It’s a family affair for Dwayne The Rock Johnson that’s been decades in the making. According to Sports Illustrated, the pro wrestler turned Hollywood star has been connected by DNA testing to five other half siblings that never knew about each other, their father, or their connection to The Rock.
While most of us have become familiar with the WWE legend, now 50, from his wrestling career that began in the early 2000’s, The Rock’s family legacy within the sport did not begin with him. In fact, it dates back two generations before him beginning with his grandfather Peter Maivia, the Somoan pro wrestler that first hit the ring in the 1960’s. Johnson’s father, originally named Wayde Bowles, (also a professional wrestler) married Maivia’s daughter Ata Maivia, giving birth to Dwayne in 1972.
Bowles who began performing under the stage name Rocky Johnson toured America for 15 years, later being named by wrestling journalist Dave Meltzer as “the best wrestler of the past 40 years when it comes to doing a dropkick series” and “one of the business’s top athletes of the ’70s, with a career record that is far more impressive than most realize.”
“Rocky” later began developing his son Dwayne, who showed interest in the profession early on, keeping him a very busy man well past his retirement in 1991. But coaching the young “Rock” wasn’t all he was busy doing throughout the years.
As Sports Illustrated broke the news, the public was introduced to Lisa Purves, a daughter of Rocky Johnson. She told the publication that she had reached out to her father on a number of occasions, once when she was just 18, and again before she turned 30. She was hung up on both times.
“I was really embarrassed that my father didn’t want me,” she told SI.
As she struggled throughout her youth and young adulthood to make sense of it all, at 53, she is now taking healing into her own hands, and opening up a path of reconciliation for her other half siblings as well. Purves is working on a film that documents the small reunion shared between the six of them at an Airbnb in Toronto in 2018. Just Call Me Lisa, the working title of the film, is still in production.
Featured are Lisa, her half sister Paula born in 1964, just a year and a half after the birth of another sister Wanda, Wanda’s full brother Curtis, as well as sons Trevor Edwards, Adrian Bowles, and Aaron Fowler who were connected to Rocky through DNA at various times.
Paula called the reunion “the greatest moment of my life,” while sister Lisa described it as “a healing weekend.”
When asked about their connection to their mega star brother, The Rock, the siblings emphasized that it wasn’t just about that.
“Dwayne doesn’t owe us anything,” said Lisa.”We just want to be recognized,” said Paula. “We sat on the back burner forever. [Rocky] was our dad just as well as Dwayne’s.”
Unfortunately, the reunion would take place without their father to guide them through it, as Rocky Johnson passed in early 2020.