 5. More info here.

Follow The Chair on facebook for updates and release info.

Posted by Marc Andrew on Jul 3 2015. Filed under Interviews. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0. Both comments and pings are currently closed.