Amy Dumas (@machetegirl), better known as Lita, is a professional wrestler and WWE Hall of Famer. She joins Chris Van Vliet to talk about returning to WWE at the Royal Rumble, her match with Becky Lynch at Elimination Chamber, how she got back to being herself again after being Lita for so many years, what her breakout moment was in her career, what she learned from traveling with Edge and Matt Hardy, her WWE debut in 2000 with Light Heavyweight Champion Essa Rios, what her first tattoo was, being inducted into the WWE Hall of Fame and much more!

Did you think that you would be back in WWE?

“Nope. Nope [laughs].”

So how did all of this come together?

“So the Royal Rumble is fun, watching it and being in it. So I did the first one, it was monumental and historic, I had to be a part of it. I was asked 24 hours in advance, I had not trained at all. I had to take a red eye, spend all day in medical to get cleared. The last time I had touched a ring was the last time that you all saw me touch a ring. So I was like nervous in all the wrong ways. I was still glad that I did it, there was only going to be one first Rumble. I am glad that I did it and I was happy to see all the girls, and I had a good time. But when I got the call this year I was like yeah I want a redo. I had a proper heads-up and had been training. My motivation was that it’s fun and I wanted to see my girl friends, so I was good nervous going into it. I was happy with it all, thought that was all and it wasn’t it all.”

So you were training just for fun? 

“So they gave me 6 weeks’ heads-up. I wasn’t in the ring before, no one apart from Nattie goes in just for fun. I train if I am training for something. I did Twitch through the pandemic and I met a bunch of people. I connected with a drag queen named Pollo Del mar who is very involved in the wrestling community. So we connected and they connected me with Dark Sheik, who then connected me with Hoodslam, which is a Bay area wrestling promotion for misfits, there are no boundaries. I had a crew, I could train with them for the Rumble. In those 6 weeks, I wasn’t only training, but I was having fun. I went into the Rumble feeling pretty good.”

You went in looking like you had just wrestled the day before. I guess it is like riding a bike?

“It did feel like that. I didn’t know how it looked, but it feels fine. I don’t watch my stuff back but I watch the clips on Twitter and it looked good, I was happy with that.”

But it was just supposed to be a one-off?

“Yeah and I was happy for it. As I was coming out of Gorilla position, WWE 24 was following me around for an episode too, and there is Johnny Ace. He is like ‘What do you think about wrestling Becky [Lynch]?’ And we have been trying to [wrestle] and fantasy book that for years. I think she was more serious than I was, I thought it was a fun thing we talked about sometimes. There was no way I could say no to that. Even though it was 3 weeks from the moment that he asked, I would have liked 3 months. Gearing up from yeah it’s fun to a title match, 2 totally different training regimes. But you take the opportunity when it is there. This is what is happening now, and you just go with what is in front of you.”

I would imagine that you had a bunch of stuff planned out that in your “regular life” you had to put on hold to have the match with Becky.

“For sure. Even just leading up to the Rumble, my schedule has been pretty flexible, Zoom orientated and easy to work around. Because it was so short, I felt like I just pull all of the good and let the delayed connecting flights [not affect me] and roll with it. But it was just, I don’t know, it was novel and I was doing this thing. I felt similar to when I decided that I was going to be a wrestler.”

Now you are back and feeling good, is WrestleMania on your radar?

“It’s not not on my radar. I just know how everything there, and nothing has changed, things are changing last minute and all the time. But I will be there, if nothing less than to watch it. But am I scouting and looking at different matches and combinations? I just feel more connected to them than I did before. We have all talked about going outside the bubble and not worry what is going on over there, and that was how I felt when these opportunities just fell into my lap. But it was really inspiring to sit down and talk with all these girls at the beginning of their career. I feel really good and proud if I have had my last match.”

Do you feel like you can now rewrite your exit from WWE?

“Yeah totally. I’ve had these one off appearances since I left my active career, but nothing meaningful like that was the last thing or this is how people will remember me. It was things with Heath Slater or the opening match at Evolution. I had fun spots, but nothing big. This just felt different.”

You have obviously broken a ton of barriers, but what was the first one where it was like this is something special?

“I think it was, and it gets replayed often, but it was me and The Hardys vs. Test, Albert and Trish [Stratus]. I was just kicking those dudes asses, I had no business doing it. These are 6 foot 5 people and I am hurricanraning Test and jumping onto Albert, women were not seen being that physical before.”

You have spent all this time as Lita, but who is Amy?

“So when I retired, it was like a reinvention of Amy. Lita is going to be on pause and will take a nap. If I had an interview when I was actively wrestling, they would ask me ‘So what do you do when you are not wrestling?’ I remember thinking that I had to make stuff up. It sounds boring if I say ‘I eat, sleep and breathe wrestling and I am either doing laundry or I am in a ring.’ That is what my life is, but it doesn’t sound cool in an interview, so I would make stuff up. But now I am not wrestling, I love the aspect of not having 2 days being the same. I like getting out of my comfort zone and seeing what the future holds. I decided to go exploring around Latin America. I wanted to meet people, work on my Spanish and surf, that checked all of the boxes.”

Did you have a moment in WWE where you were like ‘I don’t want to be here anymore?’

“It was more ‘I think I don’t want to be here.’ And it was at the time where my contract had a year or 6 months on it, whenever they start talking to you. I remember not being as excited when my music hit, just being like ‘Well that’s my music, time to go to work.’ Even being on the ramp, that was a weird feeling. It wasn’t how it was supposed to feel. I felt like I was punching a clock and I never want to do that. I remember asking to be taken off of the live events because I needed to figure these things out. They started asking contract negotiations like what do I want financially? I’m like well that’s not how I want to think about this, I just want to figure out if I still want to be here and we can work out everything else after that. I remember not missing it and it feeling more right. I have done more than I ever thought I would do in my career, so maybe it is time to get out. So I didn’t feel fear, I am ok if I fall on my face for this next chapter. It felt like I was missing out, my friends were getting married and having baby showers and I stopped getting the invitations. It was like ‘She is out of town, so it’s cool.’”

Did you have a final match in mind? I can’t imagine that the way it ended was the way you wanted it to go?

“I mean I was happy to work Mickie James, but in my mind it was a good long match and we hug at the end of it. Here’s the title, you see it’s in good hands and I am out of here. It just hurt my feelings, I was very vocal about it. I went to my producer, to the head writer and to Vince. Then I went back to my producer, back to the writer and back to Vince. I’m like ‘Is there any way we can not do this and we can do it in a pre-tape later?’ I’m like can I just have this match. The answer was ‘You are a heel, this is what we are doing, you’re giving it to someone we want to boost up, and that is what you do when you leave.’ I was like what did I do to have this ending? They are like ‘You are looking at it wrong. It’s business, you are a heel.’ I remember saying ‘Alright. This is the last time you get to pull my strings and you are pulling them hard. I’ll go out there and because I am a professional, but I want you to know that this hurts my feelings. I know that this is business, which doesn’t involve feelings, but I want you to know as someone who has broken their neck for this company, this hurts my feelings.”

Was this just a product of the time because women’s wrestling did not get to the level where it is at now?

“Right, especially now with perspective, that’s what I chalked it up to. That’s where we were then and it wasn’t really given a lot of thought. It was like ‘Oh here is a thing that can stoke Cryme Tyme for 5 minutes.’ It wasn’t really given a lot of thought, but now we are here.”

I remember watching that Cryme Tyme segment and I felt insulted as a fan.

“It was one of those things that was so hard. I would get asked about it by fans or by interviews or whatever. You’re not trying to air your dirty laundry or go on these rants or carry negative energy with you. But it wasn’t a thing where I could spin it so it was like ‘Yeah it was great, it was hilarious.’ I was just like it’s a bummer. They would keep talking about it, I’m not going to keep piling on but I hear you.”

When you think of Lita, what is the pinnacle of your career?

“Gosh there’s just so many. It felt like I was almost getting there and my neck was broken in 2002. I knew something was terribly wrong and I couldn’t move, but I thought it was my collarbone. I was getting crazy momentum, but then I was sidelined. But then I got into another good pocket, but I tore everything in my knee. I wasn’t fully out, but I couldn’t wrestle for like 6 or 7 months.”

Looking back at your previous run, it is obvious that you can still go.

“I don’t know. I think it has been cool and inspiring seeing Edge come back after all that happened with his neck, and he can still go and knows how to engage with the crowd. It is tempting, but at the same time, I don’t know, I feel conflicted. I feel proud of what I did with Becky and everything is good and get out while it is good. But at the same time, there is that part that says well how much better would it be if I trained for it. If the opportunity falls in my lap again, but I don’t want to force it. It might happen, someone might call me out on TV and then I answer.”

I end every interview talking about gratitude. What are 3 things in your life that you are grateful for right now?

“My 19 year old dog, the ocean and the close friends that I have.”    

Embedded images: Instagram

Featured image: Esquire

EC3 (@therealec3) is a professional wrestling known for his time in WWE and IMPACT Wrestling where he is a 2-time TNA World Heavyweight Champion. He sits down with Chris Van Vliet in Orlando, FL to talk about Control Your Narrative and what exactly it’s all about, the backlash he received after hiring Austin Aries, why he banned superkicks and Canadian Destroyers at his CYN show, what his workout routine looks like, his earliest memory, his WWE release and much more!

So you said you had to reschedule leg day because you almost died! What happened there?

“We were coming off of our first live event, which was a great success and we had an amazing time. But the next day we had a pre-production meeting, a narrative seminar, that took a lot out of us mentally. The following day we had a shoot with Pro-Wrestling TV for Free The Narrative 3, there are a lot of responsibilities in that. You are performing and you are producing everything that is going on. There is a great team around you, but you need to make sure that you are around everything. So there is that and the fact that we are fighting a fake culture, so much happened with exhaustion and the physicality of the training to look super f*cking jacked and ripped. At the end of the day I was laying down after a very successful day, and I felt like I was almost dying.”

So you said to yourself ‘I am not doing legs?’

“No, what I did was I decided to reschedule it. Instead I actually took 2 days off. I ate like a pig, but then I was feeling worse. Then it was a deload day with legs and moving things around with my coach. I had to rearrange things again to do this, and here we are.”

There are a lot of comparisons with Control Your Narrative to Fight Club. Do you think these are justified?

“Absolutely, because we stole a lot of ideas from it. No doubt about it. There was one comment ‘Someone should tell EC3 that Fight Club is satire and he shouldn’t try to be Tyler Durden.’ I said ‘Professional wrestling is satire, so you are making my point.’ I am aware, I am so self-aware.”

Can you explain The Rant Room?

“The Rant Room originated because it sounds cool in my mind. In the first feature we did I always thought that if we were creating an army of men, there would be this room with a camera, almost like a confessional. They would walk into the room and just rant and get it out. It started as that, but then I am watching social media where people are making all these horrific statements to people I know. There is nothing you can say to me to hurt me, but when it is people I know and have the best intentions, these horrible things are being said that no one would say to their face. In essence, maybe I rage tweeted, but I initiated The Rant Room. You can choose 3 minutes in the rant room, pay $100, and say anything to a wrestler of your choice and they can’t do anything about it. The backlash we received was because we were using The Rant Room to get money, which I am. But if you want The Rant Room and you don’t want to pay a cent, I will give it to you too. You won’t do it to people’s faces, you are a coward.”

Oh really?

“Yeah so we were in Orlando and someone asked me if The Rant Room was real? I said it was and they asked to talk to Austin Aries. I said ‘sh*t! OK, I don’t know if he is here.’ The one problem is that The Rant Room was initially just meant for me, and bringing other people into my insanity was not the best choice, but those that support it were behind it. So Austin agrees, we find the guy and I bring them into the room. For those 3 minutes, all the fan did was talk about how good of a wrestler Austin Aries was and how much he respects him. After a while, the fan said ‘I wish you would just stop tweeting your opinions so much.’ Austin asked why and the fan had no justification. I’m like I think this is good. What I learned is that face to face, different opinions can find common ground and peace, and maybe that is what The Rant Room is for.”

People have strong opinions about Austin Aries. I experienced that when I had him on my show.

“That’s what I don’t get. How do you know what someone thinks or feels if you don’t know what they think? Or actually listen to what they said?”

So what made you decide to bring him into this promotion?

“He reached out before it was decided that we were becoming a promotion in the sense of having television or live events. He said ‘I dig what you are doing and I would love to be a part of it.’ Here is a guy who is a former world champion and one of the best wrestlers in the world. He went away for a long time on a journey of personal discovery, and that is a story worth discovering. We had a phone call with him and it felt good. We looked at the ups and downs, and while he has opinions, there is nothing cancellable. It seemed logical and safe, and if I am bringing in a world champion, he can teach the younger generation. He is a leader and a locker room leader, and I respect that. Do I agree with him on everything? Probably not. But I can live with the fact that we have the same vision.”

So for those that don’t know, what is Control Your Narrative?

“To Control Your Narrative is to tell your story, that is my intent to it. But we ask people what it means to them and I am fascinated by the responses.” 

I know I have said this before but you are a former IMPACT World Champion, you had a great run there. Then you go to WWE and they don’t know what to do with you.

“NXT was cool but I was never meant for NXT. When we were called up, it was very rash and very unplanned. Our vignettes were shot in our homes, and we were called up as a group. Then I am a mute even though I am capable of speaking.”

When they brought you in they clearly didn’t see your promos in IMPACT. 

“The people that brought me in knew I could [talk], but no one would speak up because one man’s opinion rules.”

I’m going to ask you a general question. What are your thoughts on pro-wrestling right now?

