Ken Anderson (@mrkenanderson) is an actor and professional wrestler known for his time in WWE when he went by “Mr. Kennedy” and in TNA Impact Wrestling where he was a 2-time TNA World Heavyweight Champion. He talks about his wrestling school called The Academy School of Pro Wrestling, how Paul Heyman helped to change the course of his career, how he came up with the name “Kennedy”, his relationship with Vince McMahon, what winning the Money in the Bank ladder match at WrestleMania 23 meant to him, the regrets he has about his time in WWE, working for TNA and his epic cage match with Kurt Angle, training Gable Steveson and much more!

On training prospective wrestlers:

“I will say this, I do not regret being trained by some of the guys that went to the dance. Because the guys that trained me were awesome, even though they never quite made it to the scene. They knew the inner workings, but they also taught me that a lot of the mistakes that I had to make were my own. I had to wrestle on the independents for 6 years by the time I was hired by WWE, and that was my goal from day 1. I never said that to anybody, but internally I was like I want to go to WWE. When I started sending tapes and getting responses from Kevin Kelly, and then I got booked as an extra, then I was like ok, I can do this. All I have to do is get better every time and show improvement, and then I will get hired. But yeah, I do think that the reason why I opened my school in the first place is that I wanted to cut out a lot of the missteps that people have to make. I had to stumble and bumble my way about, and I am able to cut a lot of those corners for people.”

On the backstage environment in WWE:

“When I was backstage at WWE or TNA, they need silence when those backstage interviews [take place]. A lot of times they are recorded during the day. There have been times where it seems like we record 50 times, and we would then get busted by somebody [saying]’ Cut! Cut! Gotta do it again!’ So I am kind of used to it.”

On John Cena’s work ethic:

“There was a story when I first started that John Cena had been home one day out of 365 days. He had been on the road for [that long] because he would go from, you know, wrestling house shows, pay-per-views, and then he’d have appearances and things like that that he would have to do, and this was before he was doing movies. So that’s just kind of, that’s the way it goes. And I always looked at it, they would come to me and say, ‘Hey, we’ve got this appearance for you out in California. On your day off. Do you want to do it?’ And you know, it’d be sometimes, like unpaid, or we would do interviews with people when they would be unpaid. And some people would complain about that. I always looked at it as this free advertising for my business, you know. So I love doing it, I love doing it. And yeah, it was just kind of crazy.”

On being one of the first Paul Heyman guys:

I don’t say this with great glee. But I will say that the best thing that ever happened to me in my career was Jim Cornette slapping, paint brushing Santino Marella backstage at OVW. Because, he did that and he got fired, and they brought Paul Heyman in. And I had done some stuff with Paul, he would come down every couple of months and he would do a promo day. And we would have to come up with an opponent in a two minute promo, we would go in and sit in a room with Paul and a camera, cut the promo, then he would give you some feedback and a few notes, and then you go home and fine tune it and come back the next day and cut it again. And I remember, I would come back and I would sit down, and he was always kind of like, not standoffish, but just professional, you know. And then I would come back on the second day, I would cut the promo, he would go ‘I love it! Great! I would say ‘Any notes or anything?’ [Heyman responded] ‘Nope, I love it. Thank you.’ And I was like, this guy hates me, okay, that’s the worst. Sometimes when you’re trying to learn and you’re trying to get to that next level, that’s the worst thing is not hearing anything at all, not hearing any feedback, there’s got to be something that I can do better.  And then when that happened, and Paul Heyman came in the first day to do TV at OVW. He pulled me into the office, and he said, ‘You’re the next guy out of here.’ He literally said those words. He said, ‘You’re the next guy out of here.’ He said ‘I’ve been a fan of yours since I saw you when you were an extra.’ Because I had been an extra one time and all the extras were in the ring. Like there had to be 10 of us, and we were just kind of tagging in and tagging out and you get in there and wrestle. And guys were getting in there and they would just chain wrestling. I remember Daivari, he had been hired at that time already and he pulled me aside. He was like ‘That’s not what they’re looking for. They don’t care if you can wrestle. They don’t want to see moves. They want to see character.’ And so when I got in there I made sure to show some character and stuff. And Jim Ross and Paul Heyman were sitting ringside. They were the only two people there because like everybody else was in a staff meeting or something. And I tagged out and Paul said ‘Come to me for a second.’ And I walked over to him, he was like ‘Who trained you?’ And I was like ‘I got trained by two guys in Green Bay. And then I got polished up and fine tuned by Brad Rheingans.’ And his eyes lit up because Brad Rheingans trained Brock Lesnar. And he was like, he asked me a couple of questions. And from that point on, it was like, I think at the end of the day, he gave me his number. And he told me like, call my number next week, let’s talk and I was like, here we go.”

On Vince McMahon giving Mr. Kennedy a surprise last minute TV debut:

“But I would call every week, he would never return my phone call. So you know, fastforward, we’re in that office, and he says, ‘You’re the next guy out of here. I’ve been a fan of yours since that day. And I’ve loved your promo work and stuff. And I’m going to do so much stuff with you on TV that they’re going to have to take notice. And you’ll get pulled up in that first night.’ OVW was in one hour programme, and I think I had 35 to 40 minutes on that first one hour programme that Paul Heyman did. And five weeks later, I got a call from Tommy Dreamer. He said, ‘Hey, they want you to come up. And they want to see you and they want you to do your gimmick.’ Because I had just started doing the, you know, the announcer thing, announcing my name and saying my last name twice, and then I went up. And this was crazy, because I was just supposed to do a dark match. It was supposed to be a dark match against Funaki, who was gonna win the match, and I was in Gorilla position. I’m warming up doing push ups, going over everything in my head. And Vince walks by and Vince would never come up and see the dark matches and stuff. He would sit down literally as the pyro was going off for SmackDown or Raw or whatever. And he came up and he nodded at me. And then, like two minutes later, Dave Lagonda came walking around the corner and he said, ‘Hey, there’s been a change.’ And I immediately in my head, I was like, [sighs] I guess they’re pulling my match. Okay, no big deal. And he said ‘We have to come up with a finish for you because you’re going over, winning the match. And this is no longer going to be a dark match. This is going to be a televised match, welcome aboard.’ And he stuck out his hand and I was like, really? He’s like, Yeah. Earlier in the day, I had gone in and done a promo, Brooklyn Brawler told me to. And he’s like, Hey, come here and cut a promo. And I went in I just had something in my back pocket because I had cut so many in six years and I hit that promo. And I remember he said ‘I’m going to tell Vince that was awesome.’ And, and he did. So it was like all these things sort of merged all together. And, you know, I was very fortunate to be in the right place at the right time.”

On wrestling being more about the character than the moves:

“I just saw an interview. I think it was Vince McMahon on the Pat McAfee show, where he said, like, ‘I don’t care about wrestling moves.’ And I keep trying to like, drill this into my students. And they’re like  ‘Hey, look at this new move that I came up with.’ Like, I don’t want to be, I don’t want to be a jerk, but like, I’m kinda like, that’s cool, but you know, that doesn’t matter. It really doesn’t matter. In the end, if you can do 75 cool moves, but you can’t talk to a crowd or, you know, you can’t tell a story with your actions. And there’s a guy who can literally do like a clothesline, a hip toss and a body slam, and that’s it, but he’s got a great character, the WWE, you know, they have to hire somebody, they’re gonna hire the person that can do that for them.”

On winning Money in the Bank:

“I remember thinking like, that was what I wanted to do when I grabbed it. And I start climbing the ladder and you can see I look up and I’m like, God, this isn’t going to be a good shot. So I shifted a little ladder over directly underneath that briefcase. Yeah, definitely. You know, the crazy thing about that was I remember walking through the curtain and looking out and expecting to see this like, you know, it’s 83,000 people that’s the most people had ever wrestled in front of and it didn’t look like it. It looked just looked like a really jam packed, you know, 15,000 seat to 20,000 seat arena. [Chris – So just like a Raw or SmackDown] Yeah, and so then I went, I did my match and I showered and I went up to the boxes, because they had a luxury box up there for the family members. And that’s when I got over to the window and I looked out and I saw this giant sea of people and this little tiny ring in the centre. And then it dawned on me what I had just done. It was kind of crazy.”

On possibly being given the name A-Hole

“So Vince asked me ‘Do you have any catchphrases?’ and I said ‘ Yeah, nice guys finish last thing good thing him an asshole.’ And he was like, We they had just gone PG. It was like, ‘No, I don’t, we can’t do that.’ And then Johnny was getting into it, it was like Johnny, Stephanie, Kevin Dunn, Vince, I think that’s who was all in that room. And Johnny goes, ‘Hey, how about what if your name was like Adam Hole? And then you could say, “Nice guys finish last. Thank God I’m an A Hole.” And it would be…’ And I remember Vince, just, there was a silence in the room. And Vince just looked up at me and he goes, ‘What do you think of that?’ And I said ‘I like it. I think it’s funny. But I feel like that would be sort of a flash in the pan, somebody that would be here for like two or three months and then be done. It sounds very gimmicky. And I’ve been here for a long time.’ And Vince looks at me like, almost as though we’re a test.”

On the origin of the Mr. Kennedy name:

“Like, I feel like he did [get the connection]. Because it was Paul that suggested it in the first place. Because I called Paul and I said ‘Hey, they want me to change my name? What do you think?’ And he was like ‘You know, you have to pick something that is near and dear to his heart.’ And he was like ‘His dog’s name is Ruckus, or Rumpus.’ I think he had two dogs at a time. ‘But what about Kenny Rumpus? Kenny Ruckus?’ I’m like no. And then I had, I was Kamikaze Ken when I started in the indies, and I had these like backwards K’s. And I wanted to sort of like keep that as my logo. And I was like something with a K and he was like ‘Kennedy is his middle name.’ And then I remember when we were in that room, and I said that they just pause for a minute it was [Vince saying] ‘Oh, I don’t think there’s ever been a Kennedy. Do you like it?’ And I was like ‘I liked Ken Anderson to be honest with you, but you call me Mr. Dickhead if you want to. It’s your company.’ And he just kind of smirked and then he looked at Kevin Dunn, and he goes, ‘Make sure he’s got Kennedy on his TitanTron tonight.’ That was, that was the second week. That was the week that I did do it on SmackDown. So the first two weeks that I was there on TV I was Anderson.”

On losing the Money in the Bank briefcase:

Yeah, the idea was that I would cash it in next year’s Wrestlemania. That was the plan, I announced it right away I believe, and that was the plan. And then a few months later, I feel like I only had it a month and a half, two months maybe, and they came to me. I was riding with Matt Hardy. We left the building early, which was unlike us, we usually stayed until the very end, for whatever reason that day, we left early. And I got a call from Michael Hayes. And he said ‘Where are you guys? I need you to come back. Vince needs to talk to you in his office. So I like scurried back to the building and I was walking into his office. And by the time we got back there, everybody had pretty much filed out, so it was an empty building. And I remember Batista coming out of Vince’s office, and we passed each other in the hall. And he just came up to me and he gave me a big hug. And he was like ‘You deserve it bro.’ And I you know, I played stupid, I was like, what do you mean? What do you mean? He was like just, you know, go in there, I want them to tell you. So I went in, it was Vince and Stephanie. And they said, Look, we had planned on having Taker as the champion for like, a really long time. Unfortunately, he’s injured and tore his biceps, I believe, and he needs to have surgery. So we’re going to next week, and he laid out the scenario, and he’s like, you’re gonna cash in your briefcase, we’re gonna have a new champion. And I remember him telling me that they were high on Batista at the time, that was their guy. And that, if Batista [was champion] you know, sometimes guys are better when they’re chasing the title. When they have it, they kind of like their ratings kind of dip. And they felt like the Batista needed to chase for a while and they said, you know ‘When we feel the time is right, we’re going to put it on Batista. But we don’t know how long that could be. It could be like a month or five months or six months, whatever.’ And I remember I just said, like, ‘Look, I appreciate you guys saying that. But this is business and I’ll do what’s necessary.’ And then the very next time I wrestled, I got clotheslined, and I hit the mat, and I felt something popping in my triceps. I rolled out to the floor, and I remember Finlay came over, he looked at me, he goes, ‘It doesn’t look good. And by the time I got downstairs it was already, my arm was swollen up. I couldn’t bend it. It was starting to change colours already, which is really weird because bruising normally takes like a week, like those deep bruises. And then I went to [hospital] I remember Hornswoggle drove me to the emergency room in Erie, Pennsylvania. I got an MRI. And then the next day Stephanie called me in my hotel room and she’s like, ‘Ken you tore your triceps off the bone. We’re gonna have to, we still need to get that title off of Taker though. So we’re sending this jet to pick you up. We’re gonna take you to Penn State, Edge is going to challenge you for the briefcase, and then he’s gonna go on and do what you’re supposed to do tomorrow night. Okay, and I remember thinking at the time like I got a year to cash this thing in isn’t there some other way that you can get it off him? But I didn’t say it. I sort of regret not saying it now. But. And then I went in, Edge called me a chicken. I said, ‘Nobody calls me chicken.’ And gave up the briefcase. The next day, I flew to Birmingham, Alabama, I’m sitting on Doc Andrews table, and he’s feeling my triceps and he was like, ‘That’s not a tear.’ And I was like ‘Excuse me?’ And he goes, ‘I don’t I don’t feel a tear.’ And there’s not a tear there, I’m pretty sure. So we did another MRI and sure enough, it was just a bruise. It was like a large bunch of blood vessels burst inside my triceps and he said you’ll be out for four or five weeks. And that was kind of a crazy.”

