Deonna Purrazzo has had to reinvent herself for television more than once — and she was candid about both experiences in a recent interview with Fightful’s Sean Ross Sapp. The ROH Women’s Pure Champion discussed how transitioning to AEW presented a steeper learning curve than expected, and revealed a creative pitch she brought to the company that never got the green light.
Purrazzo explained that her early career forced her to adapt quickly to TV production, having her eighth-ever match at a TNA Knockouts pay-per-view and working as a Rosebud on Raw and SmackDown shortly after. But when she arrived in AEW, she found herself behind in different ways. “TNA wasn’t live at the time. Everything was taped except pay-per-views, and so I hadn’t worked a commercial break in three years. So it was a real big learning curve to go back to live TV when I hadn’t for so long. I felt like I was a little bit behind the ball, actually, almost two years ago when I started there.”
Purrazzo Pitched a Comedy Segment That Chelsea Green Called “Gold”
On the creative side, Purrazzo revealed a segment concept she called “Purrazzo in Picture” — a mock picture-in-picture format where her floating head would pop up to talk trash about an opponent, run an AEW history pop quiz about one of the women on the roster, and then get squashed as a consequence. “I was like, don’t need to be like a serious ‘rassler. I can just do Purrazzo in Picture,” she said. She noted she ran the idea by Chelsea Green, who told her: “Deonna, that’s gold. You need to pitch this.” The segment was never approved. Purrazzo defends her ROH Women’s Pure Championship against Billie Starkz on tomorrow’s edition of ROH on HonorClub TV.