“I don’t like it. It doesn’t engage me and I can’t watch it.”

You mentioned that the turning point was when Goldberg beat The Fiend?

“It was. I know Windham and he has a super creative mind. I know how much he put into creating that character. That was so outside the box, so impressive and so not WWE. It caught on like wildfire and everyone was into it. Then people saw that it was diluting. But the way that he created and he gets defeated on a grand scale, that means something. To watch him put his heart and soul into it and it’s like ‘Let’s have Goldberg beat him in 3 minutes.’ At that moment, I knew whatever I did then it wouldn’t matter. If that didn’t work, then what will?”         

I end every interview talking about gratitude. What are 3 things in your life that you are grateful for?

“Health, family and everybody within Control Your Narrative.”      

Embedded images: Instagram

Megan Olivi (@meganolivi) is a reporter and host for UFC and also a sideline reporter for the NFL on FOX. She sits down with Chris Van Vliet at the Blue Wire Studios at Wynn Las Vegas to talk about how she got started as a broadcaster, majoring in Political Science in college, landing her job with UFC, how interviewing Conor McGregor, Ronda Rousey and Brock Lesnar changed the course of her career, meeting her husband Joe Benavidez, working as a sideline reporter for the NFL on FOX, the best advice that Dana White has given her, being on the commentary team with Joe Rogan, her favorite UFC fight of all time and more!

I don’t think people realize the full scope of the things that you do. They see you on UFC for like 20 seconds and think that it’s an easy job.

“Yeah, that is exactly the reaction from a lot of people. They think that I am either reading a teleprompter, reading a script that someone else wrote or that someone is in my ear. I write 100% of my own scripts and I memorize them all! There are no teleprompters in our world, it’s a lot. It’s live TV so we do a lot of pivoting, nothing ever goes exactly to plan. Sometimes you will prepare for 2 dozen things and only get to do 10 of them. Sometimes they will say ‘Hey all that work you did, you’ve got to throw it out.’ And you have to think of something new in 5 minutes. It’s about being ready for anything and being prepared and on your toes. You may have to fill for 24 minutes if all the fights end early, you have to be a part of that. But also there might not be time to get all the stuff in that you worked really hard on. So it’s a broad scope and a lot that goes into it.”

I don’t think a lot of people realize what goes into it all. So what does a “typical” pay-per-view day look like to you?

“So I will base that answer off of what happened last weekend. I do rehearsals of the intricate hits that you see, they have to be timed perfectly with the cameras and the fighters walk. We rehearse those so that the fighter looks so perfect when they are in position. I arrive at 10:30 am, get hair and makeup, go into rehearsal. If I feel like it needs it, I will edit the scripts and start memorizing as much as I can. The rest of the team then comes in, we try and get some food and then we just hit the ground running. The fights start at 3, which is pretty typical for west coast pay-per-views. We don’t stop, I left the building at midnight, it’s a long day. I will contribute to commentary, do reports and interviews. I also host a post-show for ESPN after the fights, so it’s a lot of different roles and variables. It’s a long day, when I get home I try to just eat 17 tacos and go to bed.” 

How many different ways have you found to ask “How are you feeling?” Because that is what we want to know as the audience.

“That’s a good question, you definitely try to phrase things differently. But it has a lot to do with each person’s individuality. Some people you can’t just dive right in, you have to ask them something to make them comfortable. But some will just want to get in and out, so you will have to cut your words down and get the bare minimum so you can get the right wording and they can get out as well. There are so many things involved, but it is about how they are doing and what the future holds. You don’t see this in other sports, there is always another opportunity. But after a fight it is uncertain, so if I can get them to truly express themselves, I know that I am doing my job.”

You only have a handful of questions, like 2 or 3?

“Yes and that is what hard. On TV you have like 2 and a half minutes, which is not very long. If you are doing something for digital, or another platform where you can have 5 minutes, it’s amazing. But if you are on TV and an answer goes super long and you are getting wrapped, it’s killing me that I can’t ask this final question. Sometimes I will try and sneak it in, but it’s an art. People don’t realize that there are these time windows and figuring out where I can go from here, there is a lot in play.”  

You have interviewed Ronda Rousey and Conor McGregor, how much have they changed the course of your career?

“Oh my God, I can confidently say that I would not be in the position I am in if it wasn’t for Conor and Ronda. They didn’t judge me on my age or my gender, they just judged me on how that conversation was for them. The first conversations went so well that they wanted to do it again, that is the highest honor. To be there for their career journeys, it means a lot. Those interviews go viral, and to be that platform where they can be their best selves, that means the world to me.”             

Taking this way back, you went to school for political science. What did you originally think you were going to do for a career?

“I don’t know really, I thought I might manage political campaigns. I also thought about going to law school after that too, I just really enjoyed learning about the political landscape of our country. Not just modern times but how it was formed. I quickly realized that sports broadcasting was a real possibility. It wasn’t that I thought I couldn’t do, I just didn;t realize that it was an option. I was a die hard Yankees and Giants fan, my house was very sports dominated, but I never thought to consider it. Once I did start to realize it, then it became a possibility.”

But there are not thousands of jobs available for this.

“Right, which is why I wanted to get a degree. It was like well this helps me stand out from the pack. But I started out from the bottom by getting coffee and printing out scripts. I started out on the morning shows, so I would get the 4:12am train to New York City. I would get home and then go to classes in the evening. It was how can I set myself apart? Education is huge, but so is hands on experience and not thinking I am better than anybody. Part of the journey is learning every step along the way. Sometimes they are the thankless jobs, but we need all of them.” 

People say you need real world experience, but that is not easy. How did you get your foot in the door?

“So I applied to all these different news networks and congressmen’s offices. The only people that responded to me, I started in the summer before my sophomore year, said that they only take seniors. That is not always doable. People who responded said I was very gung ho so come on in. It was about non-stop movement, and it is not easy to get these opportunities. There are a lot of different avenues, but just keep trying, learning what you like and what you don’t.”

When did you start to block out the criticisms? With the industry that you are in, there is a lot of tweets, and not all of them are nice.

“I’m fortunate that most of them are kind. But when there is one that isn’t great, that is what sticks with you. I would be lying if I said it doesn’t affect me. If it’s about how I look, that is easier to ignore. I am fortunate that I don’t get a lot about my intelligence, because those are the ones that sting. I try to block it out but I am only human, I can tell you that nobody will be a harsher critic of me than myself. But it keeps me going and I strive for perfection, you can’t get that on live TV though.”

How did you find out about the UFC opportunity?

“So I worked in New York City, I was in grad school and interning. My boss was connected in the UFC world, so I started meeting people at dinners. It happened that a group of people had a videogame party and they said that there was going to be a post-show for the UFC and they were looking for a co-host, and they asked if I could do it. I said yeah, I was not ready for it, but I worked super hard and was part of the pre and post-shows.”

Did you ever think that you would be married to a fighter?

“Oh God no! I grew up in a house of combat sports athletes, but I never dated a fighter. But when I dated my husband, it was different.”

What changed?

“He is not your typical fighter. Everyone who has gotten to work with him adores him. You would never know in a million years that he was a fighter. But he was so good to be around, was never mean and he was just the best.”    

What is it like working for Dana White?

“It’s interesting, but he finds a way. Look at what happened with COVID, people made fun of fight island, but then we did it and it was amazing. He made it work and made it an option where it wasn’t before. He finds a way and that is why the UFC is the way that it is. It is great to have that as a leader and it’s like well watch this!”

What is the best advice you have gotten from Dana by talking to him or just watching him?

“I think it is by watching him that fear doesn’t hold him back. He bets on himself and the people around him, and it shows that he has the best people. We don’t have many employees and they are all very young. I think as a broadcaster it gives me the confidence knowing that I am talented due to the confidence that he has.”

How did the NFL come about?

“FOX has been amazing. The original UFC partnership was with FOX, and 4 or 5 years into it I was a reporter for them on big fights. I got the call to do 2 NFL games as a try-out and go from there. I needed the UFC’s permission and Dana couldn’t have been prouder. The first game was the New York Giants, who I grew up watching. I did a post game with Ely Manning, and I used to wear an Ely Manning jersey all around college. I had a game the next week, they gave me more games and it just went from there. It wasn’t that I was good at UFC, it was that I was a good broadcaster, and that meant a lot to me.”       

So where does it go from here?

“So I am super fortunate and want to keep doing what I am doing. I want to be the best storyteller in sports, whether that is producing shows, I would still love to do a morning show too and fill up the weekdays a little more.”

I end every interview talking about gratitude. What are 3 things that you are grateful for right now?

“My health, my family and opportunitues.”

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Featured image IMDB

Have we just seen the first proof that the Gypsy King, Tyson Fury, is heading back into the world of sports entertainment, bringing his unique skillset, arrogance, and charisma back into the squared circle?

If the recent social media posts from the World Heavyweight Champion boxer are anything to go by, then the answer would be a resounding yes.

Fury has regularly taken to Instagram of late to share updates on his training regime, and in typical style, he was bullish about his performance. “In the gym, guys; smashing it, absolutely smashing it.” He proclaimed to his 5.4 million followers. However, moments later, he revealed the outfit he wore at the 2020 Crown Jewel to the camera. “He’s coming, the Saudi Arabian King is coming back. Get up there, my boy, some big news coming. Hold tight.”

Although Fury hasn’t yet revealed what that ‘big news’ is, he’s certainly thinking about heading back into the WWE as his wife Paris went on to reveal on BBC radio over in England that he’s in constant contact with Vince McMahon.

Fury’s first foray into the wrestling ring came in the Middle East at the second edition of the Crown Jewel event, which has been held in Riyadh, Saudi Arabia, since 2018. The Brit took on Braun Strowman in a battle of the giants, with the boxer coming out of the thrilling eight-minute contest as the victor. Fury struck Strowman with a hard-right hand that led to a count-out; it infuriated the ‘Monster Among Men’ who, as reported by Bleacher Report retaliated by power slamming Fury after the winner had been announced. It left the door open for a rematch as wrestling fans were pleasantly surprised by the performance of the Gypsy King.

The WWE contest in Saudi Arabia came just ahead of Fury’s second fight in the trilogy against Deontay Wilder. He not only re-established himself as the WBC World Heavyweight Champion, but he also elevated his status to become one of the true greats of the modern era in boxing. Although the middle fight of the three between the Bronze Bomber and Fury was memorable, the third was even better; leaving many proclaiming it was one of the best in history. Fury won the bout with an eleventh-round knockout, the fifth knockdown of an epic encounter in Las Vegas, setting the Brit up for a chance to unify the belts. Next up for him is a mandatory defence of his title against Dillian Whyte, a fight in which he’s the favorite to win in the current odds from Ladbrokes. Should he overcome the challenge of Whyte, Fury is also tipped to win potential future bouts against either the holder of the remaining heavyweight title belts, Oleksandr Usyk, or previous champ, Anthony Joshua. The pair square up against each other in a rematch, with the victor looking likely to take on Fury in a winner takes all clash. Another option on the tip of people’s tongues is a possible bout with the heavy-hitting UFC Heavyweight Champion, Francis Ngannou, which shows how much of a draw the Gypsy King is to everyone in combat sports.

Whatever Fury decides to do post the Whyte bout, he’s already proven that his personality and talent are the ideal combinations for the WWE. Although he won’t be able to revive his rivalry with Strowman, who has now left the organization, there’s plenty of time for him to get back into the squared circle and forge a career outside of the boxing ring.

Featured image: Wikipedia

Mark Jindrak is an actor and professional wrestler known for his time in WCW and WWE. He chats with Chris Van Vliet about the crazy story that lead to him becoming a wrestler, training at the famous WCW Power Plant, being a member of “The Natural Born Thrillers” in WCW, WCW getting bought by Vince McMahon, what the reaction was like for Shane McMahon backstage at the final Nitro, being an original member of Evolution with Triple H, Ric Flair and Randy Orton and why he was replaced by Dave Bautista, finding success as a wrestler in Mexico under the name Marco Corleone, his current job grading sports cards and more!

You recently posted that you were back in the ring for the first time in 4 years. Was that in Mexico?

“It was almost in Mexico. It was in Loredo on the first night and the next night in El Paso. It was 4 years, but I have gotten into the ring a bit here in Knoxville. Kane and Dr. Tom Prichard have a school here, so for a couple of nights I did some drills and stuff. At my age, the bumps are limited. I ran a few miles everyday, made sure that everything was good. But I wrestled and everything was good, I missed the ring. But it’s crazy, it’s been 4 years but I didn’t feel like I had skipped a beat. It’s weird, time goes on but things don’t really change.”

Your physique doesn’t appear to have changed. You are just as jacked as you were in WCW!

“I felt like I looked the part, and that was important to me. As long as you look the part, age is just a number. I aim to improve my body another 25% for my future dates too. If you are training not to wrestle for a few years, you workout but not to an extreme level for the ring. For 3 years I just trained to maintain a halfway decent body. Once I trained to get back into the ring, I knew a lot of things would change. The diet, stretching, I would always stretch all day, people thought I was weird. But stretching is very vital.” 

What did you weigh in your body guy peak?

“Around 250 – 255 with not much body fat. I think I could have held 290 and still looked halfway normal, if that makes sense.”

If we take this way back, what did you want to be when you grew up?

“It was always geared towards sports. Growing up in New York, big Yankee country. I loved Reggie Jackson, but I was also into basketball and football. It was all about sports, sports, sports, always. I was division 3 basketball and went to college in Rochester. It was good competition and I blossomed into a more elite athlete in college. Once I started getting more of a man body, that was when the wrestling came about. I didn’t peak until my late 20s.”