On if winning the TNA World Title feels like being on the top of the mountain:

“No, no, I think, you know, and that’s nothing against TNA, but like they just were not the same. It wasn’t the same and, but it’s okay. Like, I’m not, you know, not crying in my oatmeal about it, like, it is what it is, we gotta move on. But yeah, I do have some regrets for sure.”

On WWE reaching out as Ken Anderson was making a name for himself in TNA:

“I had heard from somebody in the office that Vince had said, I think he regretted pulling the trigger so quickly on firing me. And I probably should have, like, reached out at the time, but I had such a huge chip on my shoulder. I had a chip on my shoulder for years from, you know, the way that I left WWE and and you know, today I will say honestly, like, that was all my fault. Like I am, I am responsible, nobody did anything to me, I did it to myself. So you know, it was just the straw that broke the camel’s back there at the end. But  I heard that and then at some point, I cut a promo and I remember Randy Orton texting me and saying, like that was an awesome promo. But I believe he was being serious. I don’t think it was him being sarcastic.”

On being Eddie Guerrero’s last ever opponent:

“I remember him telling me to calm down in the beginning, there was some, we did some chain wrestling. I remember I was scrambling to get to the ropes quickly to break. And I remember him telling me like, just calm down, like, you don’t have to go so quickly there. And then I remember, we were talking through the match, I’m supposed to hit him with the chair at the end, and I remember he’s like ‘Bring it. Hit me with it.’ And I was like, ‘Okay, I’m gonna hit you with it.’ And then I hit him with it. And we got backstage and he was like ‘Maybe a little too much.’ But then we went out to dinner that night, I was riding, I was actually writing with him and Benoit at the time, and we went to a steakhouse. And I remember they were talking because the next week after, it was like a super show in Minneapolis. It was Raw and SmackDown, I’m not sure if ECW was around at the time yet. But it was going to be a Raw SmackDown Super Show and then we were heading to the airport, we were going to fly out and doing my first international tour. They were like, you know, you’re gonna get [pranked] they’re gonna mess with you. They’re gonna shave your eyebrows while you’re sleeping. You know, stuff like that, get me all riled up. And then I remember, I pulled into the arena. And the guy that parks the cars that helps park all the vehicles told me, he’s like Eddie died. And I walked into the building. And it was just like this crazy, sick feeling that everybody had all day. Everybody was super sombre and sad It was, it was a crazy, crazy day.”

On one of his biggest regrets:

“And one of my biggest regrets was WrestleMania 23. After I won that Money in the Bank briefcase, Michael Hayes came up to me, he goes, ‘They want you to cut a promo afterwards. And they want it to be an Austin 3:16 moment.’ And I was like, I’m gonna say it. And I’m gonna hit the line. ‘Nice guys. Thank God I am an asshole.’ And l walk off. And I remember, right, I better just ask [permission], And so I asked permission. And of course, at the time, there was no swearing, no cursing, but it was WrestleMania, I thought I could get away with it. And I would have gotten away with it too. But I asked permission and they said no. And so you know it’s the worst thing like if you ask for permission, but they said no, you can’t do it.”

On what he is grateful for:

“A partner that I have who supports me in everything I do, 2 awesome kids and I have had these experiences and can pass them on to other people.”

Featured image: Wikipedia

The quality of your life is the quality of the questions that you ask. I’m so pumped to be able to connect with you one-on-one for this solo episode. I feel so incredibly fortunate to be able to spend the last 17 years working as a TV Host and Entertainment Reporter and talking to some of the biggest stars in the world like The Rock, Oprah Winfrey, John Cena, Leonardo Di Caprio, Julia Roberts and so many others. I learned that if you ask better questions, you get better answers. And that doesn’t just apply to the questions that you ask of others; it is most important for the questions that you ask of yourself!

Why you should ask better questions:

Tony Robbins says that the quality of your life is the quality of the questions that you ask. So for the last 17 years, I have been so fortunate to work as a TV host and an entertainment reporter. I have shared conversations with people like The Rock, Tom Cruise, Oprah Winfrey, Adam Sandler, Julia Roberts, Ryan Reynolds, and so many others! I have learned quickly that if you ask better questions, you get better answers.

Where it all began:

I have always been a naturally curious person. Maybe you can relate to this. If you can’t relate personally then you definitely know somebody who is like this. I was that annoying kid who was like why/ Why is that? Why why why? Until you’re parents are like ‘Just because! OK!’ I got obsessed also with the word how, how do things work? I was the kid who would take their pen apart during class and I would be like ‘Oh there is a spring in here. If I stretch the spring, my pen now clicks faster.’ I’m sure you can relate to this, I like to call it conscious curiosity. It is this general wonder of who, what, where, when, why and how? That curiosity that I had as a kid, it really grew and it lead me to what I am doing now here on TV, YouTube and on the podcast. I have told this story several other times and I am sure you have heard it, but basically I talked my way into getting my first TV shop. I kind of lied my way into it. Basically I was like ‘Hey I’m going to be in town next Thursday, if you have some time can I come and maybe talk to you about the job?’ It worked, and here I am now because it worked. 

Do you enjoy your job:

It’s amazing to me, because as kids we are always asked the same question, and you know the question, ‘What do you want to be when you grow up?’ And there is this general attitude of we encourage kids to dream as big as possible. Then this strange thing seems to happen. When we “Grow up” because none of us have really grown up and figured this out, but the question becomes ‘So what do you do?’ It shifts from what do you want to be to what do you do? And you can define by this job that you have, and for so many people it is not a job that you enjoy doing. 

What are you waiting for:

I want to ask you a different question, ‘When did your journey begin?’ It’s not the day that you were born, but when did you get on that path that you are on now, and is it really your path that you are on? If it is not the path you want to be on, what are you doing to really get back to the things that juice you and really fulfill you every single day. It’s really important to not just ask great questions of other people, but so important to start with yourself. A big question that you should be asking yourself right now is what are you waiting for? There is no such thing as the perfect time. For me, I realized in my senior year at college at 21 years old that after graduation, we were going to have to work for the rest of our lives. I was having the best time of my life in college, I was living with my 4 best friends and we would decide whether we would sleep in or go to class or drink beer. I asked myself in this moment, I asked myself if I would be happy waking up and going to a job I don’t enjoy for the next 40 or 50 years. Then more importantly, if I settle for a job now that has decent pay and benefits, am I going to be happy in 40 or 50 years knowing that I could have tried harder and could have pushed more in my 20s and 30s. If somebody out there is doing what you want to do, I know it makes some people jealous, but it makes me pumped up! It makes me pumped up knowing that the path has been carved by that person and I can reverse engineer my way back from there. 

A lesson from Oprah Winfrey:

I do think that social media is the worst for this. It shows the highlight reels of people’s lives and so rarely shows the bumps in the road. So if the quality of your life is the quality of the questions that you ask, what are the questions that you are asking of yourself? I heard a great story that Oprah sets an intention for every interview. In the green room beforehand, she would ask the person ‘What is the intention for this interview? What do you want people to feel about you once this interview is done?’ And now she is not doing as many interviews, she sets an intention for every meeting that she is in. At the start of every interview she asks ‘What is our intention? What do we want to achieve when it is done?’ From that I take the idea that it is so important to have a vision and a clarity and an intention for your life. 

What is your intention:

What if you started asking those questions of yourself? What is my intention for today? What is my intention for this week, this month or this year? What is my intention for this event I am walking into, this interview that I am doing, this meeting I am having? The reason why I ask people at the end of every interview what they are grateful for is 1) I am genuinely interested to hear what they are grateful for, but 2) I want people who are listening to go ‘Oh my gosh. That person who is so successful and has it all is grateful for things like their health and family. I can be grateful for those things too.’

Be grateful for what you do have:

I learned that it is impossible to be simultaneously angry and grateful. If you are angry, maybe focus on the things that you do have, instead of the things that you don’t have. And start asking better questions, of others of course, but mostly of yourself.

Harrison Rogers (@harrisonjrogers) is the CEO and Founder of Freedom Fight Night. He joins Chris Van Vliet to talk about the next event with Team Tito Ortiz vs. Team Ryan Bader on July 15 in Mesa, AZ. He also talks about why he started Freedom Fight Night, his love of MMA, the biggest lessons he has learned as an entrepreneur and much more!

On Freedom Fight Night:

“We are having our first Freedom Fight Night in Arizona. We had our first one in Miami and it was a blast. Some of my friends and family were frustrated because they were like ‘Why did you do it across the country?’ So we are bringing it home:

On being a fight promoter:

“It evolved and it is still evolving. It started out as trying to figure out how to be in politics without being some fundraiser guy. Being in the private sector, one of my passions is MMA. I am not a fighter but a lot of our audience in the MMA world want to be involved in politics but they don’t know where to begin. It seems like MMA is the only sport that has not moved into the woke movement. So let’s see if we can evolve this and move it into other sports and have a good time promoting fights.”  

On the big names at Freedom Fight Night One:

“Yeah it was surreal. Watching these big names I saw growing up like Frank Mir, Tito Ortiz, Rampage Jackson, Evander Holyfeld came too. How did this happen?”

Where it all began for Harrison Rogers:

“I grew up sucking at formal education, I dropped out of high school in my junior year to start my first business cleaning carpets. Over the summer of my junior year, it got that busy that I could either be in the formal high school class and not succeed, or I can pursue this and make some money. So I grew the business enough so that I was busy and the rest is history.”

On what was next:

“I sold my carpet cleaning business in 2007, right before the market crashed, to go on a missionary mission. The problem is I parlayed the proceeds into real estate. I came back from the mission and had a heart attack at 19, it was a birth defect. I didn’t have any money because I had no business, so I had to start from scratch.”

On what scratch was:

“Well I got married, I met my wife shortly after I got back. Then I took out as many student loans as possible and enrolled in the cheapest online college that we could find, because then you can max out the student loans. We did that, and after paying for the tuition costs, we had about $6,000, and I traded that in currency. I got really good at figuring out how political announcements would affect currency, so how it would affect the dollar against the euro. So I did a lot with the euro and dollar, the euro was tanking because of the situation with Spain. I loved speculating with the markets, so I said if I have extra time, I am going to help my sister and mom, my sister has extreme autism. So I got a contract with Arizona to provide these services, being able to pay providers a good wage, you get the best of the best.”  

On dream partners for Freedom Fight Night:

“Well Frank Mir has been an incredible partner. Not only does he know so much of the MMA world, he is our host and commentator. So many people that don’t know MMA listen to him and he is educating them on the moves. But right now, I would love to have a Joe Rogan or an Elon Musk supporting this.”

On his favorite MMA fight:

“Just because of what it did for the sport, I think the Forrest Griffin vs. Stephan Bonnar fight. I wish I could say something before then but I am not an OG.”

On future Freedom Fight Night Plans:

“I want to say that nothing is set in stone, but in October on Freedom Fight Night 3, Tito Ortiz wants to do his final fight. It’s weird growing up with all these legends, and now to have them on a card that I am promoting, it’s fun.”

On what he is grateful for:

“My family, a loving creator and the opportunity I have right now.”

Featured image: PR Newswire

Peter Avalon (@pavalon) is a professional wrestler known for his time in AEW, TNA and Championship Wrestling From Hollywood. He sits down with Chris Van Vliet at his house in Burbank, CA to talk about his current status with AEW, how Tony Khan came up with his character “The Librarian”, working his first match for NJPW Strong, why he feels wrestling is like The Muppets Show, how he started training actor David Arquette to be a wrestler and much more!

