Chris Bey (@dashingchrisbey) is a professional wrestler known for his time in IMPACT Wrestling and New Japan Pro Wrestling. He joins Chris Van Vliet at the Blue Wire Studios at Wynn Las Vegas to talk about how he got started as a pro wrestler, moving his entire life to Las Vegas to chase his dreams, how he got signed by IMPACT Wrestling, winning the X Division Championship, his main event with Rich Swan, joining Bullet Club in NJPW and much more!

On Chris Bey being his real name:

“My first wrestling name was terrible. It was, shout out to Roderick Strong, but it was Chris Strong, The Genetic Genius. I thought it was pretty hard, but everybody in Vegas, like all my trainers said ‘Wait, your name is Chris Bey? Why don’t you just wrestle as that?’ I didn’t know how wrestling works, I didn’t want to get heat with anybody like ‘Oh this guy thinks he can use his real name.’ Like John Cena right? When I first realized I had a great last name, I was in middle school. I was writing down my initials in biology class, terrible at biology so I wasn’t paying any attention. I’m just writing down my name a million times over and over, I’m looking at my name and I’m like imagine this on the back of a football jersey. I had written raps and I was going to start again, so I’m like OK, I’m going to drop everything under the name Chris Bey. Like I’m going to do it now, and it just took on a world of its own.”

On where the story began:

“I was born in Maryland and I grew up in Alexandria, Virginia, a lot of my family is still in that area. All of my family is back there and I started there, I’m the youngest of 6, I have 5 older brothers. I am so tough because they were always trying to jump me back then. Naturally I was super small until high school, but I’m like if I want to be a pro wrestler then I should probably start lifting weights. But bro, they were wrestling fans and they beat me up, but it was good times.”

On wrestling being his dream:

“It was either that or being the first black president, but Obama beat me to it. Man I was tight when he won, but Obama, you took my dreams away from me so many years before I could try. I was the school president, I was trying to be you before you were! But it was around 8 when I knew I wanted to be a wrestler. It was when Eddie Guerrero won the title from Brock Lesnar, we couldn’t afford cable so we were watching a lot of DVDs. The first one I got was Cheating Death, Stealing Life and I watched that every day. People in my life, a lot of them have had addiction problems. When I saw what Eddie had overcome, he got his family back and made it to the top of the mountain when people thought he couldn’t. And watching the people in the building when he won that title, man I couldn’t imagine how it was going to play out. Just that story, this is what I want to do, make people feel how this made me feel.”

On realising he could be a wrestler:

“I implore all wrestlers to do their research, because there are so many people out there with different schools and different availabilities, styles, techniques and opportunities. I have been doing my research since 15 in graphics class, doing no work! I wish I had paid attention anymore. But instead I was researching and training Team 3D training academy, emailing Ring of Honor, watching videos. Then when I was 18 to 20, I knew I wanted to go into wrestling after I graduated, but I had no money. I remember sitting on the side of the road and I had like 70 cents. Fresh out of high school, I knew I needed to get a job but I had no experience. Eventually I got a job as a cashier and that was my home for the next 2 years.”

On saving up:

“I’m watching wrestling and I am saving up. But the more I am saving up, the more that doubt is creeping into my mind. My friends are coming back from college and seeing me at the restaurant, they are on the other side like ‘How’s the wrestling going?’ I’m like ‘Yeah, still going good but still saving.’ I am realizing that damn I am procrastinating. Looking forward to my 20th birthday, I had a friend who lived in Vegas, so I went there. I land in Vegas and it’s 76 degrees, and I’ve never experienced a birthday where it is not cold. The last day it dawns on me that they probably have wrestling here. I looked it up, Future Stars of Wrestling. But I didn’t have time to see the school, so I’m like damn, I wish I got to see that. But the next month my dad passes away, I get the call, he was going through colon cancer at the time. There were times I would get off work and go and see my dad in the hospital and not responding. He started to reject the medicine up until the last day, I’m standing over him and this is real. I took a seat and it the machine started beeping, they said that now is the time for last words. Selfishly, one of my thoughts was that he would never see me wrestle, because he bought all of the wrestling toys, the DVDs, took me to 12 WWE events. He didn’t care for wrestling, but he knew that I did. After he passed, his funeral and birthday was the same weekend as WrestleMania 32. I decided to go to Connecticut to watch it with one of my friends, who I had been friends with for a while, because I wanted to be around someone who likes wrestling.”

On the deciding factor to pursue wrestling:

“I remember doing the funeral, hopping on a plane and going to Connecticut. This was the biggest WrestleMania of all time at that point. I am watching the opening match and Zack Ryder, Matt Cardona is in the match when he not supposed to be, I think Neville got hurt. He wins the Intercontinental Title, his dad gets in the ring and I am pissed off, because I will never get to have that moment. I just buried my dad and I am watching this guy celebrate with his dad. I’m just like, that’s it, I am getting the f*ck of my ass and I am doing this. I started researching Future Stars of Wrestling, the cost and the living, and they called me right before I was about to start a workout. They gave me the low down and I said I will probably see them in a couple of months. After deciding whether or not this was the move I wanted to make, I bought a one way ticket to Vegas, no insurance. I said to my mom ‘I’m going to Vegas to do wrestling.’ And she’s like OK, and that was it.”

On having no excuses:

“That’s how you to have to do it. I used to say that I would have my back against the wall so I would either do it or do it. That’s why I came to Vegas. People don’t realize how much I have to sacrifice. I haven’t just sacrificed my nieces and nephews growing up, a lot of family passed after I moved out here, so I missed a lot of funerals. I couldn’t go back for the funerals and for the important moments. After 6 months of living in Vegas not getting a job that would also let me train, it was like 6 to 9pm, well sorry, training is 4 until 7pm. I did nothing for money, what I did first was I blew through my savings and sold all my finest possessions. I sold guitars and my collection of wrestling belts. All I had left was a bed, no car and I couldn’t afford an apartment, for a while I was sleeping in the school and then in a friend’s kitchen. But I knew if I had the wrestling, then the rest of it wouldn’t matter. I had been obsessing for 20 years and didn’t have it, but now I have it.” 

On never giving up:

“There were times where I would call my mom and I would break down. There were times where I was like this is hard, I can’t get on my feet. She was like well come back here and you can that job back and stack up some money. I said ‘Listen, I know you don’t want to hear this, but I would rather be homeless here than go back there.’ The difference between me here and me there is that I got to be me here in Vegas. People were like ‘You were too small.’ So I avoided it all this time, I only went back there recently, it’s a dangerous place where I come from.”

On the first break:

“I started getting a little better with it about 2018. The first time I touched IMPACT was 2018. It took me a while because I was young and dumb, I was not concerned about real life at all. I was negating credit, bills and savings because of wrestling. I don’t have my dad to tell me some of these things, he was a very smart person. I didn’t understand, I was struggling. I would have this plan where if I worked hard and hustled, I could then get a contract and take things more seriously. But it wasn’t until I started wrestling as Chris Bey that things changed.”

On being a WWE extra:

“So I did some extra work for WWE about a year in. I’m not on screen for this one, but I did a 3 day loop and got to work a match in front of the talent. I worked a local wrestler named Nino Black, me and him had just lost out tag titles at the time, so we were like if we are going to get contracts, then we are going to have to wrestle each other here at The Staples Center.”

On his goals moving forward:

“To keep shocking the world with everything that Bullet Club is doing. Bullet Club is something that people want to say is watered down, nah you ain’t seen nothing yet. The big LG, Karl Anderson, me, Juice Robinson, we are only getting bigger.” 

On Bullet Club merch money:

“I’ve never asked. There have been 16 members so probably 1/16th of it. I see people wearing Bullet Club shirts who don’t even know who I am! I am fan of when things in wrestling bleed into real life.”

On being mistaken for other wrestlers:

“Yeah, all the time. At first I thought it was just a trolling thing, but now that it is happening more in person, I don’t think it is. It started with Kofi, but he has gone on his New Day Podcast that he got the blonde from me. I told it so many times that I thought I was lying. I was doing 205 Live when I was doing it, and Kofi said ‘Man I like your hair, I was thinking about doing it. And now I see it, it’s a great idea.’ I’m like yeah do it so they can think we are the same person even more, we laughed about it. So he debuts on SmackDown with the hair and my timeline is blowing up of ‘Is that Chris Bey on SmackDown? Oh wait it is Kofi.’ The other one is Swerve, I guess now because he is on AEW it is happening more. We were at Wale Mania, me and him are walking up the stairs, I am right behind him. This girl looks me dead in my soul, walks by and goes ‘Oh my God Swerve! Can I get a picture?’ She is looking in my soul. I stop and look at her, look back at him, and look back at her. I’m like, it’s literally the guy right in front of me. People are like does it trigger me? I’m like yes!”   

Using mistaken identity to his advantage:

“I’ve had my moments where I have benefitted off of it. I ran in a Jack In The Box one time when the inside was open at like 3am. The guy was in the back cleaning and I’m like ‘Excuse me, can I get a milkshake?’  He goes ‘yeah just give me a second.’ He comes to the front and he’s like ‘Hey, you that’s wrestler aren’t you?’ I go [leans back] ‘Which one?’ He goes ‘Kofi.’ I’m like ‘Yes sir, that’s me. What’s up with that milkshake though? Is it on the house?’ And it was, I have reaped the benefits. But it does suck that you work so hard to separate yourself and be you, and then you get immediately discredited by people who are not caring to look at the work. ‘Oh you look like that person, so you are that person.’ You’re like, ok.” 

On pandemic wrestling:

“I’m a vocal wrestler, I like to tell one liners and things like that. If you see me live, I do a lot of that and you won’t hear it on TV. When we wrestled during the pandemic, I got back and agents were like ‘Yeah, maybe don’t do that. Maybe wait until we get crowds back.’ Well how else do I entertain the people if all they can hear is me breathing? We worked so hard but, man. But wrestling will always be there. When the pandemic started, once the world had to legit stop, I had been going non stop since I moved to Vegas. I was doing everything and setting goals. I did extra work with WWE and did work with IMPACT, and I wanted to sign with IMPACT. I was there and I was figuring it out, and anybody who is anybody got shook up by what happened. Everybody got affected, but in my position, I’m in Vegas 2000 miles away from my family and trying to figure out what was going on. We didn’t film for 9 weeks, the world is shut down and people are trying to balance what is important, to me it was family. My nieces and nephews are getting older and understanding what I do and watch me on tv. So I asked myself, if wrestling stopped, what would I do with my life? I then got motivated, got my real life stuff together like my vision and getting my tooth fixed, it got knocked out in 2018. I made more money than I ever had, then I blew my calf out. I couldn’t walk to the kitchen, but what if it was worse, how could I survive? And at this point, there is no crowd so I am getting no response. My whole career in IMPACT was in front of nobody. I won the X Division Title in IMPACT, I called my mom and she fell asleep during the pay-per-view. I’m like is any of this real? Now I am getting hurt, nothing felt certain and that I was going in the right direction. I started feeling like, I’m getting older and looking at my 30s, what do I want that to look like? Well I want to be mobile, have enough money to eat, a lot of that to figure out. Once we got back to live events and my shirt are selling out, now I get to feel that again and see people you inspire. That is why I got in this business, not money and not security, it’s what you do out there. Now I am doing shows again, it reminded me of what I am doing and my legacy.”

On what Chris Bey is grateful for:

“The ability to wake up today, my family has been supportive and all the people.”