You trained at the WCW Power Plant. What was that like?

“It was alright. It was tough but I was definitely ready. The try-out itself favored an athlete that was more well-rounded. I could run efficiently and had good endurance, agility and speed. I was big, but I was well proportioned. At 240 lbs I could move like I was 220. But as I got bigger, I looked more like I was 280. It was just the way I wore it.”

So what do you think the big break was for you in WCW?

“I think it was Vince Russo in the fall of WCW. Ratings were diving and all the ex-WWF guys were draining the payroll, they were not producing anymore. So because of that, all of us young guys got a chance. So basically that was our break, the new blood came in. Breaking out on TV was kind of easy, imagine starting a new day of school with 7 friends. We probably got some heat because we were too cliquey and stuck together, no one messed with us. When you are solo, some guys will help you and some won’t. But nobody really messed with us, we held our own.”

How did you all find out that WCW was being bought by Vince?

“There were always rumblings backstage. Then it was at the Panama city show where Shane came. There were rumours and we heard about it before, but there was uncertainty on whether it would actually happen. I wasn’t on the show, but I did a dark match before we went to TV. I remember coming backstage and seeing those guys there and I’m like wow this is crazy! The crowd was sweet as I had the first match there so I got a pretty good pop. I felt like I had a good chance, great body, young and not a lot of overhead. Guys like Luger and Kevin Nash were on bigger contracts.”

Do you remember the reaction to people seeing Shane backstage at Nitro?

“Yeah it was kind of a mixture depending on which wrestler you were. I was a fan of his and I thought it was cool, he seemed like a pretty cool dude. Shane was exactly the guy I thought he was. Some guys were marking out a bit and wanted to start the butt kissing right away, others had the big guaranteed contract with WCW so didn’t really care.”

I felt that it was unfortunate that a lot of the guys that were on Nitro, such as yourself, were not getting a lot of airtime.

“Yeah, I think it was because a lot of us were green. But again, when you are 6 foot 6, and WWE was still the land of the giants. It wasn’t until about 2003 when Eddie Guerrero and Chris Benoit started winning the championships [that it changed].”

Was it you being friends with Randy Orton that lead to you originally being a part of Evolution? 

“I don’t know. That I don’t know. We were just becoming friends in Louisville. I had flown up to Stamford with Orlando Jordan, they told me what he was going to be doing and that I would be in Evolution. Randy was joining Evolution as well, and that was when we started to become friends. We started going to the gym together and we continued our friendship on TV, which turned into a brotherhood. He and I became good friends and started travelling together, which was fun. But I think eventually it got to be too much fun so I got kicked out of Evolution, but it was great times. In my opinion he is easy top 5 of all time wrestlers in WWE.”

So how long was it from pitching to you being in Evolution to it being decided that they were going to go with someone else?

“I’m not sure of the timeline. I always envision the timeline of we became friends and then they set us up on TV. I think I was doing Heat matches, I don’t really remember. But even though I was part of the group, I was getting scared about it. They would do these polls on Raw, and I remember Jerry “The King” Lawler being like ‘Who is the next member of Evolution?!’ Then there was this poll of Test, Kevin Nash, Jericho, big stars, I can’t remember the names. I’m like I’m the next guy, but they are having these polls and hyping it up. I was not that known, I felt that they were hyping it up real big. Also I never really connected with Triple H. I always felt that we had the relationship where he was the older brother and I was the annoying younger brother. Orton and I together were 2 immature guys who loved having fun. We always rented cars and guys would zoom out the arenas to get to the next city. I remember Bob Holly going ‘We can make it in 2 hours 45.’ But me and Orton would took our time, stop at a WalMart, get a Slush Puppy, something stupid, but those times were fun.”

“When it became time to get this group together, Triple H would get us together on the house show loop and it went from me and Orton having a great old time to car rides with Triple H and Ric Flair, which was cool. But our young bunch, it was cramping our style. Flair wasn’t though, Flair was cool. Triple H said in the documentary Ruthless Aggression that he wanted to kick me out of the car, throw me over a bridge or something. But it makes sense, we were young kids like ‘Are we there yet?’ Flair is still a kid in the heart of himself. The car rides were meant to be talking about the Xs and Os of the group, but it was immature hour for me and Orton. The only thing missing was Triple H being like ‘I’m going to pull this car over!’ Ric Flair would ask us about the girls we met.”

I’m sure Ric wanted to meet the girls too.

“Yeah but that wasn’t the direction that triple H wanted to go. It was more supposed to be talking about business and stuff. After a couple of loops and car rides, he like many who rode with me, wanted to kick us out or something.”

So was it Triple H who said ‘Sorry Mark.’ Or Vince?

“Well you see in the documentary too, for me it was a relief to hear. Triple H said to Vince ‘He is not for the group.’ And Vince said ‘Yeah he is.’ Triple H also included Ric in that, but Ric never had a problem with me. Triple H was the one who put the axe to it. We had those vignettes where we were in the suits, and they filmed it. I guess he knew that I wasn’t going to be in it, so it sucked. I was so immature I didn’t really know what was going on. When you are young you feel like you can create anything you want.”

You have to look back now in hindsight at that missed opportunity.

“Oh absolutely. Every time I now see Batista in a commercial or movie I think about that, but we are different kinds of wrestlers. He might have fit the enforcer type better than me. Looking back now you can always say what if? But then I went to Mexico.”

You’re a huge star in Mexico.

“Yeah I flew under the radar for a bit due to a name change, I was Marco Corleone. The one thing in that documentary that they express, and they have to do it, is that if I wasn’t in Evolution then I was roadkill, but it wasn’t that way. I got released, but shortly after that I got into Mexico.”

What brought you back to America?

“I was on a Mexican soap opera. On the network we were on, WWE came on the same channel and we would get pushed to the side. The syndicate we were on got way less ratings. In 2017, I relaized I am getting older and nearing 40. My son was 1 year old at the time and Mexico was getting more unsafe and the value of the Peso was going down in value. I almost made the same as when I first got there, it sucked. So I decided to make the move right before the pandemic, so it all worked out, it was time.” 

I end every interview talking about gratitude. What are 3 things in your life that you are grateful for?

“My family, peace of mind and faith.”

Featured image: Pro Wrestling Fandom

Los Silva (@loshustle) is a self-made millionaire, keynote speaker, and founder of SVG Media, one of the largest influencer and athlete marketing agencies in the United States. He chats with Chris Van Vliet about the power of building an online brand, how he started his first business on eBay, the biggest mistakes that most people make on social media, why people need to stop saying “I Can’t” and start doing what they’ve always dreamed of and much more!

I was doing a deep dive on your Instagram before we came on here. It’s impressive what you have built for yourself as both a personal brand and this being your thing. You build brands for people.

“Right. Everyone thinks that I am an overnight success, but I have been in the digital marketing space for over 20 years now, I feel old. It’s funny because I saw an ad recently that said ‘I have been doing marketing consulting since Apple AirPods came out.’ That’s hilarious. I’ve been doing this since WordPress was a thing.”

Some people try to post one thing a day for 30 days and they only get like 16 more followers. What do you think is the formula for growing your audience?

“It’s just consistency, that’s the truth. My Twitter got hacked so I had to restart it and I now only have 12 followers. I had to do the same with my Instagram too, it was Los Silva and now it’s Los Hustle everywhere. It became a trademark but I am not exactly a hustler. But right now as it stands, we are creating a large amount of content for our brands. I look at content and if I regret one thing, it’s not doing more content sooner. We are putting out 3 Tik Toks, Instagram Reels and YouTube Shorts a day. It hurts your feelings to get 100 views on one platform, but I am being consistent and sticking at it. I understand that you need money to start a business and it might not be the best use of your time, but it can create a moat around your business for later on.”

There’s this assumption that if you have tons of followers then you are crushing it and you live in a big mansion. But the reality is most of those people are barely getting by.

“For one of my businesses for a few years our model was to use influencers. It’s still one of our divisions but with different influencers. We used to use fitness influencers with 3 – 5 million followers, I’m like these guys are raking it in. But no, nothing like that at all. They were a few steps above broke, they were scared to sell and didn’t know how to create content. Frankly, a lot of them were also lazy. Being a creator doesn’t necessarily make you want to be an entrepreneur or hard worker. With these guys, they are just gorgeous so things would come to them. At any stage, it is hard work, but so is digging ditches, being in a restaurant, work is work. If you want to excel, you have to do the hard work.”

So how can you make money on social media these days?

“If you are a creator, then it’s the affiliate deals and stuff like that. But it depends on your brand. If you are a makeup brand, you might use Sephora and try to build up your makeup line, I would build a brand. If you are a consultant then it’s all in the DMs. You could create a poll in your stories, or use testimonials from free work. You can create some amazing calls to action from your stories and say ‘If you are x,y and z…’ and put out a poll and DM all the people who say yes. You could put out a call to action saying ‘I am looking for 5 people who are looking to do this.’ and see who responds in the DMs.

Taking this back, where did it all begin?

“I have never had a job. When I was 20 my buddy John and I, we used to go out at night and stuff, we started to sell video projectors. We were making $480 and we were rich. We were selling on eBay and we were balling! So I also looked at what other high margin things I could sell and one of those is speakers. I asked Bose if I could be a reseller and they said yes as long as I don’t sell them anywhere else. I may or may have not done that and became a very big distributor on eBay. But then eBay slapped me and I didn’t know what to do next. So I started contacting architects for designer houses and cold calling them. I would offer to install something for free to get the deals from the AV . I didn’t get a dollar from that for 9 months. The last call I did was for Ethan Allen, which got me money and I made $100,000 from AV. I didn’t know how to install AV, so I got a company and white labelled them for installation and built that company.”

So where did the shift to social media come from?

“Before social media I bought ads. I bought display ads on every platform and built funnels for every agency. Back in the day a lot of people did product launches where no one would sell from the back of it. So through webinars I learned to monetize the back end and make a percentage from it. I got started with that, and when social media came, I got big because one of the businesses wasn’t producing content anymore. He got lazy and was chilling in Hawaii, and I got so annoyed by it. He owned a supplement company so I made like 60 videos about keto. That got me into people following me and I started to work with influencers and made content about helping people. I just then got to it and started speaking. I originally wanted to be an actor, I lived in a garage in Miami where ants would eat my food. So I was then like f*ck this and went back to business.” 

You chased this other dream of wanting to be an actor and then gave that up. What was that like for you?

“It was simple, I had no food. It was something I wanted to do but I always knew that I was going to be an entrepreneur. So I went back and started to think about what else I wanted to do. That was the hardest thing, I was buying everything and doing every course, but you are doing it all half assed and it all fails. So I commited to LinkedIn and it became a big thing for me in that moment. That then took me to other marketers who were doing this other thing, so I would go over there. I just stayed in the marketing realm and accidentally learned to do all these things. 18 years later we are here.”

A lot of people don’t want the hourly wage or the 40 hour week. What’s the first step they can take to start their own business?

“I’m going to say something that most people won’t. Go and get a job at a place that does something similar. I wouldn’t want to start this by myself again. I would go and learn what to do. If you don’t have much cash flow or a skill set, give yourself some breathing room. Realize that you won’t get rich quick and you are doing this to make your own way in life.”

How do you realize the best way to monetize your audience?

“It depends who you are. I’m assuming a lot of people who want to do this have an agency or are a speaker. The speaker would sell consulting of that vertical, the business can sell their service. The famous face can sell a brand deal for a better rate, or create their own product. Coaching, consulting, they are all the same business. I would focus on how you can create revenue in the service space, but then create a course when you have more of a following and more of a continuity.”

What has been the best piece of advice that you have been given along your journey?

“I think it’s a quote that ‘If you stand for nothing then you will fall for anything.’ You will be tricked on every situation e.g. if you just want to make money. If you have a goal and you want to support others, then it works. If your goal is just to make money, I can see that and it puts me off. So If you are supportive and helpful, people will want to talk to you.”

Can you talk to me about the advice that Magic Johnson gave to you?

“It was a few years ago at an event where Magic Johnson was speaking and I was fortunate enough to be close with the people backstage at the event. I asked him, because he had a similar situation to me, ‘What do you do when you know that in one of these businesses you need to start firing people?’ He said ‘Los. Winners win, that’s it.’ I came back and I fired half of my office. You are only as good as your bad player, and I had a lot of bad players. All the people that stayed, their workload stuck and it made us realize that we were more optimal. It’s hard to tell someone they suck, but sometimes you have to do it, because it is hurting you more than it is hurting them.”

I end every interview talking about gratitude. What are 3 things in your life that you are grateful for?

“My health, my girls and my wife.”

Featured image: Medium

David Arquette (@davidarquette) is an actor, director, producer and professional wrestler and former WCW Champion. He is best known for his roles in movies like the “Scream” franchise, “Ready To Rumble”, “Never Been Kissed”, “Eight Legged Freaks” and many others. He sits down with Chris Van Vliet at his home in Los Angeles, CA to talk about Scream 5, whether his character Dewey Riley was every considered as the killer, the evolution of horror movies, what his first big break in acting was, his marriage to Courteney Cox, winning the WCW Championship to help promote the film “Ready to Rumble”, why he started training to become a professional wrestling almost 20 years later, his documentary “You Cannot Kill David Arquette”, his infamous death match with Nick Gage and much more!

When you look at yourself as an actor, how do you think you have developed from the first Scream to this new Scream?