On Peter Avalon doing acting:

“I’m trying to do more and more. I just got myself a little commercial agent and I am working on getting myself some more agents. I just did a film and a music video with Jacob Sartorius. He is a very talented young man and he is big on Tik Tok, millions of followers. I am just trying to stay busy while also still wrestling. I am still with AEW, [also] booking, writing and appearing on Championship Wrestling, which we do every month at the Irvine Improv. Then I am doing GCW with my man Ray Rosa, Prestige Wrestling, we have Epic Pro Wrestling coming up. There is a lot of stuff, I am very active, very busy and a lot of fun.”

On still being in AEW:

“You can see me and [Ryan] Nemeth and the rest of the wingmen, Cezar and JD, we are usually main-eventing Dark. Weird how it works out where people wonder where we are at, we are not on the flyers or any of the advertising. Hell, it’s hard, they don’t even post any of our pictures on Green Fly. But it’s funny that we will main event most episodes of Dark and we are now 0 and 672 to The Dark Order and to The Best Friends. We are doing really well against both teams.”

On the fans’ reaction when Peter Avalon said he was taking bookings:

“It’s weird in wrestling when people in wrestling, you know, whatever. [They] Start to think of ideas and [makes confused face. Chris mentions it is the fans who think that]. Yeah, that’s what I mean. But it means that I am still there, I am doing more things and there is more to life than Dynamite and Rampage. I’ve been in Dynamite since day one, and they are doing their thing so I am going to do my thing.”

On multiple stars in AEW taking other bookings:

“It’s beautiful for Tony to let us do that and expand our horizons while still being able to work at AEW. It’s great, shoutout to Tony for that.”

On Peter Avalon’s initial name:

“I wanted to be Prince Peter Avalon. I wanted to write myself as a Spaniard prince and put a little italic over one of them. It was a little idea I had for Hollywood that I never ran with.”

On possibly teaming with Aaron Stevens in Championship Wrestling from Hollywood:

“Funny you should say that. He was writing the show before I took over. So that’s fun. We are both handsome and stunning.”

On The Librarian gimmick:

“That is all Tony, it’s Tony Khan’s idea. I had Cody when he was there and it was when AEW was still an idea that people were talking about. I had a DM from him after working at Championship Wrestling. He DM’d me saying ‘Hey. Hold whatever date in May.’ It ended up being the first Double or Nothing. May 25th, hold that date. So I said OK. So at a bar wrestling show at The Bootleg we are downstairs and I think The Bucks came, Chris Daniels maybe, Scorpio Sky was booked. And they all just started telling me this idea about The Librarian, and it was Tony’s idea. After then explaining it to me and after Tony explained the idea, we thought that the only person that could get this over and play this well is Peter Avalon. I said oh thank you. So they explained the idea and they explained this and they filmed a bit for BTE and then it was kind of off to the races. They would still kind of describe what the character was going to be as time went on. So the idea that Tony wanted was that he wanted a librarian, it was a character that got heat by saying shush to everyone, I work at the library. And that was pretty much the gist of the idea. The Bucks wanted to do a take on it where I am Peter Avalon and I am going to take this dumb part because I want my foot in the company by any means necessary. So we are kind of acknowledging that this gimmick is dumb but I am going to do it because I want the job. We then kind of played it like that on BTE. Ultimately I just kind of became a librarian and started to believe it. Then the team with Brandon happened and then the split happened.”

On Leva Bates being The Librarian as well:

“That was also just kind of done on the fly. I was under the idea that I was going to be the only librarian. I was under the idea that I was going to be The Librarian on BTE, and then they did this thing where there was going to be a contest where people could send in promos to become The Librarian. They kind of told me that it was going to happen and that they had an idea for 2 librarians. I am like hey whatever, I’m down for whatever. I am professional Peter Avalon and I can make anything work. Especially anything silly. So whatever, these promos happen and Leva’s naturally gains traction, she is good at what she does, she is a natural entertainer and she is good. So now she wins the contest and we are partnered together and here we are today. It was kind of written as we went on, and it was a lot of my own brainchild of trying to think of what to say. Tony wanted it to be very Lanny Poffo, but I didn’t just want to be a direct Lanny Poffo. Maybe I won’t do poetry, let me dive in and actually see what a librarian actually does. I know he is not someone who just reads books, a librarian just doesn’t read books, he is Google before Google. You go and talk to him and you can find out information or he can point you in the right direction. So that’s what I will do, I will spit facts. So maybe I will find some sports facts and start reciting some facts. So that became my fame for a little bit as I come out and try to take the little jabs at the sports teams. I had Jenn Sterger there at the time, she was my clue in to anything that was sports related. She knew her stuff man. I would be like ‘OK, where are we at? What team?’ And she was hammering off like current stuff like ‘This guy is this, this guy is injured…’ I’m like sh*t I don’t know any of this stuff. I don’t give a sh*t I am not an NFL or an NBA guy. So she helped my big time with those promos.”

On the crowd loving to shush:

“They did, I still get shushed. My match with Sonny Kiss at Fight For the Fallen was the first time that I got to actually wrestle as The Librarian. I just remember, and again, everything was just done on the fly. Nothing has been hammered out, I am getting my reps in on air as The Librarian and what this character is. I have nothing written down. So this is kind of before I started doing the shush schtick before I started walking down to the ring. So now I have no idea what I am going to do as The Librarian, transitioning from Professional Peter at the Hollywood show, then being Producer Peter at my Arizona show, those are 2 separate characters. Then I was still doing the stripping PPRay act, which is a completely separate character. So now I have a fourth character that I have to develop and I don’t know what it is. So I come out to just silence. I have the mic, they wanted me to say something to get to Sonny’s entrance, and I am getting booed the entire way down. I am like hell yeah this is awesome, this feels good. They are booing the hell out of me and I didn’t have the music, they just had the Titantron that said ‘Quiet in the library.’ Me and Leva just paused at the top of the ramp and continued down. Boos, heavy boos, I’m like yes this is great, this is working. I get in the ring, look at the hard cam and give them one lone shhh. And they are then booing the hell out of me and I am like this is great, this feels so good. Me and Sonny have a nice little 5 minute match. I think it was a good pre-match, we didn’t overstay our welcome. But Sonny comes out with a little song and dance number, fun little match, Sonny wins, we go home. Everyone is awake and goes into the pay-per-view excited, which is the point of a pre-match. Then when I got to the back, Tony was ecstatic, he was so stoked. He was behind the desk going ‘Peter that was great! Peter Avalon Championship Wrestling from F’in Hollywood! My man, that was wonderful. Hell yeah, great job great job!’ He’s telling me how great I did and he is putting over Championship Wrestling, hey thanks for watching. He was so stoked that it went so well, and I was so stoked that it went so well. It just had a natural, people had the natural inclination to boo this. ‘Don’t tell me to be quiet.’ And they did [boo me] and it was great.”

On Chad Gable also shushing people:

“I got quite a few [texts]. I would get tagged on social media. I’m like what is this and then it’s like ohh. [Puts thumb up] Good for you Chad. [Chris mentions Peter Avalon did it first] That’s right, I’m the shush man.”

On who helped Peter Avalon get his foot in the door:

“It was a bunch of people. I am a one of a kind character in professional wrestling. I can play one of a kind characters. It is great that people can practise their characters for so long, but I can play it with nothing, just give it to me. Like The Librarian, there was nothing given to me and I made it completely unique, so I am a one of a kind character. So it was Cody, it was The Bucks, most of the EVPs sans Kenny, he was the only one I hadn’t met. I met The Bucks in 2007, I was training at a school in Anaheim. Charles Mercury was the trainer, he is an old PWG guy. Scorpio Sky was one of my trainers, he would come through. And since they were pals with all the guys in the area, The Bucks were still coming up from time to time. They came around to roll in the ring, we also had Chris Hero, Candice LeRae, a lot of people would come through. That was how I met the bucks, they would come through training once or twice and I rolled around with them. They were like ‘This kid is talented and he wants it.’ I got to meet them for the first time and saw them wrestle at AWS nearby, this is when they were Slick Nick Jackson and Instant Replay Matt Jackson, freshly called The Young Bucks not too long ago. This was before they started working PWG too. I was at their first PWG match and I was excited for them because of the training that I had with them. Hell yeah, my pals are wrestling at Guerilla. I want to say it was Scott Lost and Chris Bosh. I am happy that they thought of me, it is one thing to say that my pals got me in, but an idea came and they all clicked in unison, Peter Avalon, immediately Peter Avalon. Yeah I had that way in, but all of their brains went into one direction.”

On call The Gunn Club “Ass Boys” before Danhausen did:

“Yeah, like way before. Me and Shawn Spears wrestled against Austin and Billy, Colten wasn’t there yet. Me being The Librarian, I got to talk on the mic, I can’t remember what I said exactly. But it was something like ‘Billy. Billy Gunn and son. What does that make you? The Ass Boy?’ There was Ass Boy chants going on and everything, it was fun. It was on Dark and it is on my Twitter. It’s alright, my cheque will come.”

On dream matches:

“Oh there are so many. Christian Cage, Ethan Page, Brian Cage, DDP. I would have loved to have wrestled Brian Cage when he was the TV champ, but who wouldn’t want to?” 

On Peter Avalon’s time in TNA:

“I loved working with Ethan Carter, EC3, he is great. He was very helpful with me, he knew what the role was, I’m there to get my ass whooped. But he wanted me to come out of it really well and he knows I’m not supposed to come out of it well. This is all for him, but he wanted to make sure that I got as much mileage as I could out of it. I think because of that, I was able to get 6 months out of it in 2013 as Norv Fernum. Jeff Jarret was the producer of most of our stuff and was behind it. But when he left, they were not as gung ho and eventually we just stopped getting used.”

On possibly competing in a deathmatch:

“That goes through my mind a lot. I think it would have to be a lot of money behind it. Seeing Pretty Peter in a deathmatch, there would have to be a big cheque for me to do it.”

On training David Arquette:

“I was the head trainer at the United Wrestling Wrestle Center that is in Oxnard when the Championship Wrestling show was filmed out there every month. I was recommended to David and then I got a phone call. I think I had a private that day, so I didn’t answer the phone until after I was done. I checked my phone, got a voicemail and I thought it was a rib. So I called him back, set up a time and he came down to Oxnard. I think he came down 2 or 3 times, the first time I made his ass puke! It was hard and it was hot in my school, the rolls make you dizzy. He then bought a ring and set it up in his backyard, so I would go to his house and train every week in his backyard.”

On what Peter Avalon is grateful for:

“My current career, my future career prospects and my bunny.”

Image credits: Instagram

Tito Ortiz (@titoortiz) is a professional mixed martial artist and a UFC Hall Of Famer. He sits down with Chris Van Vliet at his house in Huntington Beach to talk about his legendary career and his rivalries with opponents like Ken Shamrock, Chuck Liddell and Guy Mezger, how he got started in UFC, the regrets he has about his relationship with UFC President Dana White, why he wants to have one more match at Freedom Fight Night, his WWE try-out, how he came up with his iconic gravedigger celebration taunt, how being a father has changed him and much more.

On celebrating his 25th anniversary in the UFC:

“I didn’t do anything too special. A few of my buddies, special force guys, we partied and did a bunch of shots. I don’t remember the end of the night but we had fun and all got home safe. It’s just one of those things where I am glad I have the fans I have. Even the ones that hate me as well as the ones that love me. The scariest ones are the ones that don’t talk about me at all.”

On right place, right time:

“We would still be sitting here. I had big dreams at a really young age. When I was 8 or 9, I had the dream of being on a red carpet, back then they didn’t have red carpets. This might have been God guiding me. But things didn’t come easy, the harder I worked, they did come. I just put my time into eat, sleep, train and compete. Before that I knew that there was something I was going to do, whether it was a professional wrestler or boxer. By accident, MMA came about. I fought on UFC 13 in 1997 and I fought for free, no other UFC fighter has ever fought for free, I just did it to see how good I could be. I was training with tank Abbot at the time and asked him to give me a fight. So I fought on May 30th 1997 and stopped the guy in 22 seconds. I visualise myself in the finals, and the guy who was in the finals got hurt, so I was the replacement. I was fighting Guy Metzger in the finals and got caught up in the guillotine, I didn’t know what that was at the time. I had to tap but I was hooked. As a kid growing up on the streets, I was always dying for the attention. I had no idea what I was getting into, but this was the making of Tito Ortiz.”

On going into the UFC:

“I was really nervous. My high school wrestling coach fought in the UFC and got elbowed in the head and knocked out, they had to do a skull reconstruction. It put the fear in me that you can get hurt but that put the fire in my heart. I was like you know what, I better train hard. I was training 3 times a day, 6 days a week and training hard for the fight. So when I did come about on May 30th, I had the mentality of being a shark and got to pace about, eat before you get eaten.”

