AEW stars Santana and Ortiz were recent guests on the Talk Is Jericho podcast to talk about their critically acclaimed Parking Lot Brawl with the Best Friends, which took place on an episode of Dynamite last month. Highlights from the interview can be found below.
How they felt about the parking lot brawl with Best Friends:
ORTIZ: “It was definitely an awesome feeling [seeing the reaction]. It was what it needed to be. We kind of went into the match saying, ‘We need this to be a really good blow off.’ ’cause I think the build-up was decent to good, but I think we needed the exclamation point at the end and I’m happy we delivered. And thanks to Jerry Lynn in kind of funneling all our ideas and setting it up to be the best possible match. And I think, I’m really happy with it.”
Filming the match in one take:
SANTANA:“Yeah, at one point I remember telling one of the production guys, I was like, ‘Please, no one yell cut in this match. It’s gonna be bad.’ We were so hyped up and so at that point where, if we had to cut anything, it would have killed the whole match, I feel like.”
Putting the match together:
ORTIZ: “That day. I mean, we talked about things over the week. And we figured out some things we wanted to do, but it was pretty much that day. We got with each other, we went over it all day. And yeah, that was the end result.”
How it was a total collaboration between all four men:
SANTANA: “We put together like a group chat with all of us. And I just wanted, my main thing was making sure that all four of our visions were being put out there, and everyone had their say in whatever. So we just got in a group text and started throwing little ideas here and there, what weapons we wanted to use, what props we want to get together. We were sharing other parking lot matches and just trying to get an idea for the madness.”
On Trent’s mom getting involved:
ORITZ: “Shout out to Sue for doing that. And I know she’ll never forgive us [for wrecking the car]. But she was great man, she was a team sport. And I think there was no better way to end the match than with that middle finger going up. And having to convince her the whole day. Because shew didn’t want to give us the finger. We were like, ‘That’s taking the match from here to like way up there. That ‘s the icing on the cake.’”
Full interview can be found below. (H/T and transcribed by 411 Mania)