A Whole Other Animal

Spectre Star Dave Bautista has Triumphed in Sports Entertainment and Mixed Martial Arts. Now he wants to Pin Hollywood Typecasting to the Mat.

- Sean Hyson

AT 6'4" AND 265 POUNDS, DAVE BAUTISTA seems like an unlikely choice to play Hamlet. The mural of tattoos down his barn-door-size back and the road map of veins running through his shoulders and arms suggest a dude who can bench press more than four plates, win six world titles in WWE, and beat a man into submission inside a mixed martial arts cage. Bautista, of course, has done all the above. But if you think the man known to sports-entertainment fans as “the Animal” can’t put a beating on somebody and then entertain you with a sonnet, you’re selling Bautista short.

Don’t do that again.

The villain of last winter’s James Bond film, Spectre, now has movie stardom in his sights and a stage production of Shakespeare on his bucket list.

An Unlikely Thespian

It’s especially funny to think of Bautista’s long-term ambition in contrast to his humble upbringing, which was as far from puffy shirts, frilly necklines, and Elizabethan English as one could get. Raised in a tough section of Washington, D.C., Bautista sought protection through weight training. He bulked up to 370 pounds and worked as a bouncer until, at age 30, he decided to take a shot at sports entertainment. Despite a successful run in WWE, Bautista was unhappy with the direction the business was headed (away from the “attitude era” to a more family-friendly product), and in 2010 he left to pursue acting.

“I did some work on a film for a friend,” he says, “and I realized what a horrible actor I was.” The movie, Wrong Side of Town, was directed by one of Bautista’s buddies, who thought he had the look to pull off the character of a Navy SEAL badass. “I was so embarrassed, but it made me want to do it again and do it better.”