 On Tito Ortiz’s first sport:

“The first sport was wrestling. My freshman year I walked in and asked where is the ring? Back in the day, I thought it was real and until I got into wrestling I didn’t know the difference. But fast forward 26 years and I end up going to the WWF training facility and worked there for 2 weeks. I got to see how hard it truly was. You know what, they say it is not real. The outcome is predetermined, but the stuff they go through, they are true athletes and I have respect for each and every one of them for what they have done. But I found my happy medium with MMA, boxing of Muhammad Ali and Hulk Hogan in WWF. I got to have that aspect in MMA. people call it cockiness and I call it confidence. I has the bleach blond hair and the flames on my shorts that people were attracted to.”

On being a personality:

“They didn’t really have that at the time, there was only a little bit of that with Tank. I had that championship mentality because of wrestling. You know, hard work, dedication, sacrifice and discipline. You will either be a victor or a victim and I worked super hard to be a victor and my kids see that. My kids have watched me evolve as a fighter and a businessman and as a father and a man in general. I am handing down these qualities to my kids, the sacrifice and the discipline I had in my career.”

On Tito Ortiz’s father figure:

“Oh wow. I had a couple of them I had a teacher Tom Wyneham, who helped me out in high school a lot. Prior to that there were some guys that I fished with in Newport Beach. But I never had one I just took little things from each of them. I had a stepdad during high school that always told me what not to do. But there was never a positive grab and a hug and a ‘I love you son.’ I never had that so I want my kids to have that. It is something that all men need. It is not easy to be a parent, but it is my choice.”

On not spoiling your kids when you can give them everything:

“Now see this is one of the things that people, and I get that the government have softened everyone up in the last 30 years. A lot of parents have done this with iPads, cell phones and videogames, which is their get away from me time. That sounds harsh, but I be a parent that is responsible for my kids and their future. So I want to make sure that their education is important and that they work hard. I don’t give them everything, but they can have everything. When they get straight A’s and do their chores, they can have what they want. Since 4 years old they have never had a cell phone or an iPad, I want them to be socially acceptable to other people.”

On the trash talking with Ken Shamrock getting personal:

“After the third fight we got a little closer to each other. A few years later we met up and now we are cool. That was the only trilogy in the UFC that I did that was honest. [Chris asks about Chuck Liddell] No that was all fabricated, he sold out.”

On speaking with Chuck Liddell now:

“I think the last time I saw him was in Vegas. It was a ‘what’s up?’ and that was about it.”

On fighting Alberto Del Rio:

“Yeah we fought for belts. I put my UFC belt on the line against his WWE belt. I got it and I told my kids I was going to win it for them, they are huge fans of WWE. they walked out with me and I told them I would give them an extra $50,000 if we made it past the first round. We got about 2 minutes in so I’m like it’s time to turn this up. So I got him on his back and rear naked choke. He trained with Ryan Bader in Arizona, I called Ryan because we fought each other. I asked Ryan how he was doing and he said ‘Tito, just train. Train as hard as you can and you won’t have a problem.’ And that was a bit more motivation, I put in 20 weeks, more than I ever have in my life. My cardio was impeccable and I wish that I did that earlier in my career. But now I relaize that my body can sustain a lot more damage and I just pushed through it.”

On cutting 40lbs in a month:

“No lifting. All I did was cardio, mat work, bag work and sparring. We are talking 2,000 calories a day, that’s nothing. On a normal camp I am eating 4,500 just to maintain.”

On boxing again:

“Maybe if I box someone at my level. Anderson Silva is a lot more advanced than me. In MMA it was all about aggression, but boxing is like chess, you have to sit back and play the game. There are a lot of things that are very methodical.”

On getting into wrestling:

“So I went to I think it was WrestleMania 34 or 35 when they came to Anaheim [Chris corrects Tito Ortiz that it was WrestleMania 2000] Right and they had the ladder match that day. It was The Hardy Brothers vs. The Dudley Brothers. They went to interview me like a normal interview, but they wanted to see what kind of personality I have. I wish I had known that because I would have really sold myself way better. I think I was too mellow, they wanted to see crazy. And I didn’t know that, I was very polite and respectful and never heard anything back. In 2019 Shane McMahon reached out and said ‘What do you think about coming in?’ So I went for a try-out, went and did it, and I didn’t think about it but they wanted someone that is over the top. Not crazy, but an eye catcher. I went to the PC and trained with Norman Smiley, amazing teacher, and learned things that normally take 6 months to learn. But then nothing came of it.”

On his brief stint in TNA:

“Yeah I did a little bit of TNA and it was fun as an enforcer, but I wanted to do some matches. I think I have what it takes and it would be a lot of hard work. I did the 2 weeks of training twice a day, it was hard, like being in college wrestling again. I had no pain after, I’ve had 4 neck surgeries.”  

On the gravedigger celebration:

“So I had just win my first World Title at a Mui Thai event and this guy from Thailand came out and did a gravedigger before the match. I am like I am stealing that. This was in 2000, I fought Evan Tanner, did it and it just blew up from there.”

On his relationship with Dana White:

“Yeah I made a mistake a while back I said that I will never fight again for the UFC and I think he is holding me to that. I wish he would get over the hard feelings but that is life.”

On what he is grateful for:

“Happy family, being a hard worker and knowing that nothing can break me.”

Featured image: Bleacher Report

Chris Van Vliet is interviewed by Stu Massengill (@stumassengill) on the podcast “Finding Direction”. Stu works for Tony Robbins as a National Trainer and Peak Performance Strategist. He is also a master interviewer and asks me some amazing questions which leads to me talking about a lot things that I’ve never opened up about publicly. We talk about how you can create your own path by being in the right place at the right time, how you can start and grow as a content creator, the biggest lessons learned from interviewing A-List celebrities like The Rock, Tom Cruise and Oprah Winfrey, why it’s important to bet on yourself and much more.

Who is Chris Van Vliet:

“I am a television host, content creator I think that’s what the new title is. I have a podcast you can listen to called Insight. But I am fascinated with telling people stories, way too often we see the finished product and we don’t see the process along the way. That is what the podcast is about and what the YouTube channel is about. I then put the clips on TikTok, Instagram, Twitter… I hope through all of that people can find my content.”

On the early years:

“The term content creator did not exist. I grew up in Canada east of Toronto in a town called Pickering. I was just fascinated with broadcasting, I had a Fisher Price tape recorder with actual tapes, and I would pretend to be the radio host that I heard on the radio. So I was 4 years old when this all started talking into the microphone and I loved the idea of performing. Whether it was in plays or doing the morning announcements, I loved the idea of having a mic in my hand and getting a reaction out of the audience. We had a mini TV studio in my high school and we would produce segments and take it in turns on the positions. We would go from VTR to camera to audio to floor director to on air talent.”

The next steps:

“So when it came time to pick a major at 17 years old, which is crazy, well communications study was fun, and that was where the process began for me. I dipped my toe in and tried to get a job in television. It hit me in high school that we had to go to work for the rest of our lives, which was when I decided I didn’t want to hate work. I reached out to every TV and radio station to get some experience and that was where my journey began. I reached out to every station to just hope that they would see some value in me.”

On how anyone can make it happen:

“We are now living in a world where anything is monetizable in some sort of way, which is incredible. The internet existed when I was in college, but now it is on a different scale. I would say to lean in on what you are passionate about, but don’t quit your job right away. Start off by doing this in your free time, a lot of people pull shoot way too early by getting out of the job that is paying them. I love diving in to things, but you need to make sure that you pay your bills. Also, bring value to whatever you are doing. What can you bring? In most cases this will be time, which you can exchange for experience. A lot of people want to be paid, but you can exchange this for experience that will get a high paying job later on.”

Right place right time:

“Think about all the different scenarios in the world. You can see where people are speaking or doing boom tours, put yourself in the way. I can’t guarantee that it will work, but put yourself in the room and see what happens from there.”

From broadcasting to YouTube:

“I had a realisation when I was working at MTV 2 in Canada. The old model of broadcasting was that if you are watching this channel at this day and time, then you won’t see it. At the time I was interviewing bands with huge followings, but they wouldn’t see it because they didn’t live in Canada. So I started taking those and putting them on a random YouTube channel without my name. I just put the interviews up there and it got 1000’s of views, so it was like OK, now this is shifting. So I created this channel with my name and did the big interviews with names like Tom Cruise and Anne Hathaway, they would go on my channel after they aired and I hoped that people would appreciate it. Some of the Twilight interviews blew up and some of the Marvel interviews did really well. This was when I realized something was going on here. So then I was like well what if I went to this show or this convention, which no one was really doing at this time, so I was ahead of the curb.”

On creating connections:

“I knew I had access to some of the back channels that people wouldn’t think of. So for example, Chris Jericho, who I am a huge fan of, wasn’t doing a lot of wrestling at the time in 2012. He was on tour with his band Fozzy. I was like well if I can get in touch with the venue to talk about the tour, maybe the venue can put me in touch with the tour manager who can set this up. It was like I was opening the third door before I knew what that was. I would also send emails with people who my guest might be friends or colleagues with, so that they would go ‘Oh he has interviewed them, I will do it too.’”

On how to be a content creator:

“This is so actionable, I love it. Number one is to get comfortable on camera and with your voice. The rest of the world hears you like this, it is how you sound. We have our smartphones, it is easy to get comfortable on camera. When I started, there were actual cameras with tapes. Number two is to just start, too many people put too much into backgrounds, lights and cameras, just start. Take all of the entry barriers away and think about the equipment 5 episodes from now. Look at Mr Beast’s first few videos, they are awful, you just need to start. Thirdly, figure out how you can become an expert on this thing and dial this niche in. Niche down on that niche and become the person people go to for that.”

On being consistent:

“I think you have to be consistent. A lot of people fail because they are not consistent. There is this stat that 80% of podcasts start after just 7 episodes. Just be consistent, one video a week on YouTube every Tuesday, make that commitment that it will go out no matter what. Also, find someone in your space that is crushing it and reverse engineer it. Maybe they are at step 63 and you are at step 2, go back from 63, 62 and so on. Number 3, find people who are the same size and collaborate with them, once you grow with them, you can all collaborate and grow together.”

Frank Mir (@thefrankmir) is a former 2-time UFC Heavyweight Champion. He sits down with Chris Van Vliet at the Blue Wire Studios in Las Vegas to talk about his legendary career, being part of Freedom Fight Night, his fights with Brock Lesnar, Junior dos Santos, Antonio Rodrigo Nogueira, Tim Sylvia and others, his daughter Bella Mir’s MMA career, his recent boxing match against Kubrat Pulev, his time working as a bouncer at Spearmint Rhino, what he thinks about Jake Paul’s boxing career and much more!

On how Frank Mir’s workouts have changed compared to when he was in the UFC:

“They are more specific, way different. I think before I wasted a lot of time training like a strength athlete when I was lifting weights or trying to be a marathoner while doing cardio. How I explain it now is that a UFC athlete is like being a decathlete. You can’t sit there and put on 10lbs so you can throw something harder. Yes you can, but then you are going to screw up your time on the 1,500. When you go from one area you take from another, so there is a lot about being specific but it’s the basics of everything. So when people watch me lift weights they might be like ‘Is this it?’ But then we go and roll and then we will spar. If you have a 2 hour workout that’s great but what are your goals here? Are you trying to be overall stronger or lift more on the bench?”

On how UFC fighters have changed:

“Well yeah at the time our fitness was like that. A lot of my workouts looked like bodybuilder workouts. I got really into the strongman competitor workouts, which I look like now but not lifting as intensely. There is only so much you can take, can lift and only so much sleep that you can get. Once a week I will lift heavy, and then the rest of the time I go pretty light. I try to go for form and function, one day could be a 50 rep day. We don’t lift that heavy just to get the blood flowing and the body to heal. Then there are some heavy days with 3 reps, but than can wreck your nervous system.”

On the fight where it all came together for Frank Mir:

“You know, the Ceick Kongo fight gave me a lot of understanding of going back and forth from fighting to submissions. You can see how quickly I can transition in the fight. I used to train an hour and a half of boxing, then wrestling, then Muay Thai. I used to train on takedowns, but the quicker you take them down, the quicker they stand up. We used to have sparring sessions, but with the 8oz puffy gloves, which are softer, and headgear. I make my daughter wear the headgear too. But I would do striking rounds and sparring rounds, but never do actual MMA rounds.”

On his daughter Bella being an undefeated champion:

“I mean nothing is certain right, you know, apart from death and taxes. But I would put Bella being an undefeated champion at number 3.”

