Kofi Kingston has commented on his infamous Jamaican accent and recalled it was an article on the BBC that saw his mother ‘out’ him as not being from the Caribbean. 

Kofi made his WWE debut in 2008, but instead of being billed from Ghana where he was actually born, he was given a Jamaican character, complete with music, attire and a fake accent linked to the country. 

Speaking on Ryan Satin’s Out of Character podcast, Kingston revealed the gimmick wasn’t just for WWE TV and that Vince McMahon ordered him to carry the character both on and off screen, including during interviews for the company’s own in-house magazine. 

“It was an emotional rollercoaster. Initially when I came in, Vince was like ‘look, you’ve got to do everything in character, I want you to do every interview in character.’ At the time, we had WWE magazine and they would call me. I’d get a 203 number so I’d answer the phone like ‘Hello?’ ‘Yeah this is Scott Dorsey and I’m calling for Kofi, is Kofi there?’ I’m like ‘oh, yeah, he’s here, hold on.’ [Speaks in his Jamaican accent] ‘What’s going on, Kofi Kingston here, what’s up?’

“Then he’d ask me all the questions you know? It was a silly situation because you know that I’m not Jamaican and I know that you know that I’m not Jamaican, but Vince said that I have to put this accent on and now we’ve got to play this game and I’ve got to interview with you with this accent on.”

While Kingston pressed on with the character, the 40-year-old revealed it was only an article on the BBC, where his mother was interviewed about her son’s WWE career, that eventually put an end to Kofi’s Jamaican gimmick. 

15 minutes later my mom calls me and goes ‘oh Kof, some guy just called me and asked me about your career and asked if you’re Jamaican and I said no, he’s from Ghana but he’s just doing it for work…’ So now I’m like ‘Mom, kayfabe mom, kayfabe!’ It’s over. Two days later Leslie Goffe writes this article, you can go out and google it and it’s BBC. Come on man, you know this is World Wrestling Entertainment, you know there are people out here that play characters on there. The Undertaker is not a walking zombie, he’s not actually dead, he’s alive and he has kids.

The article by journalist Leslie Goffe highlighted suggestions that Kingston was so desperate to become a WWE Superstar that he was willing to ‘deny who he is’ and he believed that it would be the end of his days portraying a Jamaican. However, he revealed that at first Vince was happy to continue with the character. 

“So then the article comes out, talking about ‘Kofi is ashamed of his culture and heritage,’ and I was like oh my god, it’s over bro. I survived these vignettes, this terrible accent, all for this and now it’s over. I go to New Orleans, go into the office with Vince and say ‘Vince we’ve got to talk man. It’s over bro, they know, the cats out of the bag.’ He goes ‘Well, you might think that everybody knows but it’s just a small section of people that know and you’re still going to go out there and do that accent.’

“I’m like no but then six months later he calls me back into his office and says ‘yeah, I think we’re going to have you drop the accent today.’”

The accent and gimmick was eventually ditched and Kofi transitioned into an on-screen persona closer to his own, and was finally billed from Ghana where he was legitimately born. He’d go on to win an incredible twenty-two championships in WWE, including his famous WWE Championship victory at WrestleMania 35 in 2019. 

Thanks to Wrestling Inc. for the above transcription.