“Oh man, there’s just so much life experience that happens. At the beginning there is kind of like a naivety. But I don’t know, there is an element of being green, fresh and new, there’s this confidence. But the more you act, the more it is about finding those real, honest moments when you can embody the character and tap in. There were some moments in the last Scream that were so emotional, I feel like it makes people uncomfortable when a man shows and screams emotion. But when the stakes are high, you can get really emotional. They went with a safer take, but I would have liked to challenge the audience with the more emotional one. I have all this experience with my parents dying, all of these things that were playing on my mind.”

Yeah there are a lot of subtle things that you do in your roles.

“I learned a lot about acting from wrestling. Just being in the moment and being real. The thing about wrestling is that it is so over the top, when you can find the real moments and tap into them, you are really angry and the audience feels it, that’s really powerful stuff. It’s a lot harder to do that technique than people think.”  

When you first read the script for Scream, did you flip to the last page and go ‘Oh my God! My character is still alive!’?

“No, my character wasn’t supposed to live in the first one. Was Craven brought me back.”

So there is footage out there of Dewey dying?

“Well Dewey sort of gets killed and stabbed in the back in the first one. Wes is like ‘We will put you in a gurney, see if you make it and you put the hand up.’ So thank you Wes. He was amazing and a great mentor in all sorts of ways. There were a few times where we were having discussions on where the script was going. I was always suggesting [dying]. There are a lot of red herring moments, and I always thought it would be one of the biggest ‘What do you mean!’ moments. You always try to look for those moments to surprise and shock the audience.”

You’ve embodied so many characters throughout your career. Do you sometimes forget who David is?

“No, along the journey of life I have made a lot of wrong turns. Luckily I have come back safely, but that’s part of it, figuring it all out. Staying focused, channelling the flow, that is my focus. Drugs, alcohol, pot, I can’t do any of it anymore, because it gets me out of the flow. When you stay in the flow, you start to see magical things happen. I was beating myself up for so long that it was hard to not do that stuff anymore.”

So how do you explain to the people who are not wrestling fans the whole Nick Gage situation?

“So there is this thing called the deathmatch [laughs]. And if you get offered to do it, say no!”

So they ask ‘Like a deathmatch? Do people die? There is ultra violence? What is that?’

“I didn’t know what the ultra violence thing was. They were like ‘This is the ultra violence part.’ I’m like, ok. You should have seen what was supposed to come next. I was supposed to go through a barbed wire wall, there was a bunch of stuff, but I didn’t care. I was asked why I wanted to do this, and I was like well it’s getting pain to numb the pain. What I learned doing the documentary was that I was beating myself up mentally, but why? That negative voice is my biggest enemy. I was drinking beers to quieten it down, but you have to think of other ways.”

With something like WCW it is so fast paced. They write stuff that is for the moment, but we forget that this stuff is going to live on forever. I feel like that was the space you were forced into for 20 years.

“I still stand true to the idea that I was one of the first fan champs. I got to live my dream, but the fact that I was an actor sort of taints it. But I wouldn’t change it for the world, and I respect the wrestlers for what they do. Seeing them do it all the time, when you do it all the time your body is used to it.”

There’s a lot of celebrities that do just one match. What made you decide that you were going to be an indie wrestler and tour around and make this a thing?

“I wanted to find out why the fans got so mad at me. I wanted to figure out what is wrestling. Also, I just wanted to experience it and go to my hotel room and it not be there.”

Were they booking you like an indie wrestler?

“It was a little bit different because I was shooting the documentary. If I am using the footage then I wouldn’t be paid, sometimes I would. There were a few places that treated me right. Even though I am a former champion I was a green wrestler, I took a different approach to it. If you come in with all these demands, it just takes away from it all.”

I heard that when you were training to be a wrestler you had a ring in your backyard. Do you still have it?

“No, I gave it to Jungle Boy. He’s such an incredible dude. He and his dad and the family came over and we hung out in the ring.”

But you got trained in your own backyard by Peter Avalon?

“Yeah he’s just amazing. In the first training session I puked my guts up. That was just from bumps and being out of shape, he was giving me real wrestling training. In one of my first matches I cracked my ribs and then I had do a match with RJ City. With cracked ribs, just coughing or sneezing is painful, never mind taking bumps! I had to get an MRI because it was so painful.”

A lot of people in their 40s would start training, feel it hurt and go ‘I don’t need to do this.’

“Yeah but I had already started it though. The lesson I learned from the deathmatch was to not beat myself up so much. I had started drinking at that time too, but it was like a therapy for me, I learned a lot.”

I feel like people didn’t really understand this. When you said on talk shows that you were training to be a pro-wrestler, it was almost like you were the butt of the joke.

“Yeah and I see that a lot. It’s like I am Bozo the Clown making people laugh. Even my wife was cringing at it. But you have to know where you are going and what the point is. Once you go on the journey, you have to redirect and go after what you believe in. But I know that the people will catch up and think that it was cool. I was trying to get Cody Rhodes in the film too, it was right after all the AEW stuff was coming together. I wanted to have a match with him, I thought it would be funny to be like [as Cody] ‘You disrespected the belt to my dad and I’m gonna pay you back.’ That was my pitch to him. But we had started this documentary way before [AEW] and then this explosion in wrestling happened. I still don’t think that Hollywood takes wrestling as seriously as they should. Look at what The Rock is doing.”

What advice would you give to someone who is looking to move out to LA and become an actor?

“Well right now there are so many avenues. On our phones we can shoot a movie with cinematic mode. You can edit it and everything. But if you want to get involved in acting, there are some great coaches and plays. Or put on your own play, rent the theater. If you are determined and won’t let anything stop you, then start. Do what you love and post what you love, it will resonate and people will understand. Everyone has a story and everyone wants to tell it, but unless you tell it then no one will hear it.”

How do those knives work in Scream? They look so authentic.

“Well sometimes they have just the handels, sometimes they are spring loaded. The worst is when you get stabbed with the retractable one and it doesn’t go, that hurts. Sometimes it can be CGI and sometimes it’s rubber and they make it look better.”

26 years later you are still getting royalty cheques?

“I guess so but they are not as big as they used to be.”

As a former WCW Champion, what is your favorite match?

“I’m not great with that stuff. But it might be the Hogan one at Bash at the Beach or the one with all the motorcycles. I was an old school wrestling fan, I liked Junkyard Dog, Andre The Giant and The Macho Man. But my favorite is probably Ricky Steamboat vs. Macho Man from WrestleMania 3.”

What was it like trying to get footage from WWE for the documentary?

“I went to them really early on, because I wanted to do it with them, no deathmatches involved. But they were not interested and did not want to do it. I had a really bad experience where there were general managers of Raw and Scream 4 was coming out. I contacted Triple H and was like ‘This could be cool.’ I went out there and I don’t know, I was in a bad place and going through the divorce. It was in New Orleans and I ended up staying out all night. My voice had gone, I went out and tried to get heel heat, but I was off script and I’m pretty sure I p*ssed off Vince. I didn’t mean to, I have the upmost respect. But no one smartened me up to not do this, I was thinking it was like a house show, but it was Raw. It was a bad move.” 

Did you approach AEW?

“That was the upsetting thing with AEW because a lot of the guys in AEW were in the movie. I wanted to do a match or something to promote the movie. They were like no, but I think it was TNT. They were trying to charge me.”

TNT was going to charge you to wrestle?

“No but it went through to the publicity department and it was like it costs this much to promote. We were looking to advertise on the shows or something within AEW, but they looked at it as ‘We charge this much to promote something in the ring.’ That was depressing because I knew how much it meant to the guys.”

I end every interview talking about gratitude. What are 3 things in your life that you are grateful for?

“My children, my wife and my health.”

Embedded images: Instagram

Featured image: IMDB

Rylee Meek (@theryleemeek) is an entrepreneur, coach and podcaster. Rylee is the host of The King’s Council Podcast and the founder of King’s Council Coaching. He joins Chris Van Vliet to talk about how to be the CEO of your own life, the importance of balancing the 5 power pillars of life (spiritual, mental, emotional, financial and physical), why he always finds time for the gym, how to become a better communicator, why he believes that how you do anything is how you do everything, the best advice he has ever received and much more!

Anybody that looks at you will think you make time for the gym. You are super busy with everything in your life. How important is making time to go to the gym for you?

“Oh super important. I am a big morning routine guy, more so rhythm than routine. If I can’t get the blood going in the gym then my mind juices can’t get going. Also we have only got one body, if we can’t operate that well then we can’t operate business well.”

What do you think is the difference between a morning rhythm and a morning routine?

“I think that a routine is such a negative word. Maybe that is just me, but it’s like a budget, We have a negative connotation to certain words. With a routine it’s like here we go again… I choose to call it a rhythm so it helps my mindset shift from the routine.”

We all have these moments in life where things change for us. What was your big bang moment?

“Oh man. So at the age of 15, and I have been an entrepreneur since the age of 15, but I took a job for one day. This was a “job” where I was getting an hourly wage. I thought I would make some money and eventually buy a car like all high school kids want to do. I worked an 8 hour shift at minimum wage, which was $5.15 an hour at the time. So I worked 8 hours and got like $40. There was no way I was doing that again. I walked out feeling frustrated, not that they valued me at that amount but because I allowed them to value me at that amount. That’s the day where I’m like I am not doing that again. I looked at ways that I can bring value to the market and I’ve been doing that for nearly 20 years.”

So what was step 1 in this process?

“It was the environment. I grew up in a small community with 1,000 people in the entire town. I knew I had to be intentional with my time because there were not a lot of entrepreneurs I could gleam from. So once a month I would drive up to Minnesota and attend these events called Success Training Seminars. I just got in a room with like mindsetted people, they thought differently but had the same goal in mind, which was progress. I seeked out these groups, found mentors and read books. My journey was 5 hours each way so I listened to CDs and audited my thoughts. Why did I think this way? It was mainly down to the way that I grew up. If we think ‘Why do we think that way?’ It’s probably down to what an aunt’s friend said when we were younger.”

How did a Craigslist ad change your life? Do you remember what it said?

“Oh I will never forget what it said! I was coming off a failed business venture at 24 and wondering what to do next. So I had a business valuation company, a fitness center, I was just seeking new opportunities. I literally had $673 in my bank when I saw this ad. It said ‘Work 3 days a week and make $10,000.’ I thought yeah, right! But the ad did its job and got me to click on it. That ad opened my eyes to a new concept of selling and have never heard of before. It completely blew my mind in leveraging my dollars and my time. Ultimately, it has changed the direction of my life.”

A lot of people want to start their own business. What are 3 things you would say that people have to do to start?

“The first thing that anyone can do is set up an LLC [Limited Liability Company]. Do it. People think they need to figure out a product or a service or how to sell it. Just set up the LLC, it’s the easiest part and a box you need to check. It’s great to get into the routine of checking off the boxes and you feel accomplished. It costs $160 to set up an LLC, then get the bank account and you are in business. If you don’t know what to sell, seek out a mentor or a coach and look for opportunities. People say ‘If you follow your passion then you never work a day in your life.’ I say that is BS. When COVID went down, I looked at what I can bring more value to a market place and package it into a way that people wanted it. They say ‘You can lead a horse to water but you can’t make it drink.’ No, but I can put salt in its oats so that it is thirsty. So set up your LLC, look for opportunities and bring your passion with you.”

You talk a lot about the 5 power pillars. What exactly are those?

“OK so we got mental, emotional, physical, spiritual and financial. I really believe that these pillars, we need to be operating in life like a CEO would operate a company. CEOs have marketing, fulfilment, HR… If you are thinking about running a company, you adjust the levers and control the ship. You aren’t necessarily doing it all, but you are leading the ship and directing it. If marketing struggles, it all suffers. We host these events called CEO of Your Life where we promote the health of these pillars. Then you can put yourself in control of these positions. People call it the work/life balance, but if you are balancing then something is losing. I believe that it is a wheel with 5 spokes, if one spoke is broken, we are limping around because the wheel won’t work.”

What do you think is the best advice that you have ever received?

“Oh man. The best advice I have ever received? I didn’t exactly receive it but I learned it. At 15 I learned that I need to be around certain people and be intentional. This is why we have these neural pathways, because it was the environment we grew up in. When a baby shark is born and never taken from a fish tank, it will never grow from its birth size of 8 to 10 inches. But if you take that shark and put it in the ocean, it will grow to 15 or 20 feet. This is because the environment affects the growth. If you don’t like where you are, you have to change your environment. Time is your most valuable thing, not time. Where you invest your time is where you will reap what you harvest.”

You are a fellow podcaster. What is the biggest thing that you have learned since you started your podcast?

“So I have done 2 podcasts. The Sales Conversion Podcast, which is now on hold, selfishly I did that to learn from people. I generated decent 7 figures from inviting people onto the podcast and then doing business together. It was an incredible experience. It was being intentional of me having products and services, inviting people on and doing business. A lot of The King’s Council episodes are solo episodes. I am very intentional about what I am talking about, for example the 5 pillars. It is about going from student to teacher to master, where you can teach it. It’s been epic in learning and teaching people and has taught me a lot about preparation.”

I end every interview talking about gratitude. What are 3 things in your life that you are grateful for?

“Standing here right now doing this podcast being alive and being here now as number one. Number two, being grateful for life in general. Thirdly my spouse, she has been incredible.”

Image credit: Instagram

Ryan Magin (@ryanmagin) is an entrepreneur and social media growth expert. He joins Chris Van Vliet at the Blue Wire Studios at Wynn Las Vegas to talk about the formula to creating viral videos and posts on social media, how anyone can gain followers, why you should absolutely start a TikTok account, why creators are doubling down on Instagram Reels, the value of adding captions to videos, how often you should be posting and much more!