On Bella being in the UFC:

“If she wanted to then she would be there right now. But we held back in July as she was only 17, she had 2 pro fights but I wanted her to take her time. She would probably jump into it now, but I want her to follow college. She is a National Champion and 4 time state champion, she wants to pursue wrestling in the Olympics, she is taking on freestyle now.” 

On how much pressure there is for Bella:

“I wish the outside was the only pressure that there was. She puts a lot of pressure on herself and it bugs me. Sometimes I have to reign her in on that. One time she got second in the nationals, and you know, there are things I don’t understand about female athletes, things happen every month I don’t know a lot about. So I am learning about this. We didn’t understand why she was so drained, we thought it might have been a bad weight cut. We had to drag her out the bedroom and we didn’t know why. Then we saw the bloodwork and the iron was low, that was why. So I’m like ok guys, let’s chill a bit, you are the second best in the country, you lost to the best in the country. My daughter is doing kickboxing and Jiu Jitsu, there are 4 or 5 different disciplines. I don’t want her to sacrifice things to be the best at wrestling. If you are a part time wrestler, being second and having a first place, that is not the worst thing.”

On if Frank Mir has retired:

“You know my goal is just to be in the gym and to train. I like to be healthy and I like to demonstrate what I am talking about when I am coaching. I enjoy the martial arts, sparring, rolling… When I first started, no one really bragged about being a fighter, I lost more dates than I gained. When I first started dating at 21, my wife was going to leave me. I went to check my phone after the fight and she was like ‘We need to talk.’ She had no clue.”

On Frank Mir being a bouncer at Spearmint Rhino:

“I have really seen some human nature, money, drugs and sex. One guy tried to grab my suit so I put his pinky against his elbow, that probably broke. I used to do joint manipulation, but that only works on sober people. What am I going to do, break someone’s arm? I will be broke by the time all the lawsuits are done. So I quickly learned that cutting the blood off from the brain was the quickest way to get people to see things my way.”

On Frank Mir vs. Brock Lesnar 3:

“I wanted to put myself in a position of going out there and being successful, but it wasn’t in the talks. I would be game if it happened again, but it wasn’t on his radar. When you are the draw on the a side, you get to call the shots. Because of the way I responded in the second fight, he thought I was a little off.”

On Brock Lesnar:

“He is the number one rival I get spoken about the most. Casual fans of the UFC, Brock is who they are talking about. The hardcore fans, they ask me about Wanderlei Silva.”

On if he has another match in him:

“I think I will tell you that in a couple of months. When I come back from the stem cells in a couple of months I will know. If I can spar and roll around then yeah. I was only sparring hard once a week, and they would take it as a sign that I have lost my edge. But at 41 if I do everything like a 20 year old, I will never make it to that cage again. What is the benefit of that? If I’m in the gym and a 225 rep contest takes place, I just watch. I have to pullback here if I want to succeed there.”

On boxing again:

“Yeah I would want to be a part of that as I did well the first time around. I kind of regret taking the second fight but then 5 minutes later I don’t. So look man, maybe it’s growing up with video games, but sometimes there is the reset, but the health bar is low. Life doesn’t always line it all up for you and give you everything you need, you have to make it all happen.”

On the biggest lesson learned from fighting:

“Oh there are zero guarantees. There is no guarantee of victory or failure, all we can do is push the needle. If I eat right and exercise every day, will I live longer? Maybe, but there is no guarantee. The guy who invented jogging had a heart attack at 45, you can do everything right and still fail or do everything wrong and be successful. I can make sure I can push the needle to be successful, no guarantee, but I can push the needle.” 

On Jake Paul:

“You know what, after his last fight I have to give him credit. We can critique that he hasn’t fought a boxer his own size, but I am in favour of him. You talk about what we do, the fights we do in Miami, The Freedom Fight Nights, it’s about the culture. People admire people with a left side mentality. All of our children’s heroes admire LeBron James as an athlete, you then start to take on their ideals. So that being said, the identity of our youth has been lost, unless you find a youth with military aspirations, I am trying to restore that with the Freedom Fight Nights. We do have some liberals competing, but they do believe in speaking your mind. Look how many kids are getting into combat sports because of the Paul brothers.”

On what Frank Mir is grateful for:

“Family, martial arts and the people who dislike me.”

Featured image: MMA Fighting

Kia Stevens (@meanqueenk) is an actress and professional wrestler better known as Awesome Kong in AEW and TNA Wrestling and as Kharma in WWE. She joins Chris Van Vliet to talk about her recent retirement from pro wrestling and what went into that decision, her role as Tammé Dawson on the Netflix series GLOW, what inspired her to become an actress, her only match in WWE as an entrant into the men’s Royal Rumble in 2012, working for AEW, being part of the Nightmare Collective with Brandi Rhodes and much more!

On if Awesome Kong had any part in the name Awesome Kong:

“No, zero, none. My first wrestling name was Vixen, Okay. Oh my Gosh, your first wrestling persona is all the things you have built up in your mind and stole from your favorite wrestling characters. I remember at the tie Trish Stratus being the chick, and I had just gotten off this wright loss show. I had this figure going on, so I had to get this black spandex on, my hooker boots and my hair down to there and my face beat baby and coming out sweet. My booty is 100% au natural baby, there are no fillers, and I had to go out there and show it. Everyone will tell you that the first one will not work out, but all that indulgence to get out there and work through it before you get to the persona that is right to you.” 

On the reaction to the name Awesome Kong:

“I don’t know if you heard the story of my first name, it was Amazing Kong. So I am training at the new Japan Dojo in Santa Monica, and they are training me for my first show out there in Japan. Shinsuke Nakamura, when he is brand new, was there on a rotation, they would rotate some of the new boys in and out of the USA. I walk in and he points at me like ‘Amazing Kong!’ And I’m like what did you [just say?] Wait a minute, is that what they do in Japan, they just point at black people and call them Kong? You can’t do that! You are in the USA now, let me teach you some manners. Once we got the miscommunication out of the way where he showed me a magazine where there was a press conference where they had announced that Amazing Kong was coming to be the main event of that show that they got coming up. So I’m like OK, they didn’t tell me or didn’t ask me about that. They didn’t ask me how I felt about exploiting your people essentially playing a Minstrel character. But I don’t think the Japanese promoters understood the context or that this is a lot of nuance. I told them I had to think about it, I was in my apartment in Hollywood. I remember an NWA song came on, and NWA can be NWA, and I could be Karma. I could turn that into something that people would respect, so if the people are here for me, they will be sitting up straighter or respect me, because that is a name that people would respect.” 

On if Awesome Kong found wrestling or if wrestling found her:

“A little bit of both. Fast forward and I am a social worker at a facility called St. Anne’s in Los Angeles for pregnant teenagers. You know, teenagers are already volatile, you add some pregnancy hormones and oh boy! It’s a battle royale every night! We would watch wrestling in the rec room and even though they say don’t do this at home, we would emulate it. Not to the point of contact, but we would cut promos in the hall and if my favorite worker was on the tv my girls would call and I would run. It was a very fun and calming activity for the girls watching a violent show, ironic. So Tough Enough came out, the second season, and my brother in law wanted to try out for it. This was the early days of the internet, he didn’t know how to download an application. So because of where I was working, he asked me to download his application, and I printed one out for myself. So I did, read it, filled it out and sent in a tape, and they called me in for an audition. There was a line that was 2 days and the wait time was 18 hours. I was right behind Kenny King before he was Kenny King, we bonded on that day, so when his name got called I was so happy.”

On the Tough Enough audition:

“They told to us to initially that we had to come up with a promo and then we would come up with some physical stuff in the ring. Then when they had us do the physical stuff, they told us they had to do a kip up, which I had to learn what that was. This was an 18 hour process where we had to stand in the line, but it was over 2 days. So me, Kenny, a guy that looked like a rip-off of The Rock, a girl that was friends with Stacy Kiebler but had fallen out with her, I don’t know there was some drama there. My mom went with me and got all the tea from her. We went and made a trip of it and I got  a suite at Caesars Palace. So we went to my suite and we are all trying to learn the kip-up. Even though I was a big girl I was very athletic at the time, and I learned how to do it. It was hard on the abs but I got it. However, when we got in the ring, they had me do the physical stuff first, rolling around, jumping jacks, and we had to do the kip-up last. So you are blown up and then have to do this difficult move. By the time that came around, I hadn’t impressed anyone, I was a fish out of water. When it came time to do the promo, I was proud of my promo, because I had come from acting. So I can’t remember the whole promo, but the last line was ‘Hell has no fury like a woman scorned!’ I was proud of myself, but it was like crickets. All of the judges were like, we don’t know what to do with this, and JR was like ok, bye. I was like what? No, no, I’m not going anywhere! I just dragged my raggedy ass from LA and through the mountains to get here and I spent my last cheque on a suite! I put it all in because I am going to be a millionaire! I’m like you at least need to ask me one or 2 questions. JR asked me some questions, I can’t remember the first one but it was a snarky one. But then Bob Holly was there and was like ‘No I find her interesting and I want to ask her some questions.’ And then that engaged the rest of the judges, and we got to talking. JR, bless his heart at the time, it was like ‘I’m sorry, I don’t think a girl your size can make it in wrestling. You are too big to make it in wrestling and will never make it.’ I was like what?! He was like ‘You will never make it in WWE, you are too big.’ He was gracious enough to not use the word fat, but I didn’t think I was fat, I thought I was thick. I had the build back then of Megan Thee Stallion, or she has the build of me back then. But that was the fire, remember that 200 bitches hated on me back in high school. My clapback was ‘You will kneel because I am going to be your queen!’ ‘You’re gonna have to give me flowers.’ JR said that to me on national TV so I had to clap back, but we are friends today and we have reconciled.”

On interacting with JR later:

“He didn’t remember me, but had heard about it from interviews I had done. So I’m sure that people would have brought it up to him. But the first interaction was at Cauliflower Alley Club, we saw each other at CAC and he was very happy that  had proved him wrong. Not only that, but he advocated for my signing to WWE. Him, Stone Cold and Mick Foley, personally contacted Vince McMahon. They had seen my work in TNA, not only that, but WWE contacted me the year before. There was some miscommunication and I went to TNA. What happened was that everyone who sent their best matches to WWE, I was on all of their tapes. So I mean, I never reached out to WWE, I had a plan of what I was going to do. But they called me before the part of me calling them was in my plans. So every time they sent a tape in, they are like who is this?”

On the matches with Gail Kim:

“That was a spark to the inferno that is women’s wrestling. They are not just women but they are workers now doing the deal. No more popcorn underwear matches. They used to put us on second so that the people could get their popcorn. The woman are now demanding and getting more respect. Outside of Gail and I and our programme being successful, I’d like to say I had a lot of influence in women advocating for themselves, because in TNA I would not keep my mouth shut. I just couldn’t understand some of the things that were going on, that’s backwards. You can’t tell me that when Kong and Gail are on TV, and you are telling me that the numbers are spiking every night, you can’t tell me that I am not worth x amount on paper. For example, they would put you through the gauntlet and the maze of asking for a raise or to implement change. One of the times that I asked, I found out what Kurt Angle made. All I was asking for was 1/10th of what he’s making. You look in my eye and tell me that I am not worth 1/10th of Kurt Angle, if you can’t then pay me that, one or the other.”

On leaving TNA the first time around:

“There were a lot of different aspects that would snowball. It was mainly the attitude of that I couldn’t go anywhere else. I can’t remember word for word, but it was along the lines of if you quit, then don’t think that you will be on Raw on Monday, because they ain’t interested. But that wasn’t the point to me, I made big cheddar in Japan. Tokyo ain’t cheap, and Kia was living large in Japan, that kind of burned me up. When I left, I had $70 in my bank account, and they owed me money. They thought that if they starved me out, then I would shut up. But no I am from California, I will sell oranges on the freeway to make my cheddar. I will pluck some hair off of dogs and make me the finest wig! Don’t play with me and think that you got me over a barrel because of some money.”

