In a recent interview with Ryan Satin as part of the Out Of Character podcast, WWE SmackDown superstar Kofi Kingston discussed several topics, including the original pitch for The New Day characters.
“When we were given the gimmick of positivity preaching preachers, I’ll never forget it, we had been going back-and-forth with Vince about what we wanted to be. We wanted to be some guys who were not pleased with our positions in the company and he’s like okay, well how about you guys be preachers and you guys come out here and there’s gospel music. We’re just sitting there and we know that the people are going to reject this idea because nobody comes to WWE to go to church, but this is what he wanted us to do.
We told him, whatever you give us, we’ll make it succeed because of our chemistry, we believe in it and he’s like alright, I’m going to put that to the test, you guys are going to be positivity preaching preachers, go get it over and we’re just like alright, this is our chance and we supported each other. There were a lot of people who took a big dump on our aspirations, you know, they didn’t believe in us, they made fun of us when we were just trying to get over, but now, you fast forward and those same people have come back around and they have admitted that they were wrong.”
The full interview is available at this link.