So if someone doesn’t have a TikTok account, should they have been on this yesterday?

“Well they should have been on it a year ago. There is still is time though. If you look at the time that Instagram has been popular and YouTube has been popular, TikTok has really amplified, especially over the last 2 years with everything going on. But I still think that it is so infant. TikTok is only a few years old, Instagram and YouTube didn’t pop right away, but the competition is coming.” 

Some people think that TikTok is just 98% dancing.

“In my world I have never done a dance or a trend. I don’t care what hashtags are popular and I don’t know what songs are popular. If I am going to turn this into a business, I can’t rely on external factors that make this popular. So I dove into the platform, which lead me to Reddit. Whatever is popular on Reddit is popular on TikTok. If you want to get a lot of TikTok views, you have to tap into the community and do it better.”

My girlfriend had 4 followers, posted a cute video of our dog, and it got 160,000 views. Now she has 37 followers, but she is like ‘How did this happen?’

“They do a lot of things and there are a lot of smart people behind the app. They make you keep going and go down that rabbit hole. Then you are just hooked. It’s just a never ending scroll and there is something there, that’s why Instagram and YouTube have now copied it.”

Do you think that there is a recipe for going viral?

“I do. Controversy is always the best recipe in my opinion. But also tutorials, recipes and matter of facts, practical people problems. TikTok doesn’t do well with the flexing culture. If people come on with the fancy cars, it might get a few views. But if you want to get the followers and the views, you have to give them something tangible. When they go to your profile, there has to be something else there to make them follow you.”

So if someone is grinding away and they only have 300 followers, what would you say they need to do?

“Look at your analytics and see which videos are doing better, then make more of those but make them better. TikTok is driven on watch time. The sole purpose should be to make the person watch the whole video, if not, it’s going nowhere. You have to make them watch 20 seconds, it sounds easy, but try to make them watch a full 20 seconds.”

So say you are doing one type of video, but you do something else and that takes off, should you follow that?

“So I experimented a lot. When I started on TikTok, I had some viral tips and grew to 30k quickly giving camera tips. But when I was making camera tip videos, it capped out at 100,000 because there were not a lot of people on the app. Now there are more, we are reposting those same videos and they are getting hundreds of thousands, because there are more people. There might not be a particular market yet, but niches will become more and more important. The broader the topic that relates to you, the more reach TikTok can give it.”

How do you feel about reposting your content?

“I do it all the time. I haven’t made a fresh video in 2 months. But it is also down to what kind of content you are making. We are making good videos that are not based on trends and will hopefully outlive the app. A lot of people want fresh and new, which is great until you get busy. I have reposted that have done a lot better and a lot worse. Right now I feel that it is more like the consistency over the content.”

What would you say is the viral formula?

“There is a formula to every viral video. There is a hook, a riveting story or something that is educational. It wasn’t something crazy like someone jumping off a building, but it is harder to make an educational video if there is no education. Say this video is only for men, then it limits who sees it. People on YouTube say ‘What’s up guys?’ So that will show it to guys, what about women? You have alienated half of the world. Say the video is about putting a shelf on a wall, if you say ‘What’s up guys? Here is how to put a shelf on a wall.’ It will only show it to guys. In our experience, the titles and hashtags don’t mean that much. They help in some scenarios, but I think hashtags box in the video before it starts.”

The amazing thing about TikTok is that the first 80% are people I don’t follow.

“That means you haven’t watched the ones you follow all the way through. We see a lot of data, and certain words will not go over 1,000. Anything with depression, COVID, virus, anything down that realm. If you talk about suicide prevention, the word suicide doesn’t work. If someone makes a video about their experience with pain pills, it won’t get the views that it deserves.”  

The micro content is now the gateway, it leads to the longer content. In my case, the TikTok clips and Instagram reels lead to the interviews.

“I think another argument is well how much influence can you give in 20 seconds? Well not a lot, but you can be lead to a profile, watch 30 videos and that’s 10 minutes.”

Everybody is an expert in something, figure out what it is and turn the camera on.

“Yes, but do it in a certain way. Like woodworking, break it down and teach it in a way where they will get the same enjoyment as you do. It’s not that easy anymore to go viral. The audience will tell you if your video is sh*t or not. It’s up to you whether you want to adapt or not. They drive what is viral, and what is viral on TikTok is viral everywhere. A lot of clients, their main focus is Instagram. They say ‘Put whatever you want on TikTok but not on our Instagram.’ Well you should care more about TikTok, because that is the more viral platform.”

A lot of people don’t want to join TikTok. They think it is for 14 year olds.

“Yeah a lot of people think that it is a young person’s app, but my demographics are like 18 to 30. But there are a lot of older creators that are blowing up.”

So what are 3 things that people can do right now to make their videos viral?

“One of the trigger words for TikTok is viral. We had a video on TikTok on how to make videos viral, it had 350 views after an hour. We took off the viral tags, reposted it, and it got 780,000 views. The word viral could be on the suppressed word list due to what is going on in the world. Also the hashtags may have not worked, and the video flopped.”

OK, so what are 3 things people can do to get 1 million views?

“Pay close attention to the first 3 seconds of your video. What I mean is provide something thought provoking or get people to stop scrolling. Say what is being said in a way that relates to the audience. The more you can give a personal story attached to the hook, the more people will watch the whole thing. And finally be relatable. While it’s cool seeing a Lamborghini and someone talking about not being able to drive it in Hollywood, I don’t have a Lamborghini and I don’t live in Hollywood.”

I end every interview talking about gratitude. What are 3 things in your life that you are grateful for?

“I would say TikTok, being able to support my employees and family.”

Image credits: Instagram

D’Lo Brown (@dlobrown75) is a professional wrestler known for his time in WWE and IMPACT Wrestling. He also works as the Head of Talent Relations for IMPACT Wrestling. He sits down with Chris Van Vliet at the Blue Wire Studios at Wynn Las Vegas to talk about his legendary career in WWE as part of the Attitude Era, being a member of the Nation of Domination with The Rock, Kama Mustafa (The Godfather) and Faarooq, why he considers himself the “Forrest Gump” of wrestling, his trademark headshake, working for IMPACT Wrestling, what he looks for when they sign new talent, how “the forbidden door” has changed wrestling and much more!

So what is your official title at IMPACT Wrestling?

“I am the head of talent relations.”

But if that’s your job, commentator is your job too? How many hats do you wear?

“Enough to keep me employed [laughs].”

So what is a show day like for you?

“I wake up, get to the building, sit in a production meeting and go through an agents meeting. I then break off and meet with talent about their match. If I get time, I break out the computer and see if there are any payroll issues that I need to deal with or anything out there that needs to be addressed. I then go back to talent and see if anyone else needs anything, then it’s showtime. So I put on a suit and scream at the top of my lungs for 2 hours.”

You and Tom Hannifan.

“Yeah Tom is such a great guy. He came in and injected an element of comfort. No disrespect to anyone else, but there is something about his voice that is so comforting and draws you in. He is so knowledgeable about wrestling and such a pro. I was so impressed from the moment he first sat down next to me.”

For those who don’t know this is the former Tom Phillips in WWE. That was a huge pickup for IMPACT.

“I was so happy when I heard that he was coming on board.”

Are you the guy that is out there seeking new talent?

“I am always looking. My emails, I get 100 a day from talent all over the country. Some are good and some are bad. But I get them and it is all consuming. Last night I was up until 4:30 watching videos of people trying to be that next person.” 

So if I want to get D’Lo’s attention, what do I need to do?

“Show me something that I have not seen before. Entertain me in a way where I can say yeah that translates to the masses. Give me something that I can sell to those above me and I can’t walk away from. That is a tall order. For example, we already have one Moose, we don’t need another. You as the person who is trying to get a job, what makes you stand out and what makes you special? You’ve then got 2 minutes to show us why you need a second look or a deeper evaluation.”

Is this about making a name for yourself on the indies?

“It’s not about making buzz , it’s just about being good at what you do. Your presentation, in-ring work, talking, your body, the way you are dressed… Billy Kidman is the only guy who has made money in a wife beater and shorts. Yet there are 100 guys wrestling in that look. If only one guy did it, I’m staying away from that.”

The wrestling landscape has changed over the last year, especially with IMPACT Wrestling and the forbidden door.

“IMPACT Wrestling is the backbone of the forbidden door. When you think about who is working with who, IMPACT Wrestling is always connected to somebody. [Whether it’s] New Japan, AEW, AAA, WWE, ROH, you name it and we are connected in some way, shape or form. We are the framework of the forbidden door.”

When Mickie James was announced for the Royal Rumble it was like wait, WWE is on this too!

“The second that the IMPACT Knockouts Championship came out to the ring on Mickie’s waist, that’s an acknowledgement that someone else exists from WWE. That was a huge get, huge for us and huge for Mickie.”

Do you think the door could now go both ways?

“Well never say never. That is the beautiful thing about wrestling, you can never say never.”

What was your first time doing something different?

“I think it was when the head shake first happened. The first time that I did the head shake, I knew I found something that was different from everyone else in the roster. When you are in such a tekent laden locker room, you have to find something that makes you stand out. If not, you are just another guy in spandex and baby oil. Hell, you are in the biggest company, you have to elevate up the card. If it wasn’t for the head shake, even in The Nation I had a certain amount of protection, but I was still just the 4th or 5th guy. Finally when the head shake happened, that was when things started and a focus was put on me.”

You had some great in-ring moves too.

“Those were the starting moments, but at the end of the day it is just a move. Only one guy has gotten over with a move, that’s Petey Williams with the Canadian Destroyer. Other than that, everyone does the same 12 moves of doom.”

The first time I saw that move, I was like how is this possible?

“Yeah I rewound that so many times. I believe Petey named it after one of the greats from Ontario Canada that was called The Canadian Destroyer.”

With The Nation and with The Rock, did you feel like there was something special with him?

“No not at first and even Rock would tell you. He had the failed Rocky Maivia gimmick, coming off an injury and had the pineapple hair. He was trying to find himself following the failed babyface run. Also he had some protection being in The Nation and he could make mistakes and have great minds around that would help him cultivate. The one thing I did learn about Rock was that he was willing to do the work and he would out work anybody. What I mean by that is there were times where we were all in the car and you could see him thinking. We would listen to the radio, he would hear a catchphrase in a song and 2 weeks later it would be in a promo. Because of that hard work, you could see this brother is putting the time in and working. If you go back you can see the evolution of his promom style. It took about 6 months, but the first time that he walked out in that black vest and called himself The Rock, well you know the rest.”

We now look back at the segment of DX making fun of The Nation in a really different way. Was there any trepidation at that time?

“No, and there have been a lot of stories out there. I can tell you that none of us had any real concerns about it. In retrospect, we could have done that segment without the black face, and I wish we had. It would have been just as good. Obviously I wished we changed that and we didn’t. Looking back on it in 2022, I’m not a fan of it. But in 1997/1998, it was a way to get us to go to war. Both the factions were over enough and connected to the fans enough that we can go out there and draw money, build houses and put up ratings on TV. We looked at the potential matches, and that peaked our curiosity. I think people look past the obvious elephant in the room.”           

I think even a few years later when WWE became a public company.

“You wouldn’t pitch that 3 years later. You would get laughed out the building if you pitched it a few years later.”

I mean with great respect, but IMPACT is back on the rise. What do you attribute that to?

“Consistency with storytelling, finding under utilized talent and giving them the opportunity to go out there and grow. Look at how different Moose is from his Ring of Honor days to now. Our locker room wants to be the best. Our Knockouts division wants to be and knows that they are the best women’s division out there. That is what separates IMPACT Wrestling, creative storylines, consistency and talent.”

How long before The Nation gets inducted into the WWE Hall of Fame?

“I don’t know. It would be an honor if it does happen but…”

Or does D’Lo go in first?

“I don’t think I have done enough in the business to warrant a Hall of Fame induction in my opinion. [In just WWE?] I mean it’s their Hall of Fame. I’ve spent more of my career in IMPACT than I have in WWE, twice as long. We are talking 12 years compared to 6 years.”

I end every interview talking about gratitude. What are 3 things in your life that you are grateful for?

“My family, opportunities and this crazy world of professional wrestling.”

Jeff Timmons (@jefftimmons) is a singer, songwriter, producer and one of the founding members of the boy band “98 Degrees”. He joins Chris Van Vliet at the Blue Wire Studios at the Wynn Las Vegas and blows us away with the tips and tactics he’s used to change his life. He talks about how he formed 98 Degrees, deciding on a whim to move from Ohio to Los Angeles, the importance of dreaming big, why he writes down his goals every day, how he met Nick Lachey, Drew Lachey and Justin Jeffre, what being a dad has meant to him, why 98 Degrees broke up, how they got back together and more!

You look so youthful.

“Thank you. We’ve always been gym rats, the guys in the group, but I think it’s diet more than anything. It’s a combination of diet and exercise, but I think diet is more important.”

What is your diet?

“It’s keto. I’ve been low carb since 1997. It was the Atkins diet and then it evolved. Basically it’s a high fat diet. All my profiles and stuff check out.”

I think from the outside looking in, a lot of people haven’t heard a new 98 Degrees song in quite some time.

“Yeah except for the diehard fans, and we have been touring since our comeback tour in 2013. But we have families and we have done this before, so we needed to figure out a way to do both, tour and be with our families and look after our other businesses. So we started doing this thing called the Weekend Warrior. This allows us on Friday and Saturday to do those dates, and then for the rest of the week we can concentrate on the other stuff.”

Where was the shift where boybands were not really a thing anymore?