On WWE:

“Well after losing my baby emotionally and psychologically, I was not in the place physically, emotionally and physiologically to deal with the okie doke. Now I say the okie doke, anybody who has had a WWE contract knows what that is. It is the politics, the mind games, the expectations, the standard that you have to live up to. I’m not saying that it is bad, but it is vigorous, and I wasn’t up for the okie doke. I’m not into playing games, especially with I had gone through what I had gone through. First my mother had gone, cancer, then my grandmother gone, my best friend from high school suddenly, my manager, God rest his soul, gone. Then now my baby has gone, that is a lot of death back to back. I hadn’t taken time off, I was just me being me. The day we buried my mother, I went straight to the airport for Bound for Glory. So it was working, and the way they wanted me to come back was not healthy. I was like you can bring me straight back so I can go into autopilot and work, or let me go somewhere where I can really process all of this. A lot of people like to paint WWE as the villains, but it is not as easy as that, it is very nuanced and archaic. For the most part, they were extremely supportive, they were invested in someone, excited about it, and it didn’t turn out the way that they wanted it to. And of course just my luck, Mystico had to go and fall every damn week. I’m like get it together, Triple H just got this job, you are falling and it’s not looking good right now, this sucks! At the end they asked me what do you need to come back, and I told them what I needed. It was very simple, it wasn’t money, I felt bad that they were still paying me. But no they were going to pay me, and I told them I needed to go to a facility in Colorado, because they wanted me to lose the baby weight. There is a facility where The Biggest Loser people train, it was just a coincidence. It had what I needed to get my physical and emotional wellbeing in alignment so I can go back quickly. I told them and I told them I would pay for it. They called me back and said that they were going to send me down to Florida for a while, and that’s the opposite of what I need! They send me down there to a hotel that was filled with roaches and bed bugs. They do change and send me to a nice place, but it was so not what I needed, it was never going to work.”

On Awesome Kong possibly retiring:

“It was an off and on continuously running thought in my mind. Think of Double Dutch jumping rope, you’ve got to know when to jump. You have to be at peace of knowing when to not continue. Let me put it this way, Awesome Kong retired. I think towards the end of one of the seasons of GLOW when I thought about retiring, but then I went to AEW.”

On AEW:

“AEW they love to give it to you all. They are constantly brewing up what they can do to pop it again. I love what they do to give it to the fans, it always makes you feel so good. It’s something [retirement] that has been brewing for a few years now.”

On The Nightmare Collective:

“Here’s the thing. We had a lot of leaders that have an idea and a vision, but everyone only gets a piece of that vision. Sometimes it doesn’t work. The thing is, I don’t ant to sound like I am bashing the crew over there at AEW, we were just up and running, all new executives and trying to think outside of the box and give it to you all, something new. You reference big moments in wrestling history to put something together, because we had seen it all, so we tried to give you something that you haven’t seen. For me, I felt unheard, I felt uncontrolled, I just said that I had X, Y and Z. I couldn’t get into that room where the decisions were made, and believe me I stalked that room. I would stay for the big meetings, pick up the water bottles and be like ‘anything you need?’ I tired to get into that meeting where decisions were made, but never had a chance to. After a while I am like that’s not going to happen, I’m not so pushy. It’s out of my control, if I had my control, give me 15 minutes of every show saying that this is Kia’s 15 minutes of fame! Go out there and steal the show from the boys.”

On IMPACT owning the name Awesome Kong:

“Yeah but they gave it to me. I owned it, they put me through the ringer, it’s the least that they could do, it was good karma.”

On what Awesome Kong is grateful for:

“Feeling blessed, my loved ones are in a state of health and I am not content.”

Featured image: F4WOnline

Eric Stoffers is the CEO and Founder of BioXcellerator (@bioxcellerator). He joins Chris Van Vliet to explain exactly what stem cell therapy is and how it works, why athletes like Kevin Nash, Brian Cage, Bobby Lashley, Rey Mysterio, Frank Mir and hundreds of others have received treatment with them, what kind of results you can expect, what the future of medicine holds and much more!

On helping wrestlers:

“It turns out, I haven’t been a wrestling fan since I was a kid, but now we treat some of the best wrestlers out there. It turns out that they are probably the most elite athletes of them all. Kevin Nash says in his testimonial, being a wrestler is like being in 100 car wrecks a day. Their bodies go through so much trauma, they go through so much but we are so proud to be showing the great results.”

On how it all works:

“So the stem cells are the ones in your body that are inherently able to continuously divide over time. Just like everything else in time, things slow down, stem cells included. They are not able to divide as rapidly and heal yourself nearly as well as you could when you are younger. The cells that we use are the mesenchymal ones from the umbilical cord. One thing I would like to point out is that this is not the controversial embryonic ones that you might have heard about on the news. There is no controversy here, we take a healthy mom and healthy baby, but if the mom decides to donate the healthy umbilical cord, we can help thousands of people that are suffering from chronic pain or autoimmune disease. We can take those cells, multiply them and help them fight disease.”

On why they are based in Colombia and not in the USA:

“Unfortunately the highest level science has progressed so quickly that the FDA have not really caught up to how far the technology has advanced. Some of the language in the FDA we consider as antiquated, when they catch up we hope we can administer this in the USA. Right now we have to go offshore to countries like Colombia and other progressing countries in South Asia.”

On a typical patient:

“We are very fortunate to have guys like Kevin Nash, Bobby Lashley and guys from the UFC and the NFL. So we are very fortunate to have athletes do these testimonials, but really it is the guy or gal that is getting up there in age and wants to live a better and stranger life without the pain. We also have people who are suffering from neurological or autoimmune diseases. Everyday folk are the majority of our patients, but athletes who depend on their performance, they are visiting on a consistent basis.”

On if this will be a normal procedure in the future:

“Absolutely. I am an entrepreneur and a business guy. I wouldn’t get into this if I didn’t believe that this wasn’t going to work, but it should be a paradigm shift in the way that we treat the condition. As incredible as surgeries and drugs are, I think they are over prescribed and in the wrong direction. The most invasive surgeries are the go-to for doctors, when they could be the last. Stem cells help to get to the systemic cause and help the body repair itself. I do believe that this will be a shift.”

On where the journey began:

“So I started in the real estate industry where I was selling homes and flipping houses. For me, when I was in the real estate career, I came across this group of scientists that were performing their research with remarkable results. I immersed myself in the technology and in stem cells and made the transition away from real estate. This was another entrepreneurial endeavour, where now the stakeholders are patients and giving people the opportunity to live a better life.”

On if anyone can have stem cell treatment:

“Yeah we get healthy people come to us all the time. What we are doing is increasing the ability of your own body to fight disease and promote the body to do its own healing. What we see a lot of is celebrities and millionaires looking to live longer, which we all want to do while living better as we get older. A simple IV injection can reduce inflammation and upregulate or downregulate the immune system.”

On what treatment looks like:

“The treatments are mostly non-invasive. It can be a simple injection, a couple of needle pokes and 2 seconds later it is over. What we do see is there is a little bit of inflammation depending on how bad the injury is. An athlete can have around 48 hours of inflammation, that’s the worst it can be. We mostly ask our patients to be there for 5 days, because we complement the stem cells with things like cryogenic therapy and red light therapy, cryotherapy and a host of alternatives. We like our patients to be there for a week. But if you wanted a shoulder to be done, it can only take a couple of hours.”

On if someone can’t afford stem cells:

“Unfortunately people in America don’t like talking about it, but nutrition is essential. But also the cold plunge, which is essentially free, that is a good place to start along with nutrition and exercise.”

On the 5 year plan:

“I hope that we can have a stronger presence in the USA. Most of our patients are from America, but the stronger presence is down to the FDA and not us. But now we need more locations in more strategic areas. We will continue to be the global leaders and expand the technology and apply it to real life and help patients every single day.”

On what he is grateful for:

“The people in my organisation, my parents and great people like you.”

Featured image: Maxim

Road Dogg (@BGJames) is a WWE Hall of Famer known for his time as part of the tag team “The New Age Outlaws” and as a member of D-Generation X. He joins Chris Van Vliet to talk about his new podcast called “Oh… You Didn’t Know”, how he first teamed up with his tag team partner Billy Gunn, his thoughts on Gunn Club in AEW being compared to the New Age Outlaws, his struggles with addiction, how he was able to get clean, what he learned working under Vince McMahon as the head writer on Smackdown, his relationship with Triple H, why he was jealous of The Rock and much more!

On the first time Road Dogg used ‘Oh you didn’t know?’:

“I don’t remember the date, but I remember that it was on a house show. The Underfaker, Brian Lee, he always was a great friend of mine, and we always used to mess around. He was like ‘You better fax somebody.’ Or ‘You better Page somebody.’ We were saying all kind of different stuff. So one night we were backstage and he came and he unbuttoned my tag titles. I turned around and I was mad and like ‘When I get back here…’ And he was like ‘Oh you better call somebody!’ I said ‘Oh OK,OK.’ And then I went out there, the music went [sings first bars of theme song] and I went ‘Oh you didn’t know?’ It was totally just to make the one guy laugh that I had been messing with. But it sounded so decent between the guitar riffs so I was like I’m going to try that again. And then the rest is just history.”

On The Gunn club:

“I do see some [of myself and Billy Gunn] in them, and that is kind of weird of me to say and weird for me to feel that way. But I see Austin [as myself] but the difference is that he can work too. I wasn’t a very good athlete, I was just entertaining I guess. But both of his kids are great athletes, it’s just that Austin is out there a bit more. Colten just kind of brings home the bacon, he just does what he has to do. I see some similar things in what they do, and I have actually talked a couple of times with them about coming up with something. It can’t be like what we did, but coming up with some like sing-songy thing. Like when you are a heel, it’s like the Kurt Angle you suck thing, we are trying to do something like that.”

On the Road Dogg/Billy Gunn intro:

“Oh man, I think I stole that from the Ringman brothers. You know like when you come to a fayre like ‘Ladies and gentleman, boys and girls, children of all ages…’ It was just like a carnival barker. Basically it was just that which I modified to fit mine and Billy’s names. I would tweak it each week for the town name. You give them the sing-song part that they can holler at you, but then you tweak it to make it personalised for that city.”

On how the podcast is put together:

“All I can say is thank God for the researchers. Half of the time I don’t remember the stuff before I read through the notes. But they schedule out what we are going to talk about, I wouldn’t even know where to begin.”

Or podcast topics:

“The one I was scared to talk about was the VKM one. Not because we were them, it was just a dark time in my life. It was like do I really want to live that? The one that we just did was with Billy and his kids. I hope it turns out as fun as we had recording it. Sometimes you can have a wrestling show that was fun and it was a great show, but then you look at the ratings.”

On The Ass Boys chant:

“I think they actually like it because it is something. It is something that people can get behind. But to their credit, they sell it, because that is what they are supposed to do. If they didn’t do that, I don’t think the crowd would chant.”

On not remembering a lot due to being high:

“I honestly do think that was the case. I do remember stuff when I start reading about it, it will bring stuff back. But I don’t know where my head was at. I did a lot of foolish things, crazy bumps, crazy chair shots, a lot of crazy stuff. Who can pinpoint who doesn’t make me smart, but there is something there.”

On getting clean:

“Yeah, it was, I didn’t have a job at the time and I was riding back with my brother from an independent show in upper Alabama. We just drove up and drove back, and I had got a bunch of pills, because I am still the Road Dogg at the indie show, still a big deal. So they gave me all of the pills and wanted to share with me, and I got hammered. On the ride back I was really down on myself and on life, and messed up. My brother Scott just got clean at rehab, they paid for it. He said ‘You can call Anne Russo.’ Who was in charge of the wellness policy at the time. I called that day, I don’t know if I was ready to quit doing drugs and alcohol, just to do something. So I called her and she set me right up, but by the 28th day, I didn’t know how to stop living that way. I didn’t know how to get off of the roller coaster. I didn’t care for a while, I didn’t care which handful of pills killed me, my only problem in my mind was that my kids would find me dead. That is what kept me from doing it and when Scotty told me to go to rehab. And thank God I did, I only went for 28 days. But if you are ready to quit living like that, you’ll take suggestions and quit living like that. But you have to get ready, no human or place will get you there, you have to get there and be ready.”

On mending bridges:

“100%. In the program of recovery I follow, there is some making amends parts to it. I had to make that list, Jim Ross was one, The Rock was one, The Undertaker was one, these are guys that tried to help me. Well Rock didn’t try to help me but I was mean to him because I was jealous of him and he was a threat to me, because he could do everything that I could do, but he looked friggin great too. It was like, son of a bee sting, you’ve got everything. And at that time it bothered me, because he was a threat to me, so I treated him horribly in front of everybody all of the time. I went to him and he said ‘Thank you, that’s nice to say.’ I don’t know if he does forgive me, that’s none of my business. But I had to do it to clean up my side of the street. Jim Ross, I treated him badly too because he dealt with all the contract side of stuff. The Undertaker, he tried to help me but I went ‘You ain’t my daddy. You don’t know nothing about me.’ It was just where I was at the time, and I don’t have to be there anymore.”

On keeping in touch:

“Oh yeah, I still keep in touch with Taker. Every time I see Rock we talk, he came to the Performance Center when I was down there and watched some matches. It helps me lay my head on my pillow at night. The more I can figure out what is more my fault, the better I can sleep at night.”