Image credits: Instagram

Chris Hemsworth (@chrishemsworth) is an actor and producer. He joins Chris Van Vliet to talk about his new movie SPIDERHEAD which begins streaming on Netflix on Friday, June 17th. He talks about what Father’s Day looks like in the Hemsworth household, the role that changed his life, what being Thor has meant for him, whether he is still working on a Hulk Hogan biopic with director Todd Phillips and much more!

Happy Father’s Day for this Sunday! I’m curious, what does Father’s Day look like in the Chris Hemsworth household?

“It varies. My boy is 8 and my daughter is 9. I guess now they are at the age  where it looks like something, breakfast in bed or let me go for a surf and have some space. But I’m sure that they will make it all about them. I will be making them breakfast and taking them out for a surf.”

How nice was it being in Australia to film this?

“Oh it was fantastic. We were right in amongst the COVID lockdowns and restrictions when we were shooting. People were shooting and I spoke to a lot of people in the film industry who were wanting to go to work but just sitting around. But if we were going to do something, it had to be contained and set on 3 or 4 sound stages an hour from my house, and it was fantastic. We shot what would have taken 2 or 3 months, we shot it in 4 or 5 weeks. It was so much fun and we shot it like we would if it was a piece of theater. Everything was set up weeks in advance and every little piece of the set, once we got on the set we just powered through.”

You are in Australia but you are doing an American accent. How easy is it to slip into that accent?

“It’s a lot of work. When I lived in LA for 10 years, I was around the accent a lot and immersed, so it was very easy to switch it. Since I have lived in Australia and mainly playing Thor, I haven’t done an American accent in a while. I worked really hard on this, a had a voice coach and became obsessed about it. We listened to endless tapes on people who had the vocal quality that we wanted to have. It’s just repetition and immersion over and over. Then you just don’t think about it and you can concentrate on the performance.”

I am a huge wrestling fan and was so excited when I heard that Chris Hemsworth was going to be Hulk Hogan. Is this happening?

“Err maybe. Todd Phillips is busy doing Joker 2 I believe. I’ve been off doing other films, so it has all been in conversations and developments amongst other things. A lot of different things need to come together, I don’t have 24 inch pythons, yet!”

So many people in Spiderhead have this defining moment in their life. For you Chris, what is that defining role?

“Star Trek really kicked it off. Thor is the obvious next step, but I was in LA and did a couple of things and then Star Trek came along. I remember being called into J.J. Abrams’ office and read opposite him the scene. I had no idea what the film was going to be. We shot it, forgot about it and then it came out and it got me all of this attention. That is what got me back in the room on the Thor auditions and started that journey.”

Featured image: Refinery 29

Jeff Goldblum (@jeffgoldblum) is an actor and musician known for his roles in films like Jurassic Park, Independence Day, The Fly and many others. He joins Chris Van Vliet to talk about the new movie Jurassic World: Dominion, what his meeting in 1993 with Steven Spielberg for Jurassic Park was like, how his character was almost cut from the original movie, his iconic line “Life finds a way”, his thoughts on being considered a national treasure and more!

I’m curious, does anyone call you Jeffrey?

“You know, that is on my birth certificate and passport. You may call me Jeffrey, do you know what my middle name is? It starts with L. Lynn”

Do you think Ian Malcolm is the character you know the best since you have played him so many times now?

“I did a TV series, I did characters over and over and I have done plays. But the way we have a chance to get a crack at this over 30 years. I have never done that before, that is unique. It’s been able to simmer like in a crockpot.”

Take me back 30 years to the original meeting with Stephen Spielberg about Jurassic Park.

“Well my agent said that I am going to meet Stephen Spielberg. Well great! I adore him and this is the opportunity of a lifetime. My agent said it’s about the Jurassic Park story by Michael Crichton. I went out and got the book, loved it. I loved my character, then I had this meeting where Spielberg said ‘Jeff it’s nice to meet you, I love your work and I didn’t want to cancel the meeting. But the most recent version of the script, it doesn’t have your character in it, so this may be moot.’ I said ‘Really? Oh my golly. Well I just read the book, here is why that character could be interesting.’ I’m sure it had no impact on the decision, but it got the character back in the script and got me into the movie. They offered me the part and it changed my life.”

What is more famous from the movie. Either your line ‘Life finds a way.’ Or the shirtless meme that is making the rounds? 

“I couldn’t compare them. That is apples and oranges. I am shocked that either of them or any part of what I did has struck anybody’s long term interest. I like the ‘Life finds a way’ thing.”

Everyone has said that you Jeff Goldblum are a national treasure. At what point did you think that?

“Maybe they just think the movie that Nicholas Cage has acted in. I don’t know if I am any kind of treasure though.”

Featured image: Cinema Blend

Austin Gunn (@theaustingunn) and Colten Gunn (@thecoltengunn) are brothers known by their AEW tag team name “The Gunn Club”. They join Chris Van Vliet at the Blue Wire Studios at Wynn Las Vegas to talk about how they got started in wrestling, having WWE Hall of Famer Billy Gunn as their father, their reaction to his Billy and Chuck storyline in WWE, what they think of the “Ass Boys” nickname given to them by Danhausen, their goals in pro wrestling, Austin’s music career, why Colten left his job to pursue a career as a wrestler and much more!

On teaming with Colten:

Austin: “So Colten has been in California when I started.”

Colten: “I was in Santa Monica. Right after college I was ready to move into corporate America. I was moving to LA and was building custom houses out there, like 3 stories with elevators. We had a few Lakers players move in and the CEO of Snapchat. I was doing that, I was in my trailer and on the job site, and for some reason I always, because him and dad were on AEW and doing their thing. So I just kept thinking of promos or moves or names of stuff.” 

Austin: “He would just text me out of the blue like ‘This would be cool if you and dad did it. But it would be cooler if we did it.’ He was subtly over time just pushing and pushing.”

Colten: “So I called Rikishi because he has a school out there. I was like ‘Don’t tell my dad and don’t tell your students.’ But I was going to come in one time to see what it was like. Of course when I got there, I am like a clone of my dad, so everyone knew who I was. That didn’t work very well! So after that I called my dad and I said ‘Dad I want to try this, I went to Rikishi’s school…’ And he was like ‘Why didn’t you tell me!’”

Austin: “He was heated. We were driving to some town one day and he says ‘Did Colten tell you he went to Rikishi’s the other day?’ I went ‘Yeah.’ Then he went ‘Well why didn’t you tell me! What does he want? Does he want to be a wrestler?’ He started asking me and I’m like I don’t know.”

Colten: “So I took 2 weeks off from work and went to the Breeze and Spears school, Flatbacks. My dad said ‘Do you really want to do this? 110%, no half ass?’ No pun intended. So I quit my job in LA and drove across the country and started. In November that will be 2 years.”

On having a famous dad:

Colten: “That’s how I was at first, I did not want to be a wrestler.”

Austin: “Yeah he ran away from wrestling and I ran to it.”

Colten: “Yeah I was like I do not want to do this. Then for some reason I wanted to do this, I just wanted to do this.”

Austin: “I was getting more and more texts. Eventually I was like dude if you want to do it then do it, dad will train you.”

On Austin being the MVP of Daily’s Place:

Austin: “Absolutely I am owning that! First I was like oh I am doing a good job, but now I am owning this one. It’s like on BTE, Nick Jackson said ‘There is no crowd, there is just Austin Gunn.’ When I hear that it’s kind of true. Me and dad were there at Atlanta and we thought that we would have to film at Atlanta for the rest of time. We were like oh my gosh. It was very quiet and I was injured at the time, I said ‘Dad, do you want to just go out there and have some fun?’ He says ‘Yeah I will go out there with you.’ So I made water bottles with coins in them, I was like dude how can I make as much noise as possible. Just to let our talent and wrestlers know that someone is cheering for them. Fans are crucial in our business, we feed off of them and switch direction based off them. If they can feel something then it will make them feel comfortable. The opening scene to that Atlanta one is a camera right in my face going ‘Wooaaahh! I love it here!’ People online didn’t know me as a wrestler yet, they were just like who is this annoying kid? I just kept reading terrible comments about me, so I am getting attention. But then every week I would buzz Jamie, our camera guy, and every opening scene was right in my face. Over and over, and when we went to Daily’s Place I ramped it up. And my voice doesn’t give out, I can just keep going and going at like 2am.”

Colten: “We did like 7 hours.”

Austin: “Yeah 7 hours of yelling. Someone from our company said ‘Well how hard can it be to cheer in the crowd.’ Me and Colten looked at each other and I’m like I dare you to do what we are doing for 7 straight hours! Rinse and repeat, match after match. And then we would go in the back, change and wrestle at 2:30 in the morning. When we went out there everyone was like [claps quietly]. I’m like really? This is how we are going to do this? Let me take advantage of what I can do.”

On trying to fill the shoes of The New Age Outlaws:

Austin: “You don’t try to fill those shoes ever. That’s always one of those things that dad told us is like, it was never pushed on us. It was never ‘You have to live up to this level.’ He was like ‘If you have fun, I will teach you everything you know. If you are just trying to fill our shoes, then get out of the business.’ We still get super nervous before shows, but we just go out there and be ourselves.”

Colten: “I think if we are like, how are we going to fill the shoes of The New Age Outlaws, then you lose sight of who you think you are. What makes you different? The more we are in front of a crowd, the more we find ourselves.”

On seeing WWE stars growing up:

Colten: “They [The New Age Outlaws] travelled so much, but we would travel with dad sometimes in the summer when we didn’t have school, so we knew all the guys. But they travelled so much that when you are home for like 2 days, no one is going to come over.”

Austin: “We didn’t see Road Dogg as much unless we went to the shows. We maybe saw Big Show more, he gave us our first Playstation and Xbox at Christmas, at the same time. He was like ‘I have a little present for you, it’s in my trunk.’ He opened it and it was an XBox with 5 games, PS2 with 5 games and he goes Merry Christmas. I think he was the closest one to an uncle. We were on a wrestling cruise one time for Disney, and me and Colten were getting too crowded in the adults pool. There was like a captain’s pool, very private. Big Show took us over there so we could have some privacy. The boat captain comes out and starts yelling ‘Those kids, you need to get the hell out of this pool!’ Big Show was in the water and have you ever seen those workout videos where the guy jumps out of the water and onto the thing? That’s exactly what he did, as heavy as he was and he grabbed the captain by the collar and says ‘If you ever talk to them like that again, I will throw you over this boat and I will drive us home.’ The fear in that man’s eyes, dude I can’t even imagine! I would poop my pants.”

On being on TV with Billy Gunn:

Colten: “When he is on TV you are just drawn to him.”

Austin: “He is more of a camera hog than I am! He tries to downplay it.” 

Colten: “This is the problem, I am the third. You’ve got Austin and dad fighting for this camera and I’m just there.”

On Danhausen:

Colten: “We don’t really talk about that guy.”

Austin: “Bleep that out because that is a curse word to us.”

On Billy and Chuck storyline:

Colten: “I was in 5th grade and the teacher I had in 2nd grade asked me ‘How is your other dad?’ I’m like what?”

Austin: “It’s like when you are talking to a new girl and they don’t know what wrestling is, I’m like ‘Yeah we went out there, the whole crowd chanted Ass Boys, we hated it and it was crazy.’ Then they are like what? And I’m like oh they don’t know about wrestling. When you are growing up, they would Google dad and it was the Billy and Chuck Storyline and they were like, what? What is this? What are you guys into? Sometimes it is super awkward when you are trying to explain what we do.”

