Chelsea Green has revealed that WWE originally considered a very different character for her return to the company in 2023 before she ultimately embraced the persona that has defined her current run.
Speaking on The Ghost of Hollywood, the former WWE Women’s United States Champion explained that an alternative, darker character had been planned for her comeback before those plans changed shortly before the Royal Rumble.
Chelsea Green said the concept was developed with WWE creative member Rob Fee and would have presented her as a grunge-inspired character.
“In fact, we actually had this really cool grunge alternative character planned,” Green said. “I was going to come back… it was going to be kind of an LA girl from Silver Lake, grungy, smoked cigarettes. It was so cool and so different from who I am.”
However, Green said she was told on the day of the event that the original idea would not be used and that she would instead return, portraying a version of herself.
“When I came back, and they were like, ‘Oh, actually today you’re not going to do that. Today you’re just going to be me,” she said. “I’m like, ‘Oh s***, well who am I? What’s me?’ I don’t know who I am. I’m just a white girl from Canada who wears sparkles.”
Chelsea Green Says Her Character Direction Decision Came Right Down To The Wire At The 2023 Royal Rumble
Chelsea Green said she only settled on her eventual direction hours before entering the 2023 Women’s Royal Rumble match after seeing online reports describing WWE’s idea for her as a “Karen-style” character. She immediately leaned into the concept and pitched the idea of being eliminated in record time.
“I’m like hold on… this is not what we had spoken about, but wait, this is something I can do,” Green said. “So I spoke to them, and I asked, ‘Hey, can I just be in there for a record time?’ And they’re like, ‘Okay, yeah, run in, and Rhea will toss you out.’”
Green was quickly eliminated by Rhea Ripley during the match, setting the record for the shortest time spent in the Women’s Royal Rumble.
“When I went in, we looked at each other like let’s go, and she tossed me out,” Green said. “Then I played up the Karen character and that snowballed into what it is now.”
Green added that her brief appearance at the Royal Rumble helped establish the character that would eventually grow into her current on-screen role. She noted that much of her work in WWE today involves developing her own material, with the company’s writing team providing general direction while she writes many of her promos and creative elements herself, including her online “Chelsea Chronicle” segments.