On the VKM segments being personal against DX:

“It was. It was at the time. But people change, people who say they don’t are wrong. At that moment in my life, I would have fought both of them at the drop of a hat, and I don’t even know why. The drug and alcohol addiction is very self centered and very selfish. It was very much all about me, why didn’t you stand up for me and why didn’t you keep me on? But I would have fired me too, because I was a liability. But at that moment, how dare you? You son of a guns. When Vince Russo came aboard and said do you want to do this thing? I was like, I will do whatever to keep the lights on and to keep my drug habit going. That was basically my whole tenure there.”

On Vince knowing about the VKM gimmick:

“Let me tell you something, Vince has never watched an episode of TNA ever in his whole life. But Hunter said something to me, it was in Baltimore and I will never forget it. He said ‘Hey Dogg, what’s going on?’ We had just seen each other for the first time and it was like come on in. I went into his office and he went ‘So what’s this VKM thing?’ I was like I am so sorry, he said ‘I’m just kidding, don’t worry about it.’ And that was it. I think everyone gets that you go over there and you just do what they say. But it was personal at the time, and I believe that VKM TNA was some of my best mic work. There were some really good promos I cut down there that I didn’t even realize until I did the podcast. I was like holy crap they gave me some mic time.”

On comparing the Monday Night Wars to AEW:

“Yeah it’s a little bit different because they are not going head to head. It almost feels like not a war but another wrestling show being on. I know that they are watching the higher ups, maybe Punk, are following the ratings. But I think the boys are just loving that they have a place to work. I’m just a boy that chased a dream into millions of dollars, but I don’t think the boys are in as much of a competition as the boys are. I think the boys are just happy to be paid to take the bumps.”

On lessons from Triple H:

“I came to him and I said ‘So and so wants to say this in their promo, but it’s not what we wrote in the promo, are you ok with that?’ He said ‘Does it get the same point across?’ I said that it did and he said ‘Yeah Brian, do that and the talent will trust you more. It empowers them.’ He told me that on a one on one basis, because sometimes he writes the promo and that’s what you say if he can’t fully trust you to go out there live and do and act accordingly and do your promo in a professional way, because he doesn’t trust you yet. I think this was Dolph Ziggler to be honest, it’s one of those things where it’s like I trust Dolph, but then he shoots himself in the foot! But I love Dolph and I would have loved to see him teaming with Billy Gunn in his prime. Holy crap man, The Suicide Blonds or something.”

On learning from Vince McMahon:

“Dude you sit under that learning tree and sometimes you sit under it until 3 in the morning. It was where you learn stuff and little stuff, not just about the business but being an executive. He had somebody coming to the office once a week from Carnegie to teach me how to be an executive. He wanted to make me an executive and work it, to the point where I couldn’t handle it. To work with that man is difficult, not because of how he is, but because of who he is. He will work all night and be the first one up in the morning to get to work the next day. One time we got in late, we were doing Monday Night Raw and then SmackDown on Tuesday. We flew to the next town and landed at 2am. I just wanted to go to my bed, we get off the place and he says ‘Brian, you got SmackDown?’ I said ‘Yes sir.’ I sit down and pull it out, we go over it, and then I said ‘Sir, I would like to talk about this in the morning.’ He threw it back in my lap and said ‘You’re going to regret that!’ I look over to Kevin Dunn and I said ‘Oh God I am going to regret that.’ And Kevin said ‘You should.’ Next morning he called me early and I went to his room, but I got some sleep so it didn’t matter. But he is a workhorse and I couldn’t keep up. My sobriety was a white knuckle and I just couldn’t keep up, that’s how it was in the WWE, I couldn’t handle it. That’s why I went to NXT for a little while because I thought I could skate for a little bit and I did. Then for business decisions they needed to trim some fat. Hey, it’s no secret that I got fat, it’s a business decision. I called him after to thank him. Not only did he employ me for 10 years, he paid for my rehab and for my brother. If you are bitter at that guy, something is wrong with you.”

On a possible WWE return:

“I don’t know that. I would love that, but at this stage in my life, knowing what I know now, I don’t know if I could take that. It’s not that if I could, but also if I want to. I was there for a decade, I’ve only been gone for a few months but it feels good. Nick Patrick said it best when he said that it feels like getting out of prison. It felt like a weight was lifted off my shoulders, but it’s like what do I do now.”

On people comparing DX and the nWo:

“I get that, they came at the same time. I just think one of them, of course I am biased because I was in one, but we were more distinct. They added people at every chance that they got and split into different things. I liked it when it was just Hogan and The Outsiders. Then it was Bischoff and Bagwell and Dennis Rodman, it felt like it was bastardised. I am biased but I thought that we were cooler.”

On what Road Dogg is grateful for:

“Family and friends, the health of my family and sobriety.”

Featured image: SE Scoops

Melissa McCarthy (@melissamccarthy) is an actress, comedian, writer and producer known for movies like Bridesmaids, Tammy, Spy, Ghostbusters, The Boss, Identity Thief and many others. Her husband Ben Falcone (@benfalcone) is an actor, comedian, writer, director. They join Chris Van Vliet to talk about their new Netflix series called “God’s Favorite Idiot”, why they love working together so much, what their first date was like when they met in the 90s and much more!

I think there is so many people who would hate working with their significant other. What’s your secret?

Melissa McCarthy: “It’s my favorite thing. We met doing it and it’s why we became such good friends. We have never not done it, he is my favorite person to work with and we just have a blast. That’s not a bad day in the office.”

Ben when you write this, do you instantly think that Melissa is going to be in this?

Ben Falcone: “Uh, yeah. If you happen to be married to one of the funniest people in the world, it would be silly to not think of them for a role. I wanted her to get to play this rambunctious and kind of rock n’ roll energy, and I think that she did a great job with it. It was really fun to get to work with her as my wife as well as all the other great cast members.”

Melissa McCarthy: “It was such a great group of people. Everyone is so fast and so funny, it was just like a ridiculous good time. Someone would go off on a tangent and everyone would go with them. Everyone was so loose and comedy assassins, it just makes it all great.”

I’ve lost count, is it now 15 times you have appeared on-screen together?

Melissa McCarthy: “Oh gosh I don’t know.”

Ben Falcone: “I would have to Google it.”

Melissa McCarthy: “I would definitely say a few. Specifically I would say more than 5 but less than 50.”

Where did the idea come from to write this?

Ben Falcone: “I wrote a book with a similar title when I was in my 20s. I then put it away in a drawer, and 23 years later I was talking to Melissa and we thought that it would make a funny comedy. Then she said ‘Oh he should work in an IT office. that’s who God would pick.”

Melissa McCarthy: “I still have no idea why I said that, but I said it right away.”

Ben Falcone: “The idea of this unassuming person who is touched by God, and how would people react? Would they be accepting and would the believe it or not? That could be a really dramatic idea, but I wanted to play it for comedy and be respectful to all religions and put some positive ideas out there.”

We see you go on a first date in the TV series. How similar was it to your actual first date?

Ben Falcone: “Well I didn’t glow on our first date.”

Melissa McCarthy: “Well he did to me. Our first date was just after shows, we would go down to The Snake Pit, which is a bar, and those were our first dating moments.”

Check out “God’s Favorite Idiot” on Netflix: http://www.netflix.com/godsfavoriteidiot

Featured image: Women’s Health

Kevin Hart (@kevinhart4real) is an actor, producer and comedian. Woody Harrelson (@woodyharrelson) is an Emmy Award winning actor and playwright. They join Chris Van Vliet to talk about their new action-comedy movie called “The Man From Toronto” that is streaming now on Netflix. We discuss Woody Harrelson’s most iconic roles from Cheers to Natural Born Killers to White Men Can’t Jump, Kevin Hart talks about getting mistaken for both Dwayne “The Rock” Johnson and Gary Coleman from “Diff’rent Strokes”, he details his intense 4:30am workout routine and much more!

Despite living in America, I am in fact a man from Toronto

Kevin Hart: “Hence the pronunciation.”

Woody Harrelson: “Yeah he never put the T in it. This is the first time we talked about this, we never brought this up.”

In the movie Kevin, when your character messes something up it would be “Teddying” it. If Woody were to mess up, what would “Woodying” it look like?

Kevin: “Kill too easy. Killing without a real solid reason behind it, that was a real problem for Teddy. Just like how fast he went to murder, it’s not that necessary and how you don’t deem that to be that a problem.”

OK Woody, what would “Kevining” it be?

Woody: “You know, just crushing it in life, that’s Kevin. Now Teddy, he just messes everything up in life. With Kevin, it is the complete opposite, everything he touches turns to gold, it’s unbelievable. What he he got like 19 TV shows and 12 movies, it’s incredible.”

As this is about mistaken identity, Kevin, what it is like being constantly mistaken for your friend Dwayne Johnson?

Kevin: “I get it a lot, it’s the arms though, all bicep related. I told Woody earlier that it’s either Dwayne or Willis from Different Strokes. Two different sizes.”

Woody, who do people mistake you for the most or which character do they want you to be the most?

“I always find it kind of interesting. Some people say Natural Born Killers, some say White Men Can’t Jump. It’s interesting to see which one they say.”

Who would you say is the biggest action star here?

Kevin: “Woody.”

Woody: “Kevin is an action star, I’ve only done one action movie.”

Kevin: “Woody man. He cones in and kicks ass. I love seeing Woody come in and kick some ass. I loved playing across him in The Man From Toronto. He never really let anybody in and he and Teddy’s relationship would progress through the movie. I like that we got to see that through the movie and that journey of so tough break down by the time we got to the end. It takes a great mind to pull that off.”

Kevin can you walk me through what your workout routine looks like?

Kevin: “Consistency. It’s more about the diet than anything. But you know I am true to.”

Woody: “Chick Fil A.”

Kevin: “I can’t find one in Ireland. But it’s just the dedication to the schedule. I am a 4:30am riser, workout for an hour and a half, and Sunday is a steady cardio day. Sometimes when I am on set, I treat it like boot camp. You want the days to burn, workout in the morning and cardio at night when you have done the work. It just keeps the days moving.

Featured image: Netflix

Cody Hall (@realcodyhall) is a professional wrestler and the son of the late WWE Hall of Famer Scott Hall. He joins Chris Van Vliet to talk about the recent passing of his father, what it was like growing up with Razor Ramon as a father, following in his footsteps as a professional wrestler, working for New Japan, what happened when he signed with MLW, his favorite Scott Hall matches, how DDP saved his father’s life, what his current career goals are and much more!

On Cody Hall wearing his father’s HOF ring:

“I mean I would much rather have my father than the ring, but it takes me back to all the memories. All the times, I wish that I could talk to him about LA and that I met you and stuff. I feel that all the time, but when I look at this at least I know that I have a part of him with me.”

On Cody Hall stepping away from wrestling and then coming back:

“So like I said, wrestling can be a lot of things, it can be good or bad. The highs are high and the lows are low. I felt like I kind of experienced both and felt more of the lows. So I had been living in Japan, so living abroad, it can be exciting but also tough. I had some personal stuff too along with living abroad. But I was getting to 30, and even though I love wrestling and it is my passion, there are other things that made me happy. So I kind of thought about stepping away and finding other things in life. But the whole time I missed it, I considered coming back. But then of course, losing my father,  seeing all the outpour and the love, seeing what I meant to people, remembering all those experiences that I had similar with the travel and meeting all of the people. It just made me appreciate it and be a part of it more.”

On living up to his father’s legacy:

“Yeah, I used to think that it was my burden to bear, but now I’ve been trying to see it as my torch to carry. I am so proud, my father was a great man who lived a great life who did a lot of great things in his life. He lived a full life, so I am very happy for him and very proud of him. But it is hard, every show that I go to, people want to say such and such about your father. Oh he was the coolest, he was the best, and it’s hard to live down. It is hard to over shine him or step out of that shadow, so I always had like an inferiority complex about it. Like no matter what I did, it would never be good enough and no matter what I did, people would never acknowledge it, it would always be about my father. So that was definitely a struggle for me, and it kind of still is.”

On Cody Hall coming into wrestling as himself:

“I would say that I am still searching for it. In my first couple of matches I wore my father’s old gear. I wore the dripping blood and would go out there and hit The Razor’s Edge. And it was fun, I loved doing my father’s moves and like doing an old Razor Ramon match. But it definitely became hard, every time people looked at me they would think of my father. So accentuating that is only gonna make it worse. I’m not going to come out and do his cha cha or his fire and play into it. Because being an imitation is always like a losing effort from the start. Who I am trying to be is still up for debate still.”

On Cody Hall’s older matches:

“I’m a very self deprecating moment, I am very hard on myself. I’ve always wanted have my moment, like my ladder match, something I could tell someone to look at, and I have felt like I have never had that moment. I have had good matches where afterwards I have gone back and thanked the guy and say that we should have a rematch and believe it. But it is never as good in my head as I have wanted it to be.”