On a tag team dream match:

Austin: “It would be The New Age Outlaws. Actually no, because dad hits really hard and he beat the crap out of us at practice one day. We were like ‘Me and Colten are gonna wrestle this new kid.’ Dad was like ‘Maybe I will jump in and be his tag team partner.’ We are like ok, whatever. Literally a warehouse with 3 people in flatbacks, Breeze, Spears and a student. When that guy tagged my dad, I don’t know, but his pupils just went and he turned into a machine. I was like is he going to him me, and he was like right in the nose boom! I get up and again boom! I get up and I’m like do you realize you are doing this. He says ‘Sorry guys I get a little jacked up in there.’ Dude my nose is bleeding do you not realize? He’s like ‘No I kind of blacked out, I got the tag and I blacked out.’ Just like boom, psychopath.” 

On what they are grateful for:

Austin: “I think the freedom to do a job I love, having a sibling that wants to take this career path and being able to wrestle with my dad.”

Colten: “Just that I am healthy, everyone has a roof over their heads and I have a job I love.”

Adam Sandler is an actor, comedian and filmmaker. He stars in the new movie HUSTLE with NBA player Juancho Hernangomez from the Utah Jazz who makes his acting debut in the film. They both join Chris Van Vliet to talk about HUSTLE which is streaming on Netflix as of June 8, producing the movie with LeBron James, Adam Sandler’s Oscar snub for Uncut Gems, how acting in a drama is different from a comedy, the life lessons that basketball teaches, the dream team of Adam Sandler characters and more!

Adam I am curious. Since you produced this movie with LeBron James, does this officially make you LeBron’s teammate?

Adam: “We’ve been teammates, I can say that for the rest of my life. When LeBron and I were on the same team, we shared the rock [laughs]. Yes, yes it does, thank you man.”

Juancho: “Yeah man, my teammate LeBron James asked me for movie, I said ‘yes of course.”

Adam: “He [Juancho] has got a picture with him and LeBron. I’m in it too, but I happen to look a lot shorter than these guys.”

So much of this movie is about betting on yourself and trusting your gut. What was your moment in your life where you did that?

Juancho: “It was probably before the draft. Coming to the NBA I did not speak English. I had been playing pro in Spain for 3 or 4 years, but it is nothing close to the NBA or NBA players. So I take my chances, work out really good and I was a first round pick. It made my dream come true, and it was probably the best day of my life.”

Adam: “The ebay day of my life was where I thought I was going to get drafted. But the dream was over when my father said to me ‘What the hell are you talking about!’ My bet on myself was like a slow bet. I was dumb enough back in the day where I said that I was going to be Eddie Murphy. I thought I would be the next Eddie Murphy, I had no idea how I got that confidence, but that became the obsession.”

What is your approach with a drama and how is it different to a comedy?

Adam: “You know what, when you are shooting you know what the scene means in a comedy and you know what the scene means in a drama, it’s just the day to day work. When you make a movie, 30 40 50 days on a set, it’s just doing your days work and making sure that it makes sense.”

Juancho, what do you think is the best lesson that basketball has taught you about life?

Juancho: “Same as the movie. Never give up and keep chasing your dreams. I don’t have any regrets on how hard I worked to make my dream come true. Even if I fail at the end, I will have a career and I would do it all again. I have no regrets on the bad moments, I became who I am for every moment. I would not change the past, I love how it goes and how I learned from the bad moments and the good moments.”

So picture this, it’s a game of basketball and you have all the Adam Sandler characters. Who are you picking first?

Adam: “Bobby Boucher come here.”

Juancho: “I’m picking Happy Gilmore. He can shoot good 3 point shots.”

Featured image: Gold Derby

Tyrus (@tyrussmash) is a professional wrestler, cable news personality and bestselling author. He is known for his time in WWE as Brodus Clay and he is the current NWA Television Champion. He joins Chris Van Vliet to talk about his new book called “Just Tyrus: A Memoir”, being a co-host on The Greg Gutfeld Show on FOX News Channel, why he says his WWE character The Funkasaurus was a punishment from Vince McMahon, how John Cena gave him his special moment at WrestleMania 28, what winning the NWA Television Championship means to him and much more!

On The Funkasaurus being a punishment:

“So first of all, Triple H and Stephanie were just phenomenal. I was with Alberto Del Rio and I really turned some heads. We had a good WrestleMania and they were like this guy is legit. Arn Anderson was getting me ready in the ring as well and making me into this killer heel, with the ultimate goal to be Cena. You want to go there as a heel, against Cena, Taker, Big Show, that’s what you want. So it was a combination of 2 things. One, I make a lot of jokes, obviously. I tease and make jokes in the locker room, I think it was Yoshi Tatsu, who had an all white leather outfit. Boots, pants, shirts, jacket and man bag, all white. He payed like some ungodly amount of money for that. I started teasing him about it, something like how many cows died for you to realize that this is a bad choice? I think he paid 10 grand for this, so I’m like what are you doing? Mark Henry recorded the jokes and he was laughing about it, apparently he decided to show it to the boss, who thought it was funny. The next meeting, Triple H is getting ready to debut his monster, and the boss is like ‘Are you sure? He makes a lot of jokes. Pretty funny guy.’ They are like ‘This is how he is.’ They approached me with being a babyface, to which I responded F no. Maybe at some point, but not now. Then Triple H came back to me, we are running vignettes and stuff, just came off the staples in my head healed and finished the movie No One Lives, I was ready to go. Triple H says ‘[sighs] The old man thinks you are funny.’ I’m like OK man, what does that mean? Triple H then says ‘He thinks you are a babyface.’ I’m like what? I’m the house of pain, how do we get them to cheer for that? Triple H said ‘We don’t. So we change things up.’ You are looking around like someone is trying to jump out like got you! Triple H said ‘One more thing, he wants you to dance too. He loves to dance.’ I don’t dance, even when I was a bouncer in the club. He loves it but I do not! It’s not my thing.” 

“I went back to FCW, went to Dusty and was like ‘They are doing this to me.’ He took it from me and said ‘Look, you are mine, you are my history, you have to pay for my sins. When I wore the polka dots I had a family and a mortgage to pay. I went out there, wore the polka dots and I was a 3 time Heavyweight Champion! Are you saying you are better than me?’ When he did that, it made me feel like an idiot.’ Dusty asked what I like so I said I like Run DMC because they don’t really dance, got the tracksuit. Dusty kicked everyone out the arena and put on the song Moves Like Jagger. He said ‘Dance with me!’ And after a few minutes, you can’t resist The American Dream! Before I know it, we are laughing and having fun. Then he said well who can we get to help you. It just so happens that Naomi was in the position where she was the best athlete in FCW, but they didn’t have a spot for her. This was a step back for her, because she will be a Hall of Famer, but she was like ‘I got you.’ I love The Godfather, but it couldn’t be the ho train, it had to be cheerleader or team situation. We were able to get that together, and with choreography she made me look cool. The thing is, if I don’t want to dance, who cares when you got Naomi and Ariane dancing and doing flips and stuff. No one is tripping, I’m winning!”

On locker room backlash:

“The Undertaker hated it. He’s like ‘Look at you, you are the one guy that looks the part, why are you doing this?’ He was always tough love with me. He goes ‘You should fall. Go out there and fall on the ramp, they will cut the gimmick and you can go back to what you need to be.’ I said ‘Would you do it?’ He said ‘No, I would do what I was told.’ So I didn’t fall, you do what you are told, and it will all work out.”

On John Cena

“We were supposed to have a match with Heath Slater, but time got cut. Cena did one of the most selfless things that a top guy doesn’t have to do. Vince was shaking his head, the match before went over and they were heavy on time. Vince was shaking his head and was like I think we have to cut it. All of a sudden Cena is getting ready, looks at me and says ‘I got to go the bathroom.’ I’m like what? He said ‘6 minutes?’ And he just left, now I had to go! I’m out and I got my WrestleMania moment becasue Cena had to go to the bathroom.”

On his new book “Just Tyrus: A Memoir.”:

“There’s a lot of cutting and a lot of trimming. Like you Chris, you don’t just decide one day to be a reporter. You went through other things you wanted to do and the doors closed. We all have stories, but the thing I tell in the book is that my story is not better than yours, but the color of my skin doesn’t make my story more compelling. We all have to get back to we all have issues, and if we all talk about them honestly, then we have a lot in common. I get a lot of that, especially with all the father stuff. Just on Amazon alone I am at over 3,000 reviews, and I take the time to read all of them. That’s the part where your message gets across and not being praised as a victim. If you are going through stuff now, it’s just all part of the process. The Funkasaurus was technically a punishment, but I turned it around. It could have gone a million different ways.”

On where the story begins:

“Probably just, you always think of that one memory you have as a child. I can think of like 4 specific memories that I can just go back. The most unpleasant memory was the day that we got rescued from my mother, who got away from my biological father, who was a monster to her. Then when he turned it on to me, that was when she had enough. You hate to say that he turned it on me, but if he didn’t then he would have kept the abuse to her. I don’t think that she would have ever got out of it, and it would have ended with her death. We get out of it, catch our breath and not being afraid of the noises in the night. Then my grandfather comes down and basically says that I’ve got to get my life together. I got to go to school, be a nurse, just go and do something, but they can’t stay here. Being pointed out that I can’t have black kids in my house, that it was a shame to the family, that to me was a changing point in my life. That was the first point where I felt like I didn’t belong and there was nothing I could do about it. But I was going to show him that he was wrong and I did belong. You’re not going to change someone’s mind who is set in their ways, but you can change your own mind.”

On the changing day for Tyrus:

“Probably the day that I got fired from the WWE for a second time, that was a game changer for me. My last 3 months in the WWE, I was bitter and angry and was mad that my WrestleMania match got cut. The other guys, Cody and Dustin went on to be tag champs, Tensai was going on to be a trainer, Sandow is Sandow, and I just got left holding the bag. It was a tough pill to swallow and I refused to swallow it. I was there like ‘I could be an actor instead of being here.’ You say those things and you say them enough, it gets around enough so that when the next release comes they release you. I got the call when I was on my way to train at Hard Knocks South. It was Carano calling me. I knew it was either I am going back on the road or I was getting canned, and it was the latter. I remember sitting and going ‘OK big mouth, what have you got.’ Are you going to be that guy sitting backstage at a house show when Triple H walks by and say ‘Hey can I get a dark match?’ You see those guys when you are there, you either feel sorry for them or you are like that’s not going to me. I get it, closed mouths don’t get fed, but you have the least amount of leverage if you are going over to ask. More often than not, you are getting the pity and the worst.”

On the iconic entrance:

“The music wasn’t mine, it was originally Ernest “The Cat” Millar’s. But then I had heat with him and I’m like ‘You know we don’t pick.’ Then that song became where to this day people will still sing it to me.”