“I want to say that in 2002, literally that was it. Literally radio was done and that’s it. What happened was that there was too many. There was too much pop and bubble gum pop, radio loved it and it was one of the best times. Tons came after that and the programmers, not necessarily the fan base, they were just sick of it. They said no to this type of music and stopped playing the records. That was why we all went away and nobody else emerged as a big time solo artist, with the exception of Justin Timberlake.”

I remember back in the day that you used to perform at malls.

“Before that, we actually performed at cheerleading camps before we got signed. We couldn’t get signed right away and our demo was done. What we did was that our manager was friends with the head of the National Cheerleading Association. He asked if we could go on a cheerleading camp tour, and that was how we started. It was crazy, but you look back at those times and you miss it. You don’t don’t know where things will go, but we were having a blast and it was just so much fun. Once you get signed, it gets more competitive and more of a grind and less fun.”

What do you think was the song that put you on the map?

“We had a song called Invisible Man, which is my favorite. Invisible Man came out, and Motown was trying to convince people that we were an urban group. They didn’t put our pictures on anything, they wanted people to think that we were an R & B group. The only place where the music video was served was a video channel called The Box, which was on UHM. You could call in and give the number that was on a list, and then they would play it.”

What was the next one?

“I think it was The Hardest Thing and then it was I Do. If you had 3 songs on an album then that album can go platinum.”

Do you still get the residuals?

“Yeah of course. They are not a lot, if you are not the songwriter, it’s nominal. Back in the day you used the CD sales and merchandise to make the money. Unless you wrote all the songs, which we didn’t. But we were songwriters, the label just didn’t want our songs to get on there. But if you didn’t write the songs, you made a little bit of money from the CD and the albums, you really made the money on the road.”

Isn’t this why everyone has a Christmas album?

“Yes, because it will get played every year. Also Christmas music before a certain year is public domain. So if you do your own version of it and your own arrangement, you can claim the publishing rights. It’s a great little money maker.”

If people don’t recognize you from your face, do they from the tattoo?

“There was a time when I was embarrassed by the tattoo. The music went away and it wasn’t cool to be in a “boyband.” People would nail me for the tattoo. I would wear long sleeve shirts to cover it up. I was married before, but then I got divorced and met my new wife. She was like ‘What are you doing? You are in one of the biggest groups of all time. Why are you embarrassed? You should be proud of it.” I’m like I should be proud of it, this is so strange. Why do you care so much about something that you created that went on to sell millions of records. I didn’t get the tattoo for a brand, I did it because it is my crew. I never thought of it as an advertisement to the group.”

Did you ever think about getting it covered up or removed?

“Yeah back when we were done. I would walk into Guitar Center they are like ‘Oh look it’s the 98 Degrees guy!’ I’m like ‘Yeah, and you’re still working at Guitar Center.’ Nothing wrong with that, but alright, at least I tried.”

You didn’t just try, you succeeded!

“Well I was like yeah but I was thinking this wasn’t cool anymore. That was when my wife hit me over the head with it and I am proud of this many years later.”

What advice would you give to people who are starting out now?

“I think it’s the same. The tools are different, but it’s always the same. Work harder than everyone else, and self belief is a big thing. Self confidence and self belief, no one is going to believe in you as much as you believe in yourself. Those closest to you may be the ones to discourage you the most, because they see you doing something that they were too afraid to try. Secretly they might be envious, but if you stick with it. Finally humility and to surround yourself with good people, which can be hard. But if you get rid of the bad, the good will flock to you.”

I feel like you willed this into existence with the success of 98 Degrees.

“Thanks man. You have to will it into existence, no one will believe in it as much as you do, so you have to put all of your energy and will into it. That doesn’t mean you can’t have balance, but you have to visualize it.”

I end every interview talking about gratitude. What are 3 things that you are grateful for?

“That I am still around, my family and I’m doing what I love for a living.”

Featured images: Instagram

Powerhouse Hobbs (@true_will_hobbs) is a professional wrestler also known as Will Hobbs signed to All Elite Wrestling. He joins Chris Van Vliet to discuss how he got discovered and signed by AEW, what it was like wrestling CM Punk on TV, the breakout moments he’s had in his career so far, his workout routine, the importance of mental health, how Tony Khan gave him the nickname “Powerhouse”, his favorite big men in wrestling and much more!

What job did you have before AEW hired you?

“So I was working at Facebook and Instagram. I was running their facilities department, so I was running about 4 different buildings. Then I got a call saying that we are going to give you a month off with pay, and I’m cool with it. I can take my son Bam Bam to school and look after my other son Julian. I got home about 2:30, then got a call about 3:45 saying that they were going to terminate my contract. I’m like f*ck, but everything happens for a reason. I am glad that I got let go and I am living my dream.”

Look where it’s lead you know.

“Right. I was telling Christian how I am living my dream.”

I’m liking the gear that you are using right now. It’s a tip of the hat to Harlem Heat.

“Yeah those were my dudes growing up. Just the intimidation factor and they talked like my grandparents did when I was growing up. Things like, neckbones, sucka, my grandpa said that stuff to a tee. So those were my dudes growing up. Plus they look like me, so that was a good thing.”

So what was it that drew you to pro-wrestling?

“Pro-wrestling was already on by the time that I came along. So my grandparents moved from a small town in Mississippi right down the street from The Cow Palace. They took my dad, aunts and uncles all the time, every other weekend to see Pat Patterson, Peter Maivia, all those guys. By the time I was born, wrestling was on the TV and I was hooked.”

So at what point did you think that this was something that you wanted to try?

“I’ve always wanted to be a wrestler from when I was 5, that was all that I ever cared about. I played football, basketball and baseball, but wrestling was all that mattered. I remember going to a live show and being like OK, I know what school to go to, which was APW, which was in Beyond The Mat. So I saved up the money, pulled the trigger and that was it. We had 23 people start and there were only 2 people at the end.”

There’s a lot of people who want to be a wrestler at 5 years old but they lose track of it. For yourself, you stayed on course.

“It was all I ever wanted. Coming home from school we watched old wrestling tapes. Watching wrestling on Monday and having my grandpa flick between the channels on Mondays. I remember getting mad at my grandparents for calling the cable company and them saying the wrong pay-per-view. I remember my grandma saying ‘I want to order WrestleManiac.’ I’m like ‘It’s WrestleMania!’ Them not understanding what she wanted to order, but it was always on. I had the figured, drew figures on paper growing up.”

I heard in another interview that you were skinny growing up. How skinny are we talking?

“I graduated high school at 142 lbs. I was shorter, I grew and genetics happened. But it happened, my first wrestling match in a battle royal, I thought I was the business then. So I came in, threw some punches, got chopped and kicked, then out the door. That was the highlight.”   

What do you think is the biggest difference between the Powerhouse Hobbs that is sitting here right now and when you debuted 12 years ago?

“Confidence. Having the right people around to teach me. Knowing what I can do and can’t do. Knowing how to work a crowd, have fun and be myself. When I smile and give that snarl, that’s me, I’ve been doing that since football. I have been doing that to keep the bullies away, because they thought that I was crazy.”

What originally got you on AEW’s radar?

“I know a phone call got called in, and next thing I know I got a text from QT Marshall. I looked at it and I’m like this is bullsh*t, but I sat on it for a little bit and I responded. It was one of those things where I’m like do I risk flying to Jacksonville and possibly get COVID? Or do I say ‘Thank you, when things open back up…’ But I’m like I am a fool if I say no to this. I remember QT asking me if I was local to Jacksonville? I said no but I will find a way to get there. When I got there I was amazed at Daily’s Place. Everyone was friendly to me. I looked on the board and I got a match with Orange Cassidy. I’m like cool, I’ve been following the program and he has a feud with Chris Jericho. Then 12.36 seconds later I lost to Orange Cassidy, but I couldn’t care less if I won or lost, my main thing was how can I help out this show? I knew the pay-per-view was coming up with him and Jericho, and I knew it was going on the highlight reel because of my size and his size, and it was.”

What was the breakout moment?

“I think it was the battle royal and that match on Saturday Night Dynamite with Darby [Allin] before the pay-per-view. I think local people in California knew who I was, but Florida, like people who have seen AEW Dark know who Will Hobbs was. That battle royal was crazy, because it was the anniversary of my brother’s death. I was in this battle royal and one of the last six. When I had this moment with Matt Sydal and that spinebuster and I had that moment with Archer, I’m like I should be here. It all took off after that.”

When you came back through the curtain, did Tony Khan or anyone come to you and say ‘Yeah that worked.’?

“Yeah Tony Khan was like ‘Willie Willie Wille! Let’s go!’ So I’m like sh*t let’s go, let’s do this! I think the following week was when I saved Mox from [Brian] Cage and [Ricky] Starks, that was a big moment when Mox introduced me, I was ready to go then too.”

You have this real presence in the ring as a big man. Who was your favorite big man growing up?

“For me personally, I loved the way Yokozuna worked. I loved how Mark Henry worked, just those guys. I was even impressed with Big Daddy V, when he threw that back kick! Those big guys, it took so much for the little guys to get them down, and they could just hit them with one move, like look at Vader, I love Vader man.”

You did some enhancement stuff with WWE. Did you ever feel like that was a possibility?

“I did at one time. I got to the point where they bring you in to do a half and stuff and I’m like OK cool. Then there are people on the roster who are like ‘Hey, when are they going to give you a shot?’ So you know, guys alone telling me that stuff and that I have talent.”

Walk me through finding out that you will be wrestling CM Punk on TV.

“That was crazy. I remember if you asked me a few years ago if you asked me, I would have said no. But the fact that i am wrestling him in front of 20,000 people in Arthur Ashe Stadium on cable TV, I just have been dreaming. He knew how special that night was for me, it was a little over a month since my mother had passed away. So he knew what my mindset was and how I wanted the match to come across. I can’t thank him enough and I tell him thank you all the time so that was just special.”

You have mentioned your brother and your mother both passing away, which I am very sorry to hear. How have you managed to get over those really difficult moments in your life?

“I have great people around me. Also going to therapy has helped me out, not having those feelings jumbled. If you have too much bottled in, it can destroy you, you just have to find a way to get it out. Wrestling was always a way for my family to connect, we would have parties where the family comes over to watch wrestling. It was always a way to connect the family.”

Where did Will Hobbs end and Powerhouse Hobbs begin?

“The night I hit Cody Rhodes in the face with the FTW belt. That was the end of Will Hobbs. The next week I made my Powerhouse debut against Lee Johnson, and that was it. That’s when Will Hobbs went away.”

How was the call made to change your name?

“Tony [Khan] looked at me and was like ‘Powerhouse.’ I’m like alright, let’s go! I thought he might have seen some of my clips in the gym but I don’t know where he got it from but I am loving it. But it’s one of those things where you look at Hacksaw Butch Reed, people called him Hacksaw. I know that Butch Reed was a fan of mine, I’ve talked to his son. I’m like OK, I’m up there with Hacksaw Butch Reed, you know, Hacksaw, Powerhouse. It’s like my way of paying homage to him.”

What do you think is the biggest lesson that you have learned from being with Taz and being a part of Team Taz?

“Patience. Patience in the ring. Stalking, being true to myself and doing what I feel. Doing stuff that feels natural and put my size over. I am a big dude and I like stalking people. Taz has taught me that whatever you do in the ring, make people in the arena and at home feel it. I see people cringe when I hit people and I know they are at home too.”

Who is on your radar now?

“I want to work Eddie Kingston and I want to work Jon Moxley. I am putting this out there now I want to work Mark Henry. Also The Young Bucks, FTR… I want to work with people who have my style and people don’t, just things that mesh so well.” 

I end every interview talking about gratitude. What are 3 things in your life that you are grateful for?

“My family, I work for an amazing company and that I can motivate people.” 

Image credits: AEW

Today’s guests are Corey Graves (@wwegraves) and Carmella (@carmellawwe). Corey is a color commentator and professional wrestler for WWE. Carmella is also a professional wrestler known for her time in NXT and WWE. They join Chris Van Vliet to talk about their new reality show called “Corey and Carmella” which airs on WWE’s YouTube channel. They discuss the very sexy trailer that came out before the show’s debut, their biggest pet peeves about each other as a couple, the fact that Corey is now officially cleared for in-ring performing after what was thought to be a career ending injury, they list their mentors in wrestling, the best advice they ever received in life and much more!

There are so many things to congratulate you guys on! Congratulations on your engagement and congratulations on the new reality show.

Carmella: “Thank you so much. We have so much to be excited about.”

Corey Graves: “It has been a busy several months for us.”

Well this is a good thing, right? Did you see the reaction when this trailer went out? A lot of people online went erm yeah?

Carmella: “We sure did!”

Corey: “That was by design man, we had to come out of the gate strong. We have really addressed our relationship on WWE TV apart from me fawning over her entrance, which is equally to make people angry as it is to let people know that this is a real thing. So we had to come out of the gate [strong] and we discussed with WWE how we wanted to roll this out, and we decided to take the sexy route. Just because this is so different to anything that WWE has put out recently. It’s almost a call back to The Attitude Era where it was OK to be sexy. Being on YouTube we had a little more leeway than being on a major network right now, so we are kind of exploring. This is as much of an experiment as it has been a goal.”

Carmella: “Yeah I’ve definitely read the comments. Not all of them because oh my gosh I don’t have that much time on my hands and I don’t want to be depressed. But you see things like ‘Carmella, she’s a freak, I’ve never seen her like this…’ Come on, it’s 2022. What you see on TV on Monday Night Raw, that’s not who I am in real life. Yes I like to talk about sex and yes I have stepchildren now. Yes I am a fiancée and you get to see me with my dad and all these different aspects of our lives that you don’t get to see on TV. But it’s time to normalise these things, it’s OK to be a little sexy.”