On joining the service:

“I guess that I was like just a lost soul. If you don’t have a lot of direction then the military is good for you. My parents were kind of going back and forth, I was living with a single mother at the time, I knew she was woking hard to feed me and my sister, she was cleaning houses for a living. That was really hard work, so I wanted to get out the house and alleviate the burden. So I did it, had a great time and still keep up with some of those guys. But my friends back home were telling me that I should have joined either a college or a community college. My father was finally talking to me and said that I should be a wrestler and he would coach me, so I went with him.”

On training to be a wrestler:

“I started training at 21, mostly with him in his living room. He had a DVD with 4 or 5 of his matches burnt onto it, we would just watch them over and over and I would lock up with him. This was when he was not doing good and really frail, so I had to be gentle with him. We would just go through the holds, and eventually we found a wrestling school. I would have a couple of basic matches where I would just do the moves and get through it. Then from there, he started having a hard time, so he moved to Atalanta to live with Dallas, where he really got cleaned up. I followed him up there and that was where my indie push and Japan all took off.”

On DDP saving Scott Hall’s life:

“OK, well like I said my father was kind of gone when he first decided to go and when Dallas convinced him. But he had definitely been knocking on death’s door for a while there, that’s what kind of brought me back in to push through his tough times and how he was being, just because I thought that I should spend this time with my father before he was gone. We even did like an ESPN special around that time, you can look back and see the kind of condition that he was in. I thought that would be our goodbye, so just for Dallas to step in and to give him a whole other decade of his life, give him the chance to go on and earn these Hall of Fame rings and to leave the world in a better place and create so much more goodwill and memories for my sister and I. Dallas is an angel.”

On WWE reaching out to Cody Hall:

“No I have never had a try-out or a contact actually. I mean nobody has ever talked to me, so I am not sure what to think about it. My father’s advice was to always go to Japan and to learn how to work, and I always assumed that I would go to Japan, be really good and then someday someone would call me and they would want me and say ‘Hey we have something for you.’ But that day never came. I remember being there for years and once a year William Regal and Canyon Ceman would come and watch the show. I remember looking out into the crowd and seeing two white faces and being like wow that’s them, they are watching tonight. After the show I would sell my gimmicks and I would see them go to the bathroom, they would be right in line as close as I am to my camera, and they just wouldn’t look at me or say anything, so I guess it wasn’t meant to be.”

On collecting royalties from Scott Hall:

“I think that is possible. I think Triple H mentioned to me and my sister at my father’s funeral that some royalties should be coming our way. But I’m sure that something that I can sit back on my laurels for, but a little extra money never hurts, peace of mind. Once upon a time when my father was not doing so well and hard up for cash, he did sell a portion of his royalties for a lump sum. So I don’t think they are nearly what they should or could be. So that’s why I say that I am not trying to look to pave the way for me.” 

On the best advice Cody Hall received from his father:

“That’s a tough one, because my father was really good with the advice. He had so many quips in and out of the ring. Maybe ‘Don’t be a mark for yourself in the ring.’ It’s not all about you and your moves and what you do in the ring every night. You have to take care of the other person out here with you, you have to care about the promoter. Whatever business he wants to do, you just have to keep your head on straight.”

On Scott Hall’s passing:

“I guess in some sense [ I was kind of ready]. I had kind of mentally come to terms that my father was not going to live forever. He liked to be a rockstar, even when he came back to life. He liked to drink, liked to party and liked to stay out late. So he had those crazy nights, but when you live that life you don’t live to be 80, 90 or 100. So I  always knew, but goodbyes are hard like change is hard, so I wasn’t ready for it. I am still trying to come to terms with it, but I believe that he is in a better place. By the time I did see my father, it was pretty clear that this wasn’t going to be a kickout situation. He was ready to go, and I accepted it for him. I wanted him to move on and to not be in pain anymore. So it’s this kind of life, we are always going to lose our father’s at some point. I’m just glad mine was a great one before it happens.”

On who Scott Hall was to him:

“My father was like my best friend to me for a while. Definitely in those years in Atlanta, that’s all I ever wanted, because I feel like I never really got to know him growing up. So I stopped looking as him as a father, because the things he would do would hurt to much. But I embraced him as a friend, he was one of the boys and my buddy that I could talk about all the regular stuff with. That’s what made all the difference for me.”

On what Cody Hall is grateful for:

“To wake up for something today, for health and for friends and family.”

Image credit: Instagram

Ethan Page (@officialego) is a professional wrestler and YouTuber currently signed to All Elite Wrestling. Ethan sits down with Chris Van Vliet at the Blue Wire Studios at Wynn Las Vegas to talk about teaming with Scorpio Sky, what he has learned from working with Dan Lambert and American Top Team, his fashion sense and why he never wears the same shirt twice, being inspired by Dwayne “The Rock” Johnson, why he stopped doing vlogs on his YouTube channel, his toy hunt obsession, goals in AEW and much more!

On moving to America:

“Dude you were such a help with that too. Two Canadian boys hanging out in Vegas talking about stuff, that is just amazing! I’ve only been here for a few months, but the opportunities that I have had and the change of schedule, it has done wonders in the short term, I can’t wait to see what it will do in the long term.”

On travel issues possibly preventing wrestling: 

“Oh 100%. That was when I reached out to you on WrestleMania weekend in Tampa and I was meant to do The Body Guy Extravaganza. I was like well I can try and honor this commitment I gave to the fans, I ended up doing the voiceover for the cartoon, and that really put my YouTube channel onto a different platform. People now relaize, I guess, were willing to work with me on these wacky projects. It kind of gave fans a new level of trust on this guy is going to go above and beyond. That was when I started to notice the channel grow.” 

On being a part of AEW:

“I was literally just talking to Hornswoggle in the car last week about these pinch me moments. Maybe that tag match against Darby and Sting, which was Sting’s first match after the pandemic, that was one of the moments. But also, wrestling against a fellow Canadian Chris Jericho in front of 22,000, and winning, I can’t believe that. Honestly, jit all happens so fast that this is the thought I have after. All I am trying to do is knock it out of the park and not waste an opportunity. Afterwards I will be like oh that was cool.”

On Dan Lambert:

“Honestly, the amount of people he has had us rub shoulders with, the connections, and the heat he gets. People don’t like him, but I am noticing lately that people are turning a corner on Dynamite Dan. I think it is because they understand the fact that he is a world class entertainer and performer. He is knocking it out of the park every single week. Us as a unit, I don’t think there has been a point where people have been like well that sucks. Whether it is 60 to 90 seconds, we make sure that we maximise our seconds. I have noticed that we are on TV every week and people don’t really notice the length, they just remember that they got to see us.”

On Ethan Page tattoos:

“A guy got ‘Tight Tits’ tattooed on his calf, so that’s there forever. But that’s not the first, a guy literally got my face tattooed on him. It kind of looked like Eddie Guerrero, but he told me that it was me so I will take it.”

On “Tightest Tits In The Game”:

“So I am all about wordplay. Things that sound good and shock value to stand out. My social media has always been like well what will get a laugh, a like or an interaction. So I am there like well why do women only get to talk about tits. I’ve got tits too and they are the tightest in the game. I got the best smile and the tightest tits in the game, “All Ego” Ethan Page.”

On the response:

“I just walked past everyone. I’m just so glad that it happened on Dynamite where it was live. [Chris asks if he ran it by anyone.] No, could you imagine? “So Tony I was thinking that tonight I was going to talk about my tits.” I could get this all approved, but people don’t understand the delivery or the context, it might get shot down. I know that we won’t get taken off of the air for it, but someone might say ‘You’re going to say what?! No no no, we are going to take that out.’”

On his future goals:

“As long as I am in a better position than I am now. It’s not that I am not about chasing titles or main events, it’s just that I understand how the business works a lot more now in my old age. I started this very young and I have been doing this for 16 years. My mindset has changed, as long as I am on an upward trajectory, I am happy.”  

On possibly not making it as a wrestler:

“Oh yeah many times. Just the fact that when I am flying home I am staying in America, that blows my mind. A company values me that they will sort out my paperwork and allow me to live here with my family. I thought it would happen before my family, maybe I am a greedy dude that wants the family and the dream. But everything happens for a reason, why tempt fate?”

On AEW titles:

“I would love that of course, but I won’t hang my hat on that. My goals have changed where I want to work for a long time, but I don’t want to be in the ring for a long time. I want to leave a legacy in wrestling that has a large enough connection so that when I am at conventions in my 50s or 60s fans that grew up watching me perform have that connection with me and in pop culture. For me, to retire and sit at home, I don’t think that is going to be me. Maybe as a producer to help people with their promotions or something.”     

On who Ethan Page looks to for advice:

“Oh man there are so many options. I love talking to Jerry Lynn and I love talking to Arn Anderson. I love talking to Dean Malenko, these guys have a wealth of knowledge and have helped some of the biggest stars in professional wrestling. Jim Ross too, the guy that signed The Rock. If these are the footsteps I am trying to follow, why not go to the route of everything. These guys have moulded me without knowing it and have made me apply things without knowing it, why not give it a shot?”

On what Ethan Page is grateful for:

“My wife, my son and my daughter as one, family is two and that I am in AEW.”

Miles Teller (@miles_teller) is an actor known for his roles in films like Top Gun: Maverick, Whiplash, The Spectacular Now, War Dogs, Bleed For This, Footloose and The Divergent Franchise. He joins Chris Van Vliet to talk about his new movie SPIDERHEAD that starts streaming on Netflix on Friday, June 17th. He talks about working with Top Gun: Maverick director Joseph Kosinski on Spiderhead, what he learned starring with Tom Cruise, his wife Keleigh Sperry’s thoughts on his moustache, the role that changed his career and much more!

Miles Teller you are just absolutely crushing it! You have this and Top Gun, two movies out at the same time:

“I know, and a show. The Offer is now on Paramount Plus. It might be a bit too much.”

This is incredible, congratulations. When you work with Joe [Kosinski] on Top Gun and then on Spiderhead, is it like rekindling with an old friend?

“100%, I mean Joe and I have had such a good time. We are still in the middle of the Top Gun press tour right now and doing Spiderhead press together. He is my brother from another mother. I feel like we have a good thing going together, we have done 3 now and I hope there are many more to come.”

That Top Gun moustache was epic. When you wrapped Top Gun did you shave it right away or did you hold onto it for a while after?

“I was sad to see it go, my wife, I think she was like on a calender counting down the days until she could shave it.”

Your character in this film is in the place that he is at because of a specific moment in his life. I’m curious, what for you is that defining moment that got you to that next level?

“Oh man, I don’t know. I think that I got really lucky with this first movie that I did, which was Rabbit Hole. To get that opportunity right out of college, right off the bat I was in a movie that people saw. Nicole Kidman got nominated for an Oscar for it, that was a really, I couldn’t have started with a better film. I think each film builds the audience in a bigger way, and now with Top Gun I will see what happens after this. I am taking it all in as it comes.”

What do you think is one piece of advice you learned as a young actor that you carry onto the set as an older actor?

“I think it carries over with the work. I think some people get too caught up in how they are perceived, so they try, I don’t know, it’s really all about the scene work. Something that I have taken, I have been first on the call sheet a couple of times, that’s something I take with a heft amount of responsibility. I try to be there for the cast and the crew and try to bring a certain levity to certain situations. I understand that there are people working tougher than you and longer hours than you, so don’t take yourself too seriously. That is something that I have maintained.”

You have to play a wide range of emotions in this movie, which is the hardest?

“One scene was tough because I was talking like it was the most beautiful thing that I had seen. My character’s serotonin was pumping and it’s all imaginary because I am just staring at a bunch of crew guys. I remember there was this garbage truck that kept driving by and I was frustrated by it, that was a tough one.”

When you have to learn a specific set of skills, such as playing the drums in Whiplash, can you still do those like you did on set?

“Well I have always been a good dancer, I just want to put that on the record. You either have rhythm or you don’t, it’s not really something you can learn. But with the jets, that was something, being able to withstand the G Force, that is a depreciating skill. If I went up in an F18 tomorrow, I would puke.”

You filmed Maverick and then you did Spiderhead, what is something you learned from Tom Cruise and took to this?

“I think like I said before it’s that leadership and responsibility. Also to understand how many people are feeding their families from this business. There is always somebody working longer hours than you and doing a job you don’t want to do. It’s all about acknowledging everyone and I try to get to know a but about everyone that I am working with.”

Featured image: Games Radar

Miles Teller stars in Spiderhead, which is released on Netflix on June 17th.