On hosting Fox News:

“I was terrified. A lot of my friends were, because I believe the hype, Fox News is supposed to be this super racist network that hated black people if you listened to anybody that was against them. If you didn’t listen to CNN or if you were not a democrat, there was something wrong with you. Also Hollywood wouldn’t hire you. I was apprehensive when Fox News first reached out and wanted me on. I was like well this is a setup, they want me on to try and embarrass me, they picked the wrong one. But my whole thing was to walk towards the fear because it is less scary. I was waiting for them to say ‘Wrestling is fake.’ I didn’t know what was going to happen. I think it was Ariana Grande licking doughnuts and putting them back, I mean taste tests have changed since I was a kid, but when you are her you can just lick stuff and put it back. I made some jokes and we went to a commercial, they said that my timing was great and if I lived in New York I could be a co-host. I said I wouldn’t move to New York, but I could do once a month. It was kind of fun, he asked for my opinion and I made a smart ass comment. It didn’t hurt, there was no lynch mob waiting for me. I came back a month later and did another one. The 4th appearance was where it all went wrong, I lost my suitcase and had to do the show in a t-shirt and shorts. Never good. I believe he wanted to talk about a police brutality accusation in New Orleans. It was being blown up as all cops are racist, the last thing I wanted to talk about. I’m like I want no part of this. But I was told if not me then who? I have been on both sides of it with the police. I really was conflicted, when a black man talks about police or politics, there is a box we are supposed to fall into. If we fall out of the box, we are not only disagreed with but our culture is taken from us, there is something wrong with us. So I was thinking about skipping the show, but a buddy of mine was like interview some cops. If you don’t like what they say then say what you think. So I interviewed cops from different backgrounds, got some stuff off my chest, went on TV and just said it. The response blew up and they wanted me on every week.”

On what Tyrus is grateful for:

“My family, friends and work ethic.”

Embedded images: Instagram

Featured image: Wrestling Inc.

Joey Janela (@thebadboyjoeyjanela) is a professional wrestler. He joins Chris Van Vliet at the Blue Wire Studios in Las Vegas to talk about his contract not being renewed with AEW, recently lighting his foot on fire for a flaming superkick in GCW, the original plans for him and Sonny Kiss in AEW, his regrets about drunkenly trying to fight Enzo at a Blink 182 concert, breaking Eddie Kingston’s orbital bone with a kick to the face, the hate he gets from fans on social media and more!

On the flaming superkick:

“So this is the situation. The night before, me and Drew Parker, who is one of the top deathmatch wrestlers right now. So he’s from England and he moved to Japan to wrestle some of the best deathmatch wrestlers in the world. So he went over there, he lives there, and we bring him over sporadically for GCW maybe once a year. So this match was supposed to happen on New Year’s Eve, but he didn’t want to come over because of the COVID restrictions. So we delayed the match until Los Angeles, and he is one of my favorite dudes. The night before I said to him ‘You are doing a lot of deathmatches, let’s take it easy.’ Instead we did a Joey Janela hybrid plunder match. Outlaw mud show bullsh*t. So we are at The Rainbow Room in South California and I drink a ton of whiskey. |I go ‘Drew, I got an idea. Let’s do 15 minutes of a regular wrestling match, but then it’s like an M. Night Shyamalan twist. All of a sudden it turns into a deathmatch.’ He’s like ‘Let’s do it!’ The next day I’m like f*ck, why did I agree to this? At this point in my career, I don’t want to do deathmatches. I don’t want scars on my face, I got glass still from the last one I did in my arm. But I’m like, let’s do it. Then I came up with the idea, what if I light my foot on fire while doing a superkick? Just playing with the idea and he’s like ‘That sounds cool, can we get lighter fluid?’ I ask Rob Sh*t, that’s his wrestling name, to go out and get me some lighter fluid. Within 10 minutes he comes back with lighter fluid. OK, I guess this is going to happen. I go to Brett Lauderdale, I go ‘Brett, I’m going to light my foot on fire and give Drew a superkick.’ He thought I was bullsh*tting him, being like whatever.’ 

‘So we get out there, and fire spots rarely work perfectly, they go to the right or the left. Either the fire goes out and you look like an idiot, or the fire is blazing and you nearly die. I didn’t want to make it a sh*tty fire spot, so when I took the lighter fluid, I used probably ¾ of that bottle on my foot. When we were ready to go, I took that lighter and that foot was blazing. I didn’t feel it at the time and it was a perfectly executed superkick with the fire, couldn’t have gone any better. But then I am waiting for the water, the only people that [knew about the spot] were me, Drew, the ref and some young guy that was helping out and building stuff and Rob Sh*t. I didn’t want a fire extinguisher, usually they are pointless. Usually you put water on the fire and it goes out. The last thing I want is some f*cking guy spraying a fire extinguisher at me and me breaking out in a rash and my eyes swelling up. The chemicals in a fire extinguisher are terrible for you, these are real and I don’t want that sprayed at me. Usually a bucket of water will do, and that’s what they had. So they get the water and I am trying to get my shoe off. I tied the shoe so tight, I didn’t want there to be a chance that my flaming shoe flew off and went into the crowd. So it was hard to get it off, I get it off and the shoe is on fire, and I look and the sock is on fire, how the f*ck did that happen. So I try to grab my foot and try to put it out with my hands. Eventually Rob Sh*t got his leather jacket out and saves the day.”

On the contract not being renewed:

“There’s chances that I might have been renewed either here or in Ring of Honor. But I just ran my mouth in an interview saying that I hadn’t heard from anyone. Then I heard that Tony was hot about it because it made him look bad and the talent relations look bad. But at the same time, it made them improve their communications with talent. I had talent from the company saying ‘You are 100% correct. That was cool for you to take that risk.’ So I said yes to an interview with Denise Salcedo, I had it and I was stressed out and frustrated. It was just a situation, but I created a lot of good out of it, and I haven’t talked to Tony since. It’s kind of a little, it kind of irked me. We were so cool and I would go out with him after the early shows, because I would stay up with him until 7am drinking tequila. I’m sure it irked him but there are no hard feelings on either side.”

On Tony Khan:

“Tony tries to make everyone happy. It is a fantastic working environment for professional wrestling. There is going to be a lot of politics, but when you have 25 minute matches every week, you are not going to fit everyone on the show and make everyone happy. He tries to make everyone happy.”

On the Joey Janela social media backlash:

“I love it, I love being polarizing. Growing up I was always drawn to the celebrities like Robert Downey Jr. and Tommy Lee, Marilyn f*cking Manson! When I was a kid, that was who f*cked up my life, ECW and Marilyn Manson. I know he is cancelled at the moment, but back then I was obsessed because he was always in the headlines for doing something controversial. People think I have thin skin, certainly not. I have been dealing with this harassment for years. When I rattle the hornet’s nest, it can rattle so much attention. I can light my foot on fire, say something to someone, and then I am trending. Not only am I doing something stupid, but I am acting like an asshole. I am blurring the lines more because I am not with AEW anymore. Now I am an independent guy, I don’t have to worry about TNT or whatever.They would go to Tony Khan ‘This is one of your wrestlers?! Why the f*ck did you hire him?’ This happened to me a few times over there.”

On Joey Janela being creatively stifled:

“I could never completely be myself while being under contract. The Joey Janela before AEW is similar to the Joey Janela now, I am a lot smarter and more mature than I was then. But to the outside people, I am just as idiotic and immature. I watered myself down a lot, I made money every 2 weeks for 3 years. What I learned being part of a TV company is that you can’t buy that sh*t. I learned so much from a lot of the guys there, you learn so much. People think I am untrained, but that’s not the case. I trained the same way a lot of their favorites did in the 70s and 80s. I went to camps and travelled the schools in the United States.”

On Joey Janela not re-signing with AEW:

“So this is the situation. People are going to take this and say that I am creating false narratives and craziness. So the plan was to bring me back to TV, that’s why Tony was like ‘Listen, your act with Penelope was stellar. We have to find a way to replicate your act, we need an athletic female that we can pair you with so we can do a similar act and bring you back to TV. I said that I would start to look on the indies for gymnasts or former cheerleaders that can do some amazing stuff. We looked at a few girls and were on the fence about it, when the lights are on you’ve got to be able to hit those big moves. Penelope was able to do that, she was able to while teaming with me on the indies. But I said to her ‘You have to hit this in one shot!’ And she was like ‘OK, let’s f*cking go!’ Tony wanted something similar to that, I see the girl Kayla doing Phoenix Splashes and Moonsaults, I find out she is a former Olympic gymnast and pro bodybuilder, so I’m like alright! This is different and this is great, she could be Chyna but with crazy aerial moves. We pitched it to Tony, and he is like let’s bring her in. I wanted it to be in the United Center, they debuted her there and was only training for a couple of months in one of the biggest shows in AEW at that point. But she Powerbombed Robert Anthony a bit too hard, he leaped right into it, she’s not a wrestler so she tried to make it as good as possible. It all went around the botches so Tony didn’t like it. So I then did this match with Sonny Kiss and we had 12 minutes on Dark. Right before we go out we are told we have 6 minutes, no 5 minutes, that usually happens on TV. So f*ck, we are supposed to have this big match in our home state, but that match was hot. All action, not a lot of psychology, but a hot crowd. We had them and we had her do the Moonsault on Sonny afterwards and the crowd loses it. Tony is like ‘We have something.’ And Big Show is giving her advice too. Some of the girls were not too happy that someone comes in off the street after 2 months and is on TV. So Tony says the plan is to do another Sonny Kiss and create the whole storyline. So I did and I pitched it to Cody, he liked it and OK let’s go. I’m told after we do the street fight, which I win and another great match, I’m told I’m going back on TV. But after that I am just rolling with the punches and I don’t know what happened.”

On what’s next:

“I want to explore my options and do international tours. Right now I’ve got it down that I am making more money now than in my AEW contract. People think I am bullsh*tting but I was making 6 figures there. Now I am selling my merchandise and stepping up my creative [items]. I am walking out with a ton of merch money. I was doing the indies on top of AEW, but I wasn’t allowed to sell my own merch or take Friday bookings. Tony doesn’t want people promoting their indie shows when they should be promoting the show that signs the cheques. Some of these guys are asking for $6,000 a show, all I ask for is a hotdog and a handshake. They are paying me, but as long as you work hard and want to take this route, I recommend you do. But I am gone 4 to 5 days a week, but I don’t have a family or pets. I’m not mailing in any shows, I am just brutalising myself. But I love wrestling again now.”

On joining NXT:

“Probably not. I have gotten feelers before and I know I am local, but I thought I was restricted and watered down in AEW and walking on eggshells. But NXT is a whole new level, they have the password to your Twitter. If you post something wrong they will take it down and take you into the office and yell at you. But this is me, 95% when I am on social media I am working, I don’t give a f*ck. But I do know how to blur the lines enough.”

On his teeth:

“I just decided that 2022 will be bad boy summer part 2. I want to get buff and get my teeth fixed, which we are in the process of doing right now. Thank you Britt Baker! These are just temps, the real teeth go in in June. These are just temps that are glued in dentures, but they look good for the time being. It’s expensive but it’s worth it. New teeth, new physique and bad boy summer part 2!”

On  Joey Janela fighting Enzo Amore:

“The week later I am at PNC Arts Center and I keep on saying ‘I’m going to f*ck with Enzo.’ Well, we couldn’t find him. I see some guy with a beard walk by dressed in what looks like a potato sack. I go ‘Oh sh*t it’s Enzo.’ So I start punching him in the arm and he didn’t take too kindly to that. The whole thing got caught on video and I look like the biggest f*cking idiot ever. It’s like ‘Tony, this is the guy you put in the main event with Moxley? This f*cking idiot!’ Some of the guys were like ‘F*ck this guy, he makes us look bad.’ There’s guys who are p*ss drunk at Blink 182 concerts and I look like the biggest f*cking idiot. Me and Enzo have talked out and I have apologised, if there is one thing I wish I didn’t do in my life it was that. If you get in a fist fight in New Jersey it’s a $15,000 fine and jail.”

