Kurt Angle Says Kissing Stephanie McMahon With Vince McMahon Directing Was “Ridiculously Weird”

Kurt Angle’s kiss with Stephanie McMahon was made even more uncomfortable by her father’s presence.

Speaking on the latest episode of the Kurt Angle Show (via AdFreeShows), the WWE Hall of Famer opened up about the on-screen love triangle between himself, Stephanie McMahon and Triple H during the Summer of 2000. Angle called his backstage-kiss with Stephanie “ridiculously weird,” and noted that he wanted to be as respectful as possible during the segment. He also shared that Vince McMahon wanting to direct it made the situation all the more nerve-wracking. Here’s what he said:

“Oh, this was ridiculously weird. I mean, to come backstage with Stephanie and to have to do a pre-tape that was going live, so we weren’t going to tape it, it was going to be one take. I think Vince did that on purpose so we only had to kiss once. I also don’t know if we had the time to pre-tape it, so that was probably the real issue. We got backstage and Vince wants to direct it. I was like, ‘holy shit!’ Vince McMahon, Stephanie McMahon’s father is going to direct me kissing her during a pre-tape. I was nervous as hell. Vince was four feet away and his eyes were this open [opens eyes as wide as possible]. He’s just looking. I’m like, ‘this is so weird, man.’ I don’t know how I’m going to do this, so I went down to kiss her and we caught eyes and then we went to kiss and I stuck my lips out like this [puckers lips] because I didn’t want to go with an open mouth because Vince was there and I didn’t want to disrespect Triple H or Stephanie. But I kissed her like this [puckers lips again] and after the pre-tape, she goes, ‘hey, you kiss like a fish’ [laughs]. I was like, ‘what did you expect Stephanie, your dad’s here watching. He’s directing. Your dating Triple H. What do you want me to do?”

Triple H and Kurt Angle both competed in the main event of SummerSlam that year, losing to The Rock in a Triple-Threat match for the WWF Championship in the main event.

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