Terry Crews Says WCW Appearance Helped Him Understand How To Better Connect With An Audience

Long live the legend of T-Money

Long before Everybody Hates Chris and White Chicks made Terry Crews a household name, he got his start as T-Money, a cocky brute on the reality show, Battle Dome. In the fall of 2000, as part of a co-venture with WCW, Terry Crews appeared on episodes of Monday Nitro.

Speaking recently with WWE Superstar Titus O’Neil, Crews looked back on those days as T-Money and said that the wrestling influence taught him how to better connect with an audience and become fully immersed in a character, which he would later put to great use as an actor.

“I played this character named T-Money and it put me in a cage. But we were doing like American Gladiator style stuff and we had a co-venture with WCW out of Atlanta at the time. This is back in the old days, man,” Crews began. “I look back at those days man and it’s where I learned how to really give it up, because this is another thing. With acting and all that, you have to go so far in that everyone believes it. I remember being this character and I was mean. I was the heavy. I was the heel. So, we had the contestants [on Battle Dome] and I wouldn’t talk to them… But when I came out, I was like, ‘yo!’ I was all in and they were so scared. After the game, I would go up to the guy like, ‘Hey, man, I’m glad you could come on to the show.’”

Crews continued, “But when I saw the commitment and the talent and the ability that the WWE had, I mean, I remember when The Rock was just starting out. I started in the game 20 years ago, you know what I mean? I watch all you guys and it feels like family.”

Unfortunately for T-Money, his WCW tenure was short-lived as WWE would buy out the WCW brand mere months after Crews appeared on the brand.

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