On what Joey Janela is grateful for:

“The places I have gotten to see, the wrestling business and for the booze, drugs and whores!”

Featured image: Post Wrestling

Kim Orton (@kim.orton1) and Giovanna Angle (@giovannaangle) are the wives of professional wrestlers Randy Orton and Kurt Angle. They are also the hosts of “The Wives of Wrestling Podcast” with Jon Alba. They join Chris Van Vliet to talk about how they first became friends, the story of how they met their husbands, how Kim Orton went from being a Randy Orton fan to marrying him, when she thinks Randy Orton will retire, the song they chose for their wedding, the pressures of being married to a WWE superstar, what Randy and Kurt are like when the camera are off and much more!

On how they became friends:

Kim: “It’s been 5 years. We both went to WrestleMania and it was when Kurt was fighting with Ronda [Rousey]? No, he was going into the Hall of Fame. We kind of met by the pool, Giovanna took her babies and was in the lazy river and came over to where me and my rather loud family were. She was like ‘Hi I am Giovanna.’ It was so nice to meet another wife that I have so much in common with. You know, I was mostly friends with a lot of girls and guys in the back because of Randy. To have another wife friend sounds awesome.”

On seeing each other in person:

Kim: “No but funny story. I was in Pittsburgh last weekend and waiting for my car to come and I am texting Randy like ‘Babe, the car never came.’ Randy tries to get in touch with the car company, but then who comes around but Giovanna. She went all out, she had the WWE sign, a wig and glasses, I’m like oh no! She was nervous and waiting for me in disguise, but like us it made sense for it all to get screwed up. It was so great to see her, even if only for one night.”

On names for their husbands:

Giovanna: “We try because of the kids, we call him daddy sometimes. My son is 18 and it’s not his father, but it is daddy in this house. Whenever he is being an idiot I call him Curtis or some stupid little thing, there are many names for him.”

Kim: “It’s actually weird but we for some reason, we call Randy Kevin. I don’t even know a Kevin, but I would just scream babe and it’s the weirdest story, it just reminded me of Home Alone where the mom would scream Kevin. Oddly enough he will answer to it. Then 2 years after the whole Kevin thing started, he did Changeland with Macaulay Culkin. It was weird that it went full circle.”

On podcast rules:

Kim: “Not really. Randy just kind of says to me ‘Try not to mention names.’ Me and my husband get gossipy with each other, so he knows I know a lot. But he also knows that I am not trying to mess with anyone’s life or give out juicy dirt stories. As far as he goes, he is an open book, he will be 100% honest with you and he is cool with it. Sometimes he gets embarrassed when I talk about shaving stories though.”

On a week in the life of Kurt Angle:

Giovanna: “Right now there are a lot of doctor’s appointments because he is getting surgeries done. There is that, Kurt is getting 2 knee replacements at the same time on Tuesday. I am terrified, the thing about Kurt is that I wanted him to go straight from the hospital to the center so he can’t think about anything else. But I guess after the hospital we will be going home for a few days and then someone to help him every day. The thing about Kurt is that I see him in so many situations after recovery where he is like ‘I’m good.’ He has always had that mentality because he always wanted to get back in the ring, but I have said to him ‘You are not getting back in the ring.’ This is serious, after every surgery, he just did the minimum so he was healed, that was why his knees were bent. This time they are also going to be straightening his legs again, he’s going to be so tall again!”

On Randy’s nagging injuries:

Kim: “I would say right now for Randy it’s the hamstrings. He wakes up and he uses the massage gun. After a few hours with that he is ready to go.”

On a typical day for Randy:

Kim: “So it’s been so busy since COVID. It is crazy, since COVID he has had this awesome schedule. He has really been going just for Raw, so he would leave on Sunday, do Raw on Monday and be home on Tuesday. But now he is also doing SmackDown, so he is gone Thursday, does SmackDown on Friday, maybe a house show on Saturday, pay-per-view Sunday, he can be gone the whole weekend. Now there is Europe too, so he has been gone a lot more, which does suck. We have a lot going on and I kind of need him here, but he does get those relaxing few days.”

On Randy’s career:

Kim: “He looks great and he can just keep going. I get so jealous why he is so shredded and I’m not. He says to me ‘Well you eat like sh*t.’ [laughs]. Maybe if I tried a little harder.”

Giovanna: “We will just get fat together, it’s all good.”

Kim: “Well the warmer it gets, the more I eat, I don’t know what is going on there. But yeah I think that Randy will stop when he doesn’t feel like doing an RKO anymore. Right now he does a lot of physical therapy and warming up before his matches. The bus helps too in so many ways.”

Giovanna: “Kurt says he wishes he had the bus when he was wrestling. He said ‘That’s one thing I wish I had.’ I’m like that’s the thing? You should have taken care of your body better Kurt. Just like the RKO, the Angle Slam was on his back too, it’s rough on your body. But Randy is doing it right and I wish Kurt did that too.”

On having wrestlers as husbands:

Kim: “So we were at 2 different stages of our lives when we met our husbands. I had kids, he had kids and we had both been married. I had a life for a very long time of people not knowing or caring about me. Just normal things that you get to do, not that I go around fighting people. Just normal life where no one cares about your daily activity. But now people are interested and they have opinions. People were saying things about me that were just not true. Randy taught me how you have to have a thick skin, because people are always going to talk. I feel like people always did talk, but I never heard it, but now I do. You just have to make the choice. But you know, it is what it is. I think it is weirder for our kids, they grew up watching Randy on TV, and now they see him and they see Shawn Michaels and Triple H and they are dying. It was an adjustment but it is not a thing anymore.”

Giovanna: “I think it’s the same with Kim. You don’t have anything in common anymore, my problems are not the same as their problems. It sucks because I could only hold a certain type of conversation with my friends growing up or people I know, but that is where it ends. If they talk about wrestling, I didn’t grow up watching it, I just kind of fell into it. I don’t look at a person as a wrestler, just as a person. The fans are so loyal and so hardcore, our husbands are known around the world and I forget who he is sometimes.”

On how they met their husbands:

Giovanna: “So we met on the set of an independent movie. We just kept running into each other and it was the craziest thing. We just ran into each other and a friend introduced us and I thought he was so sexy, a sexy Kurt. So I ended up being friends with his friend who ended up losing his keys at the Arnold Classic in Ohio. We were like how are we going to get home? Kurt had a spare key and my mom was 4 hours away, so I called her to help me, and my mom comes out in the morning with the spare key, threw the key at me and drove all the way back, she is the coolest mom ever. This psycho mother of mine kept Kurt’s number all this time and she called me to call him to see if he is ok. So I texted him to make sure he was OK, I am walking back to my class and he called me. He was happy I reached out and was going to ask for my number. It was crazy because he was going through some sh*t at that time, I wasn’t going to jump in but I knew he needed a friend. We started hanging out and then started dating in November. A couple of months later we got matching tattoos. Shortly afterwards he proposed, he proposed in March and I got pregnant in April, it was a wild ride.”

Kim: “I think it was a he was supposed to be with me type of thing. I watched wrestling as a kid like everyone did. But I grew up, fell out of love with wrestling and had kids. But then they got into wrestling and Shawn Michaels was still there so I got into it. Then I’m like who is this guy, it’s Randy Orton and I’m like this guy looks good. I started watching Randy more, didn’t care too much about his personal life but he was this fine, fine guy. I feel like if I met him, we would fall in love. It was so strange, I lived in New York when I met him, and there was this little arena in the Civic Center in Poughkeepsie, and they announce WWE is coming. I’m like there is no way that Randy is coming 10 minutes from my house. So I am calling for tickets, I took my 2 oldest and we went to the show. We got there 30 minutes before doors opened, standing out there and Randy’s bus was there. We have all these pictures of Daniel Bryan, Roman Reigns and Dolph Ziggler walking in. It was so hot out but I wanted to see Randy, my kids were getting too hot. He has his match and he walks past and takes pictures, stops right in front of me and asks if I want a picture. He asks me my name and I was dying! I was trying to be cool but I was shaking. I gave the security guard my phone number and the guard gave me Randy’s and we started texting. So I meet him and we go hang out for an hour. He then said he would be around for a few more days and do we want to hang out, and we have been together ever since that day.”

On what they are grateful for:

Kim: “Health, happiness and to be working with my best friend.”

Giovanna: “Healthy family being alive and having an amazing husband and dad for the family.”

Featured image: Pintrest

Lince Dorado (@lince_dorado) is a professional wrestler known for his time in WWE and MLW. He joins Chris Van Vliet to talk about how he got started in wrestling, working as a math teacher, the books that have inspired him the most, being a father of 4, Lucha House Party, his release from WWE, luchadors being compared to Rey Mysterio and much more!

On when it is time to wear a mask:

“Anything wrestling related has the masked persona. But if it’s not in the ring, it’s really me. Everything else you see on TV, that had to be me, but now it is me.”

On his indie character being different to his WWE character:

“Well it’s not different, it’s just me. It literally is me, I had to represent an idea of what a luchador is supposed to be. A couple of years later I decided to change it up. Everything a luchador was meant to be, I did the opposite. I wanted to speak English and didn’t want to wear tights, I just wanted to be different. It’s a breath of fresh air to just be me. It’s a great feeling.”

On how the indies are different to WWE:

“Honestly, now I don’t have to run ideas by anybody other than myself. Now I can really produce all of the content I want, look and sound how I want and present myself how I want to. We have this idea on how a luchador should be, and I don’t want to be that person. I always told Vince ‘You have got something special here between me and [Grand] Metalik. We understand that wrestling does not come first in WWE, it’s an entertainment and movie company.’ We understood that and wanted to do everything different to lucha libre, but we couldn’t do it dude. But now, on a weekly basis I am doing the wrestling at the weekends and creating content on the weekdays.”

On designing masks:

“So my original Lince, and I have been Lince forever, I originally had the eyes closed with the screen and it didn’t have the hair. But everything else was the same, I have always had the ears. As I got into wrestling, right before WWE, I had this mature moment where I aged the mask a little bit. So I grew out the hair and the teeth, I was trying to find myself and it was like a second part of my life. As I got into WWE, I am a businessman and I know the eyes are how we connect, so let’s get rid of the eye visors. The teeth were making it hard to understand me taking, so I got rid of them. I am bald underneath, so I mixed some sideburns mixed in with the beard. We just kept evolving until we got to this part.”

On being typecast as a luchador in WWE:

“I think at first that might have been the case. I knew that coming in, so I tried really hard to break that. So I spoke English and tried to be good brothers with anybody, so they thought of me [as someone] other than a generic luchador. It did help because I was able to communicate with the bosses and not hide in catering or the locker room. It did help that I was able to speak English and communicate. But at the end of the day, WWE is like Disneyland. They need one of everything on each show and if you fit the bill, you fit the bill. It’s kind of hard to convince the beast that you are different. I remember conversations between me, Metalik and Vince, it got emotional. Doing things on show days wasn’t beneficial for us, if we had any appointments to go to Stamford, I think we could have been something fire in WWE. But it was hard to communicate in showtimes, and that was the only time we could.”

