I was shocked to find out that the real Emperor Commodus did indeed fight in the arena as a gladiator.
But his opponents only had wooden swords. Also, Commodus liked to portray himself as Hercules, dressing in lion skins and taking bow in hand, shooting arrows at the real gladiators from his emperor’s perch in the Colleseum. He “ruled” for 13 years before his sex-slave (no joke) Narcissus either drowned or strangled him in his imperial bathroom.