Corey: “And the sexy aspect of the show is just a part of the show, there’s a lot more to it. We just figured what can we do to get people talking, and there is definitely no shortage of dirty jokes. But ultimately, it’s relatively family friendly for the most part. I would say PG 13 with leaning a little bit towards R from time to time, but it’s not going to be anything that you have to pay money to subscribe to.”

Carmella you have in your Instagram bio that Instagram is not real life. Is this show real life?

Carmella: “It sure is, you get to see all aspects of our lives, we don’t hold back. It’s basically because of our podcast Bare With Us, where we try to shed light on issues that every relationship has and everyone goes through things. We just want to normalise it like talking about sex, talking about problems in the bedroom or lack of communication, who is doing the household chores this week? We talk about it with our listeners, we don’t talk about work and we don’t talk about life in WWE. We just want to show who we are in our real lives, and we have gotten a lot of great feedback with our listeners who say something like ‘Oh my gosh my husband does that too.’ We just give advice and that’s what our show is. It’s not about looking at our life through a filter.”

Corey: “And that’s kind of been the goal from when we launched Bare With Us was to be overly honest with our audience. There have probably been things we have discussed where they have thought that they didn’t really want to know that about us. But to the point about Instagram not being reality, everyone likes to show their greatest hits of their life. It’s the perfect moment, perfect dinner, perfect kiss… Everyone is trying to keep up with each other and one up each other. We are out there on the podcast and on the show showing you the B-sides, letting people know that we have a lot of the same struggles as everybody else. It’s real life, every aspect of it, and our podcast has sort of become a form of therapy for the 2 of us.”

Carmella: “He makes me legit cry on our podcast. He’ll be like ‘You are doing this wrong.’ I’m not a podcaster, I don’t know what I am doing, I’m just trying to be real. He’s like ‘Well that’s not what we are talking about right now.’ But we leave that in there for the listeners. We are not trying to portray ourselves to be a certain way, this is us.”   

It seems like you guys get along really well. I’m curious, what are some pet peeves that you have about one another?

Corey: “It’s going to sound like I am just trying to keep myself out of trouble but there aren’t many pet peeves about Carmella. The only thing I will say is every once in a while she will get very moody, seemingly without any reason. Yesterday for example I woke up and I could sense that something was up. And I’ve now learned that when I get that feeling that something is up, 99% of the time it’s not my fault, so I can just take a step back and let her be her.”

Carmella: “Just let me be in a bad mood.”

Corey: “And she works through it and ends up coming out of the other side. Yesterday evening we went out to dinner and it was great, we had a great time. But I would say if I had to pinpoint something that makes me nuts, then that’s it, just because it comes from out of nowhere. It’s one thing if I screw up, and I do, and I can expect it. It’s more when I wake up and say ‘Hey babe, let’s go and get some coffee.’ And she says ‘I don’t want to talk to you.’”

Carmella: “I guess I would say that I have two. One is when he texts me the letter k or just the ok emoji. It’s like come on, it drives me nuts. Number two is that you don’t stop talking. I get the point but you just explain yourself way too much, let’s just try and move on.”

You know he does this for a living?

Corey: “Thank you Chris!”

Carmella: “I know but I am not paying you at home to talk.”

Corey: “Then start paying me not to [laughs]. That’s a hell of an idea.”

I feel like everything is going so well in both of your careers. If we can take this back a few steps, I want to know who have been some mentors for you both professionally who have helped you guide the way for you?

Carmella: “For me I would say The Miz. Whenever I have an issue or a problem creatively or my character or something going on in a match, I go to him. If I could be a female Miz, that to me would be such an amazing accomplishment. They trust The Miz and they put him in any position and he’s going to shine. He is not afraid to lean into his role as a bad guy and I consider that the same to myself, I like to really lean into my role. Any time that I have a problem or issue, I go to him and he is going to be honest. Sometimes it is brutally honest, but he helps me out.”

What about you Corey? There is a big section that don’t remember you as a wrestler, they just know you as a broadcaster now.

Corey: “It’s really crazy that that time has now passed as a broadcaster that it has overtaken my wrestling career. But I’ve had so many people along the way help me and I wouldn’t be in the position that I am in if it weren’t for a litany of guys. Going back to Tom Phillips when we were in NXT together, he helped teach me a lot. Michael Cole has been instrumental in most of my success. It was actually after I first got injured that I had a conversation in New Orleans with Michael Cole. I mentioned to him that I had done some local radio, and he went ‘Hmm, maybe you should give broadcasting a try.’ That was how this all came to be was just that basic conversation. After a few months out of the ring he said to give it a shot, and it didn’t happen overnight. I spent countless hours in the Performance Center in our little booth trying to learn how to call matches. But I like to think that I have learned from everybody along the way from different broadcasters, whether they are intending to teach me different things or not. If I am learning something negative, I can utilize it and put it in my tool kit to where I am confident that I can now step into a role like a Michael Cole.

I obviously can’t fill Michael Cole’s shoes because he is one of the greatest play-by play guys in history. But I have learned enough from him and absorbed it by osmosis that I can at least prevent the ship from hitting the iceberg. Along the way I think I lose track of some of the amazing minds that I am privy to on a weekly basis without even realizing it. I get to learn from Vince McMahon. Vince McMahon, sometimes in the middle of a show or in the middle of a match, will go on a 2 minute diatribe of why I have done something wrong, what he liked or what he wants me to accomplish. But in the moment it is easy to forget that you are getting advice from the guy who is responsible for all of this. I would like to think that everybody I have worked with from this side of the microphone has taught me something, because this was never my goal. I’ve had to learn and I think that has kind of leant itself to my success. OK I can’t wrestle anymore, but I don’t know anything about this world, I have to be a sponge and learn as much as I can. I have picked up good habits and I’m sure I have picked up some negative ones. But ultimately, I am constantly learning. Even now I have some trepidation when I sit down and get the countdown to the opening of Monday Night Raw. You hear 3,2 and I’m still in that frame of mind of OK, let’s not screw this up tonight. I get a little nervous, but then I get off and cruise, but I can’t thank enough people. I would be here all day if I just tried to list everyone that has taught me a lot.”

Corey, how much do you miss being in the ring?

Corey: “I miss certain aspects of it, but I have actually grown to love doing commentary. There is a part of me that will never go away as a wrestler, I have dedicated 15 years of my life, travelled the world and had a taste of some success as a competitor. It took a long time with a lot of internal work and reflection to get to this point where I have now embraced my role and realized that this is my role now. I may not be able to go down as one of the great Intercontinental Champions in history, which was always the goal, but now I look at how broad my work has reached and how it still lives on in video packages. These moments along with other ridiculous things I say ends up on t-shirts on other superstars. I actually think that in a weird way I am leaving a bigger footprint as a commentator than I probably would have as a competitor. But I definitely miss it at times.”

I feel like with the reality show this just writes itself. It’s you guys vs. Miz and Mrs.

Corey: “The thought has crossed our minds.”

Carmella: “We are open to it.”

Corey: “This is dropping a bit too close to WrestleMania. Otherwise I would have put the push on hard. But you know, SummerSlam is going to be big this year.”

Carmella: “That’s true, you never know.”

Well this report came out that you are actually cleared for in-ring performance. Is this true?            

Corey: “It is factual. The news took about 8 months to break, which I am sort of proud of and surprised that in this day and age. I wasn’t hiding it from anybody, but it wasn’t something that I was bringing to the forefront. I didn’t want everybody to go ‘Oh my God, Graves is making a comeback!’ To my previous conversation, I love what I am doing now, but there is a part of me that would love that gratification. I am a guy who when I was wrestling I was mainly a villain. To me the gratification came as soon as the bell rang at the end of the match. To me, there is nothing more satisfying than taking the crowd on a rollercoaster ride and then losing. As a good guy, you usually pose and you have to pose for the cameras. But I would lay there on my back after the ref counted 3, I would look at the lights and just think that we did it. That was what kept me going was that exhale at the end of it. So there is part of me that is going to chase that forever, and I would be open to it if the opportunity presents itself to maybe step back into the ring once in a blue moon or maybe just once. But importantly I got medically cleared, so now we see where the world takes us. Whether it’s a match, a mixed tag team match or against Pat McAfee at some point. At least now I know I can do it without endangering my health, which is the most important. I’ve got to be there for my kids and my blushing bride.”  

Did you go in hoping to get cleared or was it a routine medical and they said ‘Hey you are looking pretty good?’

Corey: “There was a process to it. I had to take a few flights and see a few doctors and get several different opinions. But I brought what I got from my doctors and showed it to WWE and then I went through WWE’s testing protocol to verify. I met all of the needs that they wanted to see, and I am medically cleared. I am still listed on the roster as a commentator, as far as I know nothing has been pitched in creative meetings as to how we get Graves into the ring. I’m just taking it one day at a time, if it presents itself I am ready, but I am not going to make myself crazy not having a transition into the other side.”

Everything happens for a reason. Carmella, you auditioned for Tough Enough, you didn’t get in and you ended up being a Lakers girl. Do you ever think about what would have happened if you did get on Tough Enough?

Carmella: “I have no idea, but everything happens for a reason, I still ended up in WWE years later. It’s kind of crazy to know how that all worked out but again I went to LA to be a dancer. That was what I was going to do and I wasn’t going to give up my career as a Laker girl, that’s why I went out there. That’s what I was focused on and I am grateful that I did it the way that I did and it lead me to where I am at now.”

How did wrestling find you originally?

Carmella: “Well for me I grew up watching wrestling, my dad was a wrestler in the early 90’s. He wrestled every big name in the 90s and I was the coolest kid in 3rd grade. But It was never anything that I aspired to do, I wanted to be a dancer. But one thing lead to another, I had an agent that lead to a try-out with WWE. I figured that there was no better time than now and with my dad’s history with the company the stars aligned.”

Corey, you were in the indies for a long time?

Corey: “Yeah I am a lifelong fan. My dad to this day is still a big fan. My earliest childhood memories involve WWE in some capacity, action figures and live events. I got to high school and was trying to figure out what to do with my life. My parents and guidance counsellors were asking me what did I want to do with my life? I went through this depression and I was sure my life was over at 14. There was this terrible depression, which I realized was just growing up. My dad said to me ‘Why not do something you love? Go and be a bodybuilder or learn to box, be a wrestler…’ I’m like OK. My dad was a fire chief in my local town, he had no idea how to help me, but he had connections to a local promotion that they would do fundraisers with. In my freshman year of high school, I started training in the back of the storefront of an old shopping mall. I had the bug and sacrificed everything to try and get a shot. Sure enough as I was about to give it all up, I had a career as a 911 dispatcher and my first kid had been born. But within weeks I get a call from WWE and the rest is history.”

You are so quick witted on commentary. Is there a favorite line that wasn’t planned beforehand?

Corey: “Oh my goodness. 99% of the lines I am proud of are completely improved. Basically anytime that I make Michael Cole break, that is when I trust that a joke landed. Cole is such the professional and can deliver terrible news with a straight face, so when I break him, I know it worked. I shouldn’t admit this, but unless it is a statistic, I rarely prepare for a show. My wit has carried me this far and 3 hours is a long time, so I need to entertain myself for my own sanity.”

I end every interview talking about gratitude. What are 3 things in your life that you are grateful for?

Carmella: “My health, my family and wine.”

Corey: “My children, my fiancée and for WWE.”  

Image credits: Instagram

Vanessa Van Edwards is the Lead Investigator at Science of People and is the bestselling author of Captivate: The Science of Succeeding with People. Her new book called Cues: Master The Secret Language of Charismatic Communication is available on March 1, 2022. She joins Chris Van Vliet to talk about how charisma is something that can be cultivated, how to read body language, tips to improve your communication, how to have better Zoom meetings and much more!

Congratulations on the new book.

“Oh my gosh, thank you so much. It is a labour of ,ove that is 17 years in the making. That ages me! If anyone has a dream and you are on year 5,10 or 17, just keep going.”

I always say to people “just start.”

“Absolutely. This all started with a little folder I created on my desktop called ‘Curious Cues.’ It was a really weird time in the media where all these athletes were being accused of doping and there was also the Amanda Knox scandal. I was watching all of these interviews and I noticed that there were these patterns. These curious cues. Lance Armstrong was on Larry King Live and insisted that he did not dope. Spoiler alert here, Lance Armstrong did. But I remember watching that interview and thinking that something is off here. Right after he said ‘I don’t dope.’ He did a lip purse. This is something we do when we are trying to hold something in. So if you ask someone a difficult question, people will often lip purse. Liars do that to hold it in. Many years later he came out and admitted the doping, so I went back and looked for patterns. I noticed that there were patterns with the bad guys in interviews. But there were also cues for good guys who were highly charismatic and you wanted to know them. Little did I know that this would be the book.”

People think that charisma is something that you are born with and you either have it or you don’t.

“This is the biggest myth I wanted to bust. People tend to think you are charismatic or not, the same thing with leadership. While research shows that genetics can help to create natural born leaders, 70% can be taught and cultivated. I am not good at reading social information and reading people, so I had to learn about things like eye contact. But it can be taught, we can learn it together.”

So what steps can people take?