On childhood:

“I’m just so cold hearted when it comes to that stuff. All those years of not feeling that love as a child. My dad was murdered when I was young and my mom raised me as a single parent, working two jobs. With that there is a lack of love in the house and pain. It’s hard when you’re an adult and people look at you as a child, you are 35 but they still see you as this 20 year old punk kid. It’s hard to break that barrier, but never say never.”

On missing family while on the road:

“The first 2 or 3 years were really hard, like right before the pandemic. I wouldn’t get to go home to my babies until the weekend. Then I would get like 2 hours sleep and didn’t want to do anything. But then the pandemic hit and it was awesome. I didn’t have to travel, I stayed in Florida in an Airbnb. I worked one day a week, took the kids to school and did things I thought that I would never get to do. Some wrestlers don’t have that advantage at all, but now after the pandemic I do, and that is so gratifying. I now don’t want to change this, but without that break, I would still be stuck in that townhouse, I am very fortunate.”

On life after wrestling:

“If you are realistic, accept death and accept life after wrestling, and I have accepted both. But life after wrestling, I came to peace with that in the past month. I am writing 2 books right now and maybe I will open a wrestling school. But I think once I am done with wrestling I will be done with wrestling. I don’t want people saying ‘That guy used to be good.’ I don’t want that in my life.”

On Lince Dorado joining AEW:

“Yeah, but I’ll be honest, I see AEW as the same for me. I will be in the same spot and just be another masked guy, and they already have 2 masked guys there, Fenix and Pentagon. I would love to go to any company who would say to me ‘What do you want to do?’ But nobody wants that, it’s ignorance. They are like ‘Why do we want this lucha guy when we have this lucha guy?’ At the end of the day, I want freedom. Even if the money is great, I don’t care. I have been poor before and broke before, I will be good.”

On what he is grateful for:

“My family, my brain and for air.”

Featured image: Sports Illustrated

Ed Mylett (@edmylett) is a best-selling author, entrepreneur, podcaster and world-renowned speaker. His new book called “The Power Of One More” is available on June 1, 2022. He joins Chris Van Vliet from his home in Laguna Beach, CA to talk about how you are one decision away from changing your life forever, he also talks about his morning routine, the most powerful guest he has had on his podcast “The Ed Mylett Show”, what you can do today to start making massive changes in your life, how to make the best out of your 24 hours each day, the three things he is grateful for and much more!

On what being 50 feels like:

“I would love to say that it didn’t hit me. So I wrote this book after my dad died, and I can vividly remember my dad at 50. It kind of hit me, I am potentially on the back 9 of my life. But at the same time, physically at 50 I look like my dad did at 30. I think it made me want to triple my efforts to really achieve my potential. My daughter asked me at my birthday party ‘Daddy, what’s up with this mid-life crisis you’ve got going on?’ I asked her what she meant and she talked about me taking selfies and being on social media. I am actually having a young life crisis, I don’t want to be the same person every year. When I was 30 years old, I was in a crisis to be a different person at 31. Now at 50, I am the same person with the same principles, but hopefully more expansion, growth and memories. I think turning 50 has inspired me to work more.”

On how his view of a day changed:

“I will give you some stuff that is in the book for free. I have an average IQ, 4th highest in my immediate family. So how was I going to be extraordinary? That’s not just me being self-deprecating, I had low self esteem and was the child of an alcoholic, so I had to fix things. 25 years ago I had the realisation that the most ridiculous thing in the world is a 24 hour day. It is the most antiquated concept ever, we still manage time the same way they did 300 years ago where there was no electricity, no internet and no smart phones. If I wanted to write you a letter 100 years ago, I write it, stick it on a horse’s butt and hopefully it gets to you in a month. Now I send a text message and we are connected in 30 seconds. How in the world are we measuring time the same way? My new working day is now 6am to noon. We all have those days where we get more done in a morning than in a week, that’s me every day. At noon a clock goes off and I look at what I need to get done the next day. So the next day is 6pm to midnight and then it’s midnight to 6am, if you stack that up, I have 21 days where you have 7.”

On his morning routine:

“It’s not as complicated as it used to be. I’ve scaled it down so it is transferable and sustainable. The first thing I do is I hit my knees and I pray, I do it on my knees because it reminds me of being small. I then get up and drink half a gallon of water before I even move, I am then energised. I have a gym in my house so I will train for half a hour. After that I will then look at my phone, I don’t look at it for the first 30 minutes, then I grab a coffee and I start my day.”

On where the title of the book The Power Of 1 More came from:

“So my dad was an alcoholic until I was 15, and this is hilarious, he got sober on 4/20. The rest of his life, he never celebrated his birthday on the actual day of April 11th, he actually celebrated it on April 20th because that was when he changed his life. I was raised in a chaotic environment, none of my friends would come to my house, it was a hard childhood. One day my dad is crying as he is driving me to school, he pulls over and said ‘Eddie, I am going to try and get sober again. I am going to give it one more try.’ I said to my dad ‘Well why is it going to be different this time?’ He said to me ‘I’m going to lose you and your sister and your mom, your mom is taking you away. I am losing my life and I want you to have a dad you can be proud of and mom can have a husband to be proud of and respect.’ He went away and he did [get sober] I asked him if he would be sober forever. He said ‘I can’t tell you that, but I can be sober for one more day.’ My dad stacked up those one more days for 35 years. I apply those one mores, stack them up and that is how I become successful.”

On how he has achieved success:

“I put it down to having great mentors. Obviously my dad was one, and I also got to know Tony Robbins and we have become great friends over the years. Another point when I was young, I won a contest to go Hawaii but I was broke. I looked at the food prices and we couldn’t afford to eat there all week, so I am going to the grocery store and walking through the lobby of the Ritz Carlton with grocery bags. So anyway, I am running before the sun is up and this bald guy comes running towards me with a hairy back and he is all sweaty. As he gets closer I realize it is Wayne Dyer, who is one of the all time great gurus in personal development. I yelled at Wayne, ‘Hey Dr. Dyer, you changed my life.’ He turned around and said ‘Well no, you changed your life, but how did I help?’ We sat on the beach and watched the sun come up for an hour and a half. Wayne said that I would change the world, and I thanked him, but advised me not to attach myself to my achievements. Instead, I should attach it to my intentions.”

On the first step to success:

“So I have a chapter in the book on being an impossibility thinker. Most people operates on memory and history, but there is a 1% that operates on vision and imagination. You are currently operating out of history and memory, where our mind deals with what we are familiar with. The reticular activating system (RAS) of the brain filters your entire life, and things won’t change unless you change that. So for example I get a red Tesla, then I am driving down the road and I see one, and another one. The thing is, they were always on the road, but you just didn’t notice them before. If you can unlock that and can believe your dreams will become true, then your dreams can become your Teslas. You will start to see things that were always there.”

On what he is grateful for:

“A God that loves me, family and one more opportunity in my life.”

Featured image: Let’s engage

Mike Iaconelli (@mikeiaconelli) is a professional bass angler, television host and podcaster. He joins Chris Van Vliet to talk about how he got started as a pro bass fisherman, how important it is to be true to himself, why he lives by the advice “Never Give Up”, his favorite lake to fish on, moving from the Bassmaster Elite Series to Major League Fishing and then qualifying to fish for BASS again, what his current goals are, the biggest things he has learned from fishing and much more!

Mike Iaconelli On explaining his job:

“It’s an easy explain and a hard one at the same time, so I will try to navigate in the middle here. Our sport, professional bass fishing, is set up like many other sports. You come into the sport as a young amateur and work your way up from the grassroots level. As you move up, your skill increases and your qualification increases. I started out as an amatuer angler, did that for a few years and then advanced to the semi-pro level. I did that for a few years and finally accumulated the points to fish professionally. That part is easy, we travel around the country and fish regularly. The hard part to explain is that our sport has other sports in it like Nascar and a little bit of wrestling. Branding, marketing and promotions are just as part of the sport as the actual sport itself. That part is a lot of what I do as well. I work with companies to promote their products, market myself and help people sell their products.”

On there being big money in fishing:

“There is real money in it, but if you strip it all away then I would still be doing it. Our sport, when you look at it, it’s very young compared to other professions. Baseball and soccer have been around for hundreds of years, but fishing started back in the 70’s. Because of that, our income isn’t at the mega sport level, but it is definitely getting there. If I could get by I would still do it, but the average event is around $100,000 to $150,000. For championship events it can be a half million for the winner, there have even been some million dollar tournaments. But the real thing is the amount of money you can make above and beyond your winnings, because it is hard to win. I know it’s like this in other sports, but I have been doing this for 30 years and have won 12 events. I am proud that the sport has gotten to the stage where a young angler can make endorsements and a living.”

On fishing not being seen as a sport:

“I have been fighting this battle for a long time. I can see, because fishing has a lot of stereotypes attached to it, some are deserved and some are not. But fishing should be a relaxing sport, but it is also very competitive. To get to the top level, you need the same traits that any top athlete has. It is a lot less physical, and that is where the confusion lies, but there are just as many mechanics. From a mental side, I would argue that fishing is more challenging. We are in an environment that we can’t control and are out there for 8 hour days in all conditions. We have to deal with all these things that change hour to hour, you have to be a study of the fish and adapt and outsmart the fish. It’s a lot, I love defending fishing as a sport.”

On all the skill sets needed for fishing:

“It’s a lot. For a lot of people who remember a Rubik’s Cube. For someone to just solve a side, and I have never solved a Rubik’s cube in my life, but to solve a side was a big deal for me. It’s like fishing, you have to get all the elements right and keep adjusting. You finally solve that side, and that is fishing. The side being loved is you catching the fish and figuring it out.”

On Mike Iaconelli being able to be himself:

“So it was in 2002. At that point, I started to let my guard down and was getting sick of being someone that I wasn’t. But in 2001, my uncle Don, who was like a dad to me, my dad passed away when I was 2 in a car accident. So my uncle was my father figure and was the one who introduced me to the sport. In 2001 he was going through stage 4 Hodgkin’s lymphoma, the diagnosis was not far along. But as he was going through that fight, my mindset changed and I said to myself that you have to enjoy life more. That was where the never give up came from. Oh by the way, my uncle beat it and he is still here today, shout out to uncle Don. But not being scared to let people know who you are, when I did that, my brand and my fanbase and my sponsors, it all started to boom. I think it was a big year because I realized you can be strange or odd and people will still accept you.”

On Mike Iaconelli finding his way in the angling world:

“It was a different world back then. Professional fishing in the mid 90’s was not a sport that catered towards non traditional southern anglers. It was a bit of a struggle, I have experienced things that if I had been from Alabama and had a southern accent, I wouldn’t have gone through those. But saying that, I am glad that I did, it made me who I am today. I am the person in my life because of those things that I went through. There were moments where I questioned if I should be doing this, even the league didn’t want me there. Everything was tougher, but as I broke the barriers down and gained the trust of the other anglers, they realized I was strange but here for the right reasons. Eventually, people saw that and it became a lot easier. As our sport became more mainstream and more national visibility, I think those barriers started to break down more.”

On Mike Iaconelli saying he was done in 2003:

“That may or may not be true. Here’s the thing, whatever your background is, I do believe that things happen for a reason. I can look at moments in my life and things happen that shouldn’t have. The classic win in 2003 shouldn’t have happened, sponsors were getting ready to leave. It was a dead end road but all these things happen where I catch the largest fish and have a 2 hour boat ride to make it back in time. I believe things happen for a reason and that you will know when it is time to move to the next thing. I took a small hiatus when COVID hit and the sport shut down. Even when it started to come back I took a year off, it was such a nice reset and I needed that. I think you know when you are ready to stop or keep competing. I am 50 and I want to win again, I want to win more trophies.”

