By James Caldwell, PWTorch assistant editor

"The Rock" Dwayne Johnson has become of Hollywood's top grossing actors. Batista had a break-out 2014 for his role in "Guardians of the Galaxy," which he has parlayed into more high-profile movie roles.

Now, John Cena wants to follow the wrestling-to-Hollywood path, but with a different approach than C-Level WWE Studios action movies playing "John Cena, WWE babyface hero."

Variety published an in-depth report on Cena's desire to try different roles, starting with a drug dealer and an ex-boyfriend in notable comedies "The Nest" and "Trainwreck."

Both movies will be released in 2015 by Universal, which has a movie deal with Johnson. Cena sees Johnson as instrumental to get himself and other WWE stars on a similar path to respectability in Hollywood.

“WWE needs more people like Dwayne,” Cena said before noting Batista's success. “I’m so happy that ‘Guardians’ killed. We have talented people working for our company. It’s just going to take a bit. It’s just going to take a few more situations like that (to make WWE more mainstream).”

Cena's comment gets to his motivation for branching out. He said he's not looking to leave wrestling or reduce his schedule. Rather, to expand WWE's reach in the mainstream. That was also WWE's motivation for creating a Studios arm, which has led to mixed results, at best.

Cena says he believes his approach will be more successful. “I don’t think I work tremendously well in action because people see me in action every week without fail,” Cena said. “If I’m the shining white knight in the movies, that’s kind of the same thing. Audiences aren’t getting anything special or different.”

Cena also recognizes that his employer, WWE, is at a financial cross-roads following the Network launch, which has underwhelmed in its first year. Cena made it sound like his mission is to grow WWE's business, and he views being part of respected, mainstream movies as a chance to expose WWE's brand to non-fans or lapsed fans.

“I’m as involved as I can be without having to live in Stamford, Conn. I don’t want to be a guy who just punches the clock. I’m much more interested in how we grow the business," Cena said.

“We put on a show every day for people who pay to go see it. If you know your consumer you can give them what they want. If I understand the system, I can be a better performer.”

Caldwell's Analysis: It might sound good that Cena wants to expose more people to WWE by appearing in mainstream movies, but that philosophy has an unproven track record. "Total Divas" has seemingly developed its own audience (although TV viewership is slumping in the current season), but Raw and Smackdown ratings have not shown improvement. Meaning, a certain audience will watch WWE stars in a separate environment, but they probably won't seek out Raw or Smackdown on USA Network and Syfy. Or, if they are checking out the core product, they are simply replacing fans who have dropped off, as indicated by the lack of TV ratings growth for the main TV shows. This comes down to WWE living vicariously through Cena wanting to be accepted in the mainstream, but WWE hurts their own cause on a weekly basis when the product includes terrible celebrity guest host segments, an adult midget on the roster presented like a child in an alligator costume, and fake military angles.

[ LINK: Full Report HERE at Variety.com ]

[Torch art credit Grant Gould (c) PWTorch.com]

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