Dwayne ‘The Rock’ Johnson reveals his ‘I made it’ moment in the industry

Dwayne “The Rock” Johnson remembers clear as day the first time he knew he had made it in the industry.

Speaking to People Magazine for its 50th anniversary issue, the professional wrestler-turned-actor, 51, revealed that after years of flying under the radar as a wrestler, his first wrestling match in Madison Square Garden was a pivotal moment in his career.

“When I was wrestling, I didn’t start in the big bright lights of WWE. I wrestled down in Tennessee, a company called the USWA,” he said, admitting that he “made his bones… wrestling for forty bucks a match, in barns, flea markets, etc.”

But he finally got his big break when he was recruited for a WWE match in Madison Square Garden.

“I was a rookie. They pulled me aside about an hour before I was going out, and said, ‘Hey kid, you’re going to win tonight. Sink or swim, it’s the Garden, it’s New York, and if you could pull this off, we feel like you have a shot, and we have a shot,’” he recalled.

By the end of the match, the Jumanji star fondly looked back on the time he heard “22,000 people all chanting [his] name” for the first time.

“I just knew that my mom and dad, who are watching at home in Tampa, were bawling. It was just a really special moment,” he said.