On Mike Iaconelli moving from major league to bass fishing:

“It was a super tough decision. I’ll try to give some context to the listeners. Our sport had a shakeup where a new league was formed, and a lot of the big athletes defected to this new league. The reasoning was almost identical to other sports, leading up to this new league forming, there was this thing where the anglers felt like they were not the priority. A lot of us felt like we were down on the ladder that was important. Those 80 anglers, including myself, a lot of that was based on a unified feeling of needing to change this. Do we want all these young anglers feeling 8th or 9th most important? No, it was about the athletes getting a good income and being top priority. I might get hate mail after this, but it needed to happen. A lot of guys want to be here instead of there or vice versa, but it has to be done. I think it made both leagues realize that the anglers are the most important thing, they are the ones generating the money, it was a wake up call. But for me, major league fishing didn’t pan out to what I thought it would. It started to feel like how I did before that, the same problems started to creep back. For me it was a no brainer to go back to bass, it is a better environment there and just felt more comfortable. But you can’t just go back, you have to re-qualify. There was a legends exemption rule, but I didn’t want to go back that way, I wanted to qualify. So last year I had to qualify, get in line, work hard, get dirty and qualify. I re-qualified and it feels good, this is where I belong.”

On the biggest change in the sport:

“Man there has been a lot. Technology is so big in our sport, I would argue bigger than in other sports. So in some sports the material that for example makes the bat, it gets lighter. But in our sport the sonar, the GPA, the boat motor… That’s helped the anglers become so much more efficient with that digital technology, it’s hard for me to keep up! But to compete, you have to keep up with those technology changes. Also now it is how important having a brand of digital content has become. SOme of our new anglers get it and some don’t want to be bothered by it, but that’s going to hurt them in the long run. It’s very difficult making money by just catching fish.”

On his morning routine:

“So on regular days I wake up at 6 in the morning, I have a big black dog and kids that wake me up. On fishing days it’s a lot earlier, like 4am. I wake up and get a quick breakfast and then off I go. On the practice days, I am out there from dark to dark. The stereotype is that there is not a lot of activity, but it’s a lot. I am making 1,000 casts, the amount of calories you burn is incredible. Then at the end of the day, get to the hotel room, throw some food down and look at the maps and take notes. Then it is the same on the tournament days and it is back to back. As I am getting older I am feeling it more, definitely taking a toll more, but I am still excited about it.”

On if his son will be better than him:

“I think so. I think that Vegas has things that I wish I had. He’s got natural ability and the negatives of my biological makeup. Vegas is very even keeled and better at going through the lows. I was a boat captain for him for a tournament where he lost. I couldn’t say anything but I saw he didn’t let it get to him. He also has an incredible amount of patience, I look back at times where I wish I could have slowed down, he has got that.”

On what Mike Iaconelli is grateful for:

“Family, fishing and fans.”

Featured images: Mike Iaconelli Instagram

Griff Garrison (@griffgarrison) is a professional wrestler currently signed to All Elite Wrestling. He sits down with Chris Van Vliet at the Squared Circle 2 Expo in Indianapolis, IN to talk about how he got discovered by AEW, what led to him forming the Varsity Blonds tag team with Brian Pillman Jr., people thinking he looks like a young Chris Jericho, playing football in high school, how a football injury led him to start wrestling, what he learned from talking to AJ Styles and much more!

On wrestlers he loved growing up:

“I mean I was the average kid that loved John Cena. I was 8 years old and like ‘I want to be that guy.’ My first ever match that I remember was his debut match against Kurt Angle. If I could meet anybody, it would be John Cena or Dwayne Johnson.”

On the best advice he has been given:

“Just go slow. If you think you are going slow, then go slower. People in wrestling move too fast, and I am one of those people. You just have to slow down and make everything count. If you go too fast, you trip yourself up and you end up botching everything.”

On Griff Garrisons’ height:

“I’m about 6 foot 3 or 6 foot 4. Every time people meet me, they are always like ‘You are so much taller than on TV.’ I think it’s because I am with Brian on TV and he is a lot stockier. Brian has such broad shoulders, I think it’s all the raises he does in the gym.”

On his diet:

“I will go to Walmart and just buy stacks and stacks of tuna. I put it in a pack and it’s like 80g of raw protein right there. So I have been cutting a lot, but I am starting to bulk more on Monday. This is just on the road. At home it is eggs and blueberries for breakfast. Then after the gym there’s a protein shake with Greek yoghurt. Then it’s chicken, green beans, asparagus, salmon, all that boring food. It sounds boring but I am as fit as I have ever been in my life. I used to care about the number on the scale, but now it’s about looking good on TV and being as strong as possible.”

On having a tumour in his foot:

“It was terrifying. Ever since after my senior football year, I started having this nagging pain in my foot. I didn’t know what it was so I started to go and see doctors. I would get a frozen lacrosse ball and rub it on my foot, wear insoles, I would try everything. Then finally whenI broke my foot the doctors were like ‘Yeah you have been growing a tumour in your foot for 2 years.’ She said that it was eroding my heel bone, and if we didn’t discover it then it would have gone up into my leg. If that happened, they would have had to amputate my leg.”

On being an athlete all of his life:

“The first spot I played was baseball. I started playing tee ball early, my dad started me off at 2 years old. I started off in ATlanta, so we always went to the Braves game. Then football came along and I went to all of these camps and combines. The one before my senior year, I tore my whole hamstring. I couldn’t go to any of these other camps, and I think that’s why I played at a division 3 school. After football season, the foot pain nagging started, so I went somewhere local to get a degree, and then that was where wrestling came about.”

On possibly following football if injuries didn’t occur:

“I played receiver. I played quarterback up until 9th grade where a better quarterback came along. He broke every record in highschool and I think he went on to go into baseball. I was getting recruited by Duke Blue Devils, but the foot thing happened. But then I got to college, fell out of love with football, found wrestling and here we are.”

On his first break in wrestling:

“Me and a friend went to a Ring of Honor dojo camp. We got to do matches and drills in front of Christopher Daniels and Punishment Martinez [Damian Priest]. That was in December and then in February we did Future of Honor. We wrestled Dalton Castle, Joe Hendry and even got to wrestle The Briscoes for the tag titles.”

On getting to AEW:

“It was 2020 and we were wrestling in Future of Honor before everyone was freaking out about the whole pandemic thing. The next month we went to Baltimore and my partner Marcus tore his ACL. They were going to offer us a contract, then COVID hit. I was online applying for teaching jobs, then my agent calls and said that they want me for extra work for AEW in Jacksonville. I can’t let this opportunity slip, I put the computer down and didn’t talk to anyone for 2 weeks. So I trained, ate and slept and watched tapes. We did a live Dynamite and taped it for the next week. I came back 2 weeks later and did a dark match against MJF. Tony Khan loved it, so we came back the next night and taped it, that was really cool.”

On how Griff Garrison and Brian Pillman Jr. became a team:

“I don’t know, I think Tony just threw me and him together. I get there one day and our names are on the board together. But I guess that Tony liked us as a team and kept putting us together. Then we got Julia, we got matching uniform and signed to a salary last July. It was crazy, my life has been one big roller coaster ride.”

On a possible split:

“I think there has already been a little seed planted here and there as you have seen with Julia. There is definitely some tension in the group, but one day I could definitely go with turning on Brian or we turn together. When we started, we did the whole Ivy League thing and we loved it.”

On his AEW goals:

“As of right now, me and Brian have a lot more to accomplish. I think we need to build more chemistry, and we hang out more outside the ring. I would love another shot at the titles and one day I want to be the TNT Champion.”

On what Griff Garrison is grateful for:

“God, my family and wrestling.”

Featured image: Wrestling Inc.

Mike Myers is an actor and comedian known for his films like “Austin Powers”, “Wayne’s World”, the “Shrek” movies, “So I Married An Axe Murderer” and many others. He joins Chris Van Vliet to talk about his new Netflix series called THE PENTAVERATE and also goes into detail about how he gets into character, how Martin Short inspired him, the biggest misconception about Canadians, what it’s like sharing the same name as Michael Myers from the Halloween movies, why he loved working with Dana Carvey and he does some of his famous voices like Dr. Evil, Austin Powers and Wayne Campbell from Wayne’s World.

Mike Myers, What do you think is the biggest misconception about Canadians?

“Well one of the things is I think that people confuse our kindness for weakness. I think that people do so at their peril, because we have consistently fought for democracy. I know that sounds corny, but with what is going on with the world right now and democracy under attack, I think we are on the right side of it.”

You play 8 characters in this series. What is the process like of getting into character?

“I remember seeing Martin Short from SCTV, he said that the makeup chair is where the character begins. The outside in the mirror fools the inside. For me, there are certain words that get me into character too. When I did Linda Richman the word was [New York accent] coffee. As a Canadian I couldn’t believe it was ‘Kauphy.’ You mean coffee? With Austin Powers it was ‘Yeah Baby’ and with Dr. Evil it was just ‘Right.’ I love performing and I love having to be there for it and show up for it.”

What’s it like sharing the name with a famous horror movie character? 

“I didn’t grow up as a public person, I grew up working class in Toronto. I go on Saturday Night Live and then I go to cash the cheque from NBC. So I went to the Chemical Bank and the cashier said ‘Michael Myers? You’re not going to kill me are you?’ So I finally get onto a TV show and a fictional mass murderer with my name has already happened. It was kind of a really? But oh well, I was just grateful to be on Saturday Night Live.”

If you were to pick one of your previous characters to appear on The Pentaverate who would you pick?

“I think that Dr. Evil would be a good fit, or Shrek. At one point I wanted to a Wayne’s World where Wayne got his own heavy metal state. I can see him running a secret society, that could be fun.”

What is the best advice that you have received in your career?

“Never give up. The reason that you should never give up is that great reviews are just comfortable information. Bad reviews are just uncomfortable information, but none of it is definition. If you make something that you want to see, then you have already won. With my upbringing, it’s a lot to ask people to show up to see your thing. You should really work your hardest, it’s a lot to ask someone to sit in the dark, plus ticket, popcorn and coke. My parents drilled into me that you have to work hard to be a really good entertainer.”

Mike Myers stars in The Pentaverate, which is out now on Netflix.

Featured image: Forbes

Jack Evans (@jackevans711) is a professional wrestler who has worked for AEW, Lucha Underground, TNA Impact Wrestling, CZW and several other promotions. He joins Chris Van Vliet to talk about AEW not renewing his contract, why he says he got “lazy” and “plump” during his time in AEW, his tag team partner from TH2 Angelico, his favorite matches, the YouTube video series called “How Isn’t Jack Evans Dead”, his AEW Dark match with Kenny Omega, the botches he has had in his career, what’s next for him and much more!

On not having his AEW contract renewed:

“It’s one of those things where I don’t really have any bad experiences or anything. Like I said in a follow-up tweet, I understand where they are coming from. I don’t think that I was actually giving added value to the company, it’s just one of those things. Living on that AEW contract was awesome, but it wasn’t a bitter breakup by any stretch of the imagination, I understood where they were coming from.”