“The first thing that provided me with relief, and this looked at how we viewed charismatic people. What they found was that 82% of our judgements are based on 2 traits. These are warmth and competence. Highly charismatic people have that perfect blend of warmth along with capability and productivity. The reason why we like these people is because they have such a perfect blend of these factors. Most people, myself included, we have an imbalance. We could be high in warmth and low in confidence, or vice versa. Do you think you are higher in warmth? This could be people wanting to come to you for advice and telling you their problems. If you are warm, you are collaborative and relatable and people like hanging out with you. However, you might struggle with boundaries and being taken seriously. If you are highly competent, you search for truth. You are respected, but people might be intimidated by you, so they won’t invite you. Neither side is right or wrong, but you need to know where you fall.”

I have this belief that you can learn any skill. I feel like you have this belief that no matter what, you can always learn more?

“Yes and let’s break this down more. You might find that at work you are high in competence, and you can dial up when it’s needed. But also, they know when to dial up the warmth more, like when they are with their friends or their kids. I think the power comes with understanding how these two straights work, understanding the cues of these traits, and how you can dial these like a thermostat. I used to struggle with competence, but now I have found my groove, because I feel like competence comes from control. When I tried to be more competent, it did not work. I think that understanding the cues helps us increase the competence.”

When I did interviews with Bill Clinton and Oprah Winfrey, they both grabbed my arm during it. What’s that about?

“Ok let’s break that down. So touch, what happens chemically is the moment we have skin to skin touch, any kind, we produce a chemical called oxytocin. This is literally the chemical of trust. They found that when they sprayed this for people, they trusted each other more. This is the chemical need to give the collaborative and the open minded. If we are close enough to touch, we think that they are a friend not a foe. If we have a touch, our body produces the chemical to connect. When Clinton touched you, then you got a big rush in oxytocin, so did he, and this creates this beautiful loop. When you are with someone, try to start with a touch so you can create trust.”

What if you are on video?

“This is a question that plagued me during the pandemic. Can you produce oxytocin through a screen? Research has found that you can. After touch, the second way we produce oxytocin is eye contact. When people say that it feels like they are being stared into their soul, when we produce a deep gaze, it produces oxytocin.”

How did you get into all of this?

“Well in the business side I am a content creator. I have a YouTube channel where I posted my first video in November 2007. People were like ‘You’re doing what?’ But I have been posting videos every week since 2007. I noticed that if I referenced science, the videos did better. Then if I tweaked an experiment with my own stuff, that really increased the engagement. I would take a study that I liked and added my own spin. So for example, there was a study where they were looking at what smells men liked. There was an experiment where the same woman wore different scents and found which one men liked the most. The smell that did the best was vanilla, men like food. So I hypothesised that if men liked food, what if I got popcorn? Butter popcorn is the best smell in the world! I put it on and went out in the world and people loved it. We don’t just want academic stuff, we want real life. Little did I know that to this day that would work.”

If someone is going to a party next month, what tips would you give?

“There are so many good one. Firstly, think about space rules. Optimizing or leveraging these are great. There are 4 zones, public, social, personal, and intimate. The specifics vary across cultures but the principles are the same. We can be aware of people getting into our intimate space too quickly, this can bring up alarm bells. But this is why loud parties work, if someone says something, you can get into the intimate zones to be heard. But when it comes to video calls, we are only 18 inches away from the camera, it’s too close and you can get burned out. Going back to parties, don’t be in the intimate zone unless you are invited. The personal zone is the best because we are not too close but close enough to reach out and touch people. At a party, you can plant yourself and see how close someone comes to you. If they go to the personal zone, great. If it’s the social zone, about 4 feet away, it’s good to know and to respect them for it.”

I end every interview talking about gratitude. What are 3 things in your life that you are grateful for?

“My health, getting through writer’s block to get through this book and for everyone listening.”     

Featured image: Creative Life

Embedded images: Instagram

Tony Chimel (@thetonychimel) is a ring announcer who was an WWE employee from 1983 until 2020. He joins Chris Van Vliet to talk about life after WWE, his new job at Trader Joe’s, how he came up with his iconic “Rated R Superstar” introduction for Edge, the many jobs he has behind the scenes including driving the ring truck, growing up on the same street with Gorilla Monsoon’s son Joey Marella and how he got started working in wrestling, his friendship with long time referee Mike Chioda, and he tells a great story about a crazy bet with Jonathan Coachman.

What a career you had in WWE.

“Yeah it was nice and lasted a long time. I never thought it would be like that and start out like that. But one thing leads to another and the next thing you know it is 38 years later.”

I would like to think that if COVID hadn’t come around then you would still be working there?

“Well that’s what I am thinking. I was ready to go when it first hit. I flew back from a show in Washington DC and flew home. The next show, I think it was in Detroit. I was getting on a plane and asking my boss ‘Are we doing this show or not?’ He was like ‘Just go like you are going to the show. And if you hear from me then we will let you know if anything changes.’ So I took off and I flew from Florida to Charlotte, and when I got to Charlotte I was told that the show is cancelled, so I turned around and went home. I never worked another show after that so yeah.”

People mainly know you as the ring announcer but you have worn like 30 different hats in WWE. What was the most recent job that you had? 

“I was working in the production office and making sure that everyone who should have rooms had rooms. Also making sure that the trucks get loaded, taking care of runners at the shows, dealing with bills and all that other stuff.”

Were you doing this job while you were ring announcing too?

“Oh yeah. Most of the time the ring announcing gig was the second part of my job. I have never just ring announced.”

His new job at Trader Joe’s:

“I figured out there is life after WWE, because you figure I started when I was 22-years old and now I’m 60. I found a job at Trader Joe’s, which I never really knew about. I had heard of Trader Joe’s, but I didn’t really know what it was. And when I first told my daughter that I was working at Trader Joe’s she was like ‘oh dad, that’s great. You gotta get this and get that’ and I was like ‘what are you talking about?’. There’s a lot of similarities because at WWE they always wanted to put smiles on people’s faces and at Trader Joe’s all they want to do is wow the customer and make the customer feel happy. I’ve always been a big customer service guy and traveling for a living, you don’t get any of that crap from the airlines and you get crappy customer service from hotels. At Trader Joe’s, if you call the store they actually answer. If you’re in there and you’re looking for something, we’ll help you and we’ll walk you to where you want to go. And the customers there are like cult followers, I didn’t get it at first but now that I’ve been there for a year I’m one of them. A lot of people love it and they swear by the store. The people are great, the bosses are great, the manager is great. Everybody’s great there.”

If we take this way back, it was ring crew that you did when you first started working for WWE?

“Yeah. Back in 1983 I was working the ring crew with Joey Marella. All that we did was drive the truck, go to the town and set the ring up. Then when the show was over we would tear the ring down and go to the next town.”

For those who don’t know, Joey Marella has a famous father.

“He is Gorilla Monsoon’s son, and that was how I got into it. I grew up in South Jersey and they happened to live 4 or 5 houses away. That was pretty cool having Gorilla Monsoon and their family as neighbours.”

How did it all start?

“When we were in high school, Gorilla owned part of the business, and he had a ring. So on the weekends and in the summer, we would drive to Baltimore, Washington, Scranton, wherever the show was. We would do the show and get paid like $50. To us, it was great. We were young, we could get out of town and hang out, do a job and get paid. I think when Vince’s dad died, Vince bought out Gorilla and he didn’t have the ring anymore. A few weeks after that, Vince called Gorilla and said ‘Does your son still want to set up the ring? Because he can set it up for me.’ Gorilla asked Joey and he was allowed to bring one other guy with him, so Joey asked me. We drove to Stamford and filled out the forms and we became employees. I think I was employee 33 of the company.”

So how do you go from setting up a ring to getting a microphone in your hand and becoming a ring announcer?

“Well the first time it happened we were setting up the ring in Pennsylvania. The show is about to start and Joey comes to me and is like do I want to ring announce? I said ‘Ring announcing? No, I don’t want to do that. I’ve never done it before.’ Then he’s like ‘They need somebody. The guy didn’t show up and they want you to do it.’ I’m dressed in sweatpants and a t-shirt, so what do I do? Then they said they’ll pay me $50 so I’m like OK, I’ll do it. They said to me ‘All you’ve got to do is not go in the ring. Just sit by the table and announce the guys as they come out.’ That was what I did and that was it. After a while when the business started to get bigger and bigger, we would be there timekeeping, taking jackets or playing music. You get to see what these guys were doing and how they are doing it. I don’t know how it evolved after that. But eventually it was like ‘Why do we have to fly someone in to do the show? Chimel will do it.’ I just started doing it in smaller venues. You see how other people did it and it went from there.”

You have that signature style. How long do you think it took to get that?

“I don’t know. I’ve always had this voice. I would just work on some syllables, lengthen some here and there and just be louder.”

I’m guessing that the first time that your voice cracked when announcing ‘The Rated R Superstar!’ It wasn’t on purpose?

“So here’s the thing about how that started. I used to travel around with Jimmy Korderas, the referee. We would talk and solve the world’s problems or whatever. If someone said something stupid, we would say something like ‘Wile E. Coyote, Super genius!’ So when the Mexicools came to WWE, I started introducing Super Crazy as [high pitched] Super Crazy. Then they left, and when Edge was The Rated R Superstar, I would introduce him as The Rated R [high pitched] Superstar! He loved it every time I did it. I was happy to do it. He would show up once in a while after retiring and he would say ‘Hey Chimel, you got your suit? Because you are going to introduce me tonight.’ I’m like really? I didn’t know he was coming. But that was fun and a pleasure to do.”

You worked there for 38 years, which is crazy! What was your relationship like with Vince?

“Vince was always good to me. He was just like a regular guy that owned the company. He knew me for so long, if he saw me in the hallway he was like ‘Chimel, you still working here? ’I’m like ‘Yeah I’m still here Vince.’ Either that or I would say ‘Yeah I’m here but I’m not working.’ He once came to bat for me big when I was ring announcing. I would get paid a certain amount to ring announce or time keep, and I was getting paid for both. After a couple of years of that, they said that they weren’t going to pay the timekeeper anymore, so I lost money. So I went to my boss and asked for more money for ring announcing so it evens out. He said to me ‘Chimel, where would you be working if you didn’t work for WWE?’ I said ‘Well I don’t know, but I am working for WWE.’ My boss always told me ‘If you have a problem with what I am doing then you can go to Vince.’ So I did. I said ‘Vince this is the deal. I’m doing both of these jobs, they took one away, I just want my money back through ring announcing. I will still ring the bell.’ And I told Vince what my boss said about not working here. Vince said ‘Please tell me he didn’t say that.’ I said he did. So I was tearing down the ring that night, my boss comes up and said we will talk about my pay on Monday. Vince must have pulled him aside and said to take care of him or whatever. I will never forget that Vince did that for me.”

Was it an intention move for you to step away from ring announcing when they brought new talent in?

“Well I did and I didn’t [want to step away]. At one point when you are there for 25-30 years, and I am teaching the Lilian Garcia or the Justin Roberts or whoever. Basically they are telling you that you are teaching them because they will be doing your job. That was why I wanted to do something else, I wanted to make myself valuable and do something else other than ring announcing. The ring announcing is the show, bit what are you doing 8 hours before or 2 hours after. There was a point where I didn’t want to be on the shows for 24 days a month and do all the house shows. There was a point where it was enough, my kids are teenagers and I didn’t get to see them grow up. It would be nice to be home 15 days a month instead of 7. I was OK not ring announcing if I could do production or just do TV. The house shows were such a grind back then because they would run so many. Friday, Saturday Sunday, do TV Monday, fly home Tuesday and my kids hated me on Wednesday. You get all your sh*t in on Thursday, then you go on Friday and do it all again. Then they would run the overseas tours in Europe, where you are on the road for 17 days straight. It was a great living and great job, but after 25 years I was like I don’t mind, someone else can ring announce.”

So when COVID first hit you were first furloughed and then later released?

“Yeah. I never not wanted to work. I was willing to get on a plane from day 1 to do anything. But when COVID first hit, I was sitting at home and was like well this will be great if it lasts a couple of weeks and I get a paycheck. Then they started running shows in Orlando and I said I would be willing to go. They said it would be laid back and I didn’t think much to it. A couple of months go by and I ask if I can still come and kept wanting to come in. They were letting the independent contractors work, not the employees. Then I got furloughed, couldn’t do anything. Then I got the call from Kevin Dunn, who said there was good news and bad news. The good news was that I was going to be getting my paycheck back. I’m like cool, because I got an email saying some are coming back in October, November or December, mine said I would be back in December. He was calling me in November and he said ‘You are going to get your paycheck because we are going to have to let you go.’ I said ‘Well the email says that I’m coming back in December. He asked me who sent it and I said human resources did. He wanted it forwarded, but he called me and said that’s it. I was getting my salary back because it was my severance, I was being let go.”

I’m guessing that introducing Edge was your favorite. Who was second?

“I always loved introducing John Cena, he was a good guy. The Rock was always good. Some names were easier to get out than others and I could get my sh*t in, but they were all good.”

You did all the announcing without an earpiece. How did you remember everything?

“Well if I did it now I wouldn’t know anybody. But when you are doing it for 5 days a week, like I’m announcing The Undertaker at 275lbs, it’s pretty much the same guy. If I write it, I would remember it more, so I would write down where they are from and their weight. Then when I sit down I am looking at the next match before the match in the ring finishes.”

This story about the greatest bet ever with Jonathan Coachman, it’s phenomenal.

“So back in the day, this was before [full time announcing] I was doing ring crew and announcing SmackDown. So during the Raw show, I would just hang out in the pre-tapes room. We would sit and watch Raw, me, [Michael] Cole before he did Raw and Coach. We would just be sitting out there and I told Coach ‘Hey Coach, I’ve started working