On AEW not firing him:

“I’ve been in darkness, I have been on Dark forever. One thing that I do want to put AEW over for is waiting for the whole contract [instead of saying] ‘We don’t want this guy anymore, dump him next week.’ or whatever. I didn’t want to get involved because those Twitter fights are eternal. But it started this huge Twitter fight and I’m like I don’t really feel like that is the way to handle it.”

On COVID restrictions halting his momentum:

“I feel like for the first year the run actually started out good. We kind of had the place as the semi comedic tag team. Then me and Angelico were at the Mexican border, which got closed because of the COVID restrictions, we had this 4 month layoff. I had this practice match when I came back, and I actually got my face broken again, so there was another 2 month layoff. I feel like after that, I never came back full force, I really feel like I deteriorated. But I can’t blame it on ring rust, I just never had the same momentum, I felt like I was never wrestling good and had just deteriorated in the ring. This sounds weird, but it gave me loads of self confidence problems. Anyone that knows me knows how nervous I am backstage, but when I step through the curtain and into the ring I am all cocky and confident. But I would step through the curtain and would still be as nervous as hell. After the COVID layoff and the face break, I feel like on a personal level I never came back as me in regards to in ring skill.”

On being complacent:

“I feel like that salary contract made me a little soft. There was a little while where I got a bit plump and I fell off after that layoff. I only feel like I started to come back after that layoff, but I think at that point the company had already made up its mind or whatever. I did just kind of get, not lazy in the ring, but lazy outside of the ring.”

On Angelico still being employed:

“I think in that first year they were pretty happy with us. We were not the type to go up to the office [with a problem]. I called us the nine to fivers. We would show up, do what we had to do, go to the locker room. There was zero politics and our in ring performance matched up to what they wanted us to do. But I think after that they started looking at me and Angelico differently. I got out of shape and plump, I wasn’t on the ball, but Angelico never fell off. I think it was then that they started seeing us as 2 different entities.”

On if not being stuck in Mexico would have meant more TV time:

“Yes but I don’t think that it would have changed anything. In the end it just came down to me having spent an extended period of laziness. During those 4 months I maybe would have been used more and maybe I would have stayed on the ball more. But I didn’t have that right mentality when I was on a salary, I thought that this will go on forever.”

On what the plan is now:

“I am not a man with the plan. For right now it is the same old same old with the indies. I am looking for a promotion in Mexico, so I am starting to send out resumes. But at my age, it might be time to start thinking about at least semi-retirement. I am at least hoping to get on TV in Mexico.”

On ambitions:

“I’m not really an ambitious person. I just want a nice little business that will pay my bills and will provide for my kids. Now I feel like I just want to chill a little bit. There is no need to try and be anything other than the basic necessities paid for. When I first started training, just going to Dragon Gate I was like I’m done. But to travel a lot of places and pay the bills, the indies pay a lot more now but they wouldn’t pay the bills before. I am really content with just how things have been.”

On realizing that he is agile:

“Early on my sister was in gymnastics, so she taught me the back handspring and I took it from there. It really took off when I got into breakdancing, that was when I realized that I have a lot of acrobatic skills.”

On the bumps seen in “How Isn’t Jack Evans Dead”:

“When it comes to that cage of death bump, I agree! On that one, I landed on my tailbone and I was getting Blitzkrieg’s gimmick 2 days later. I had this cracked tailbone and had to do this match against Super Dragon, it was rough. Just to get the Blitzkrieg outfit, that was an honor. But my worst injury was when I broke my leg in front of Chris Benoit, I had plates and screws and everything. In all honesty, most of my injuries haven’t been head injuries, but there for sure [have been concussions]. Nobody back in the early 2000’s was really thinking about that, which is something that AEW does really well. Back then there was a really different mentality. I did a bad 630 on top of a chair in ROH and I did a bad corkscrew and knocked myself out. I am sure there have been more but most of my injuries have been to my knees and my ankles. Now I have to be really careful near curbs, my ankle can lose balance and if I am hanging off slightly I can fall and collapse into the street.”

On living with X-Pac:

“We lived together for a year and a half maybe. I find that with the fans he has a different reputation with the fans as opposed to who he actually is. I used to joke around that he is like the male Mother Teresa, he would help the homeless and give them sandwiches. But then he will do this stupid sh*t, one time he was drinking and he went to an alley and was p*ssing. The police then rush him and he got extorted. I swear to God there is a grey rain cloud that follows him.”  

On his AEW highlight:

“For me my AEW highlight might have been that match with the Best Friends. I don’t think I had many classics. Also Iw ould say my singles with Kenny Omega, but man that should have been one of those 6 star classics. But I was so out of shape, I was a neurotic mess putting that match together. I was so blown up and it could have been a big break, but it should have been so much more. We cut so much out and so much was not executed properly, but that was again 100% my fault. He just out worked me where we had to end the match early because I was done. That really should have been a classic, it came off good but that one hurts me.”

On what he is grateful for:

“Wrestling in general, the family and being in Mexico.”

Featured image: TPWW

Jamil Damji (@jdamji) is a real estate entrepreneur and one of the hosts of the A&E show “Triple Digit Flip”. He sits down with Chris Van Vliet at his beach house in Marina Del Rey, CA to talk about how a failed career as a comedian led to him getting started in real estate, what someone needs to know when they are flipping their first property, what he looks for when he wholesales a property, how he started his company KeyGlee, the best advice he has ever received, his TV show “Triple Digit Flip” with his co-host Pace Morby, his advice on the current housing market and much more!

On his show “Triple Digit Flip”:

“It’s been an incredible journey for us. Four of us are the main cast members, my sister who is project manager and my best friend Pace. We run around doing life together and Pace’s wife is the real estate mogul. We run around, flip homes and make them beautiful and have a great time. Second season is in production at the moment, which is great, because not many shows get a second season.”

On the appeal of the show:

“We all live in a place, the home is a necessary place for all of us. Also, everybody has a range in respect to their design and their ideas, what makes a home a home. I think because everyone has such broad tastes and there is so much scope for business, we can make substantial profits in buying, fixing and selling homes. For the most part people just like thinking about things they can do. We can learn about anything on the internet, and if there is an opportunity to make 6 figures on house flipping, then why not? If all it takes is some courage and investment and grit, then why not?”

On how to make something from nothing:

“So when you buy a house that is distressed, you can get a pretty decent deal. If you are brand new and don’t have a lot of money to participate in the real estate market, you can do something called wholesaling. This is where you identify a good opportunity, put it under contract and then sell your position in the contract to another investor. You are literally flipping paper. That’s how I did my first deal in Canada, which they called a skip transfer. I was in a media company in the early 2000’s, where my job was cold calling, moving their advertising from the yellow pages to the internet. Businesses were reluctant because they didn’t think that the internet would stick, but haha it did! We sold the websites for $600, but they cost $700 to make, so every one was a loss! I then overheard a conversation about demolishing houses and then building duplexes, and would make $160,000 per project. They didn’t have enough to demolish, so I asked if I could find any. The next day I see a house for rent in the neighbourhood, so I called this lady and asked if she couldn’t find a renter, would she sell? She told me that for the right price she would, I asked for a price that turned out to be $350,000. I then went to my housing partners and they asked how much would they pay and they said $400,000. Most people would say ‘Oh she is willing to sell for $350,000 so just give me something.’ The way my mind worked was I need to get myself in this transaction. I started cold calling attorneys starting with a and getting through to s. This one lawyer explained to me that I need 2 contracts, one as me as the buyer and one as me as the seller. Bring both contracts back and you can be on the conveyance. After the real estate fees I made $47,000, that was my first deal.”

On trying to be a stand up comedian:

“Well it didn’t work out, which is why we are here talking about real estate and not stand up comedy [laughs]. I came to the US to do stand up comedy and got a bit of traction. I did the open mics and posted some videos on Funny or Die, they were great. So I was writing and producing but real estate just kept calling me. I was living in LA but looking at Phoenix, you could buy a condo that sold before the financial crisis for $400,000, but now it’s $25,000. It rents for $800 a month, tell me where else you can do that. I saw the opportunity, so I packed up and said that stand up is not for me anymore. I did some wholesale deals and flipped contracts, I made $17,000 in 8 minutes on Craigslist. Seeing how easy it was to spot value, I knew it was time to pack things up. It was my birthday, December 12th 2012, 12/12/12. I drove through this life threatening dust storm, made it through and here I am.”

On spotting a deal:

“So you ever see those houses that have tin foil in the windows, lawn is overgrown and the mail is piling up? Those are called zombie houses and they are all over. There is a way to contact the owner of that house and let them know that the tenant has moved out and the house is destroyed and looks like it does. You call those people and tell them about the condition and then offer to buy it. Do a cash deal and offer to handle the tennant, that is one way to find these houses. Also look at code violations, there are breadcrumbs left by the property as to there being a problem. These lists are all on public records, you can download the records, get the numbers and start calling them.”

On the future:

“One of my investment strategies, and I have a couple, for me if you have looked at the state of service, it’s not good. If you go out to eat, a lot of places are understaffed, there is a vacuum of shortages. I think also with Airbnb I think we are bullish as a world, we are all enjoying looking at other people’s species as opposed to sterile hotels. So I am looking at adding luxury spaces for people to rent. Secondly, there is an opportunity in small family homes to wholesale. I built a 6 plex, fully modelled, and the landlord had just started renting. He was renting the 2 bed and 1 bath for $1,200 a unit, rented 5 out of 6, so had 1 left over. When I negotiated, he was like ‘I’m not giving you a deal, I know who you are. I want top dollar for these, $1.2 million.’ I’m like ok I’ll take it for that. In actuality, the rent gap means that they go for $1,700, not $1,200. That last vacant unit, we rented it for $1,700 on Craigslist. We posted the lease and closed on $1.2 million, a person moved in. Now I have the rent gap of $500, times that by 5 more units available, and these people will be on a month to month contract, so you can raise rent. I made $450,000 in one transaction by raising the rent in one unit.”

On the biggest thing he has learned:

“I have realized that we are so impatient wanting to get to a destination. You can see me saying I want the car, the house and all the friendships, but they all came from pain. AT this moment in life, you are meant to be where you are. There is always an opportunity out there, but I don’t get there without the lessons or the valleys. I failed as a comedian but A & e saw something in me and let me be who I am. Nothing in life is easy, but there is God in all of the tough situations.”

On how the show came to be:

“They came and found us. We skipped the usual Hollywood b.s. Of the teaser to the pilot, then the half season and the full season. Pace’s YouTube posts a video and the casting director thinks it is hilarious. They reach out to us and A & E wanted to do a Zoom call, but I thought it was all a scam so I ignored them, you know? Nobody wants me at that time. But Pace doesn’t ignore it and we do the 30 minute Zoom call. I am looking at the names on Zoom and Googling them, and it’s all legitimate. We get an email a week later where they say they love us, so we are skipping the pilot and we got a show! Season 1 was gruelling, there was a lot of work. The show is 43 minutes long, but we shoot like 100 hours of footage.”

On advice for someone who is in a rut:

“Go inside you. Nothing that you want is outside of you, I can’t stress that enough. I have found so much peace and opportunity by just being in my own heart. If you can live where you are present in it, you know when you go on autopilot, you do that a lot each day. So a lot of us are checked out, and then nothing we do has power. But if you are in a rut, try to get as clear as possible about where you are. Take one step in being present and see the doors that open. There are doors everywhere, I have walked through some that are chance, but they are not. There is love there and opportunity.”

On what he is grateful for: 

“Breath, family and for me.”

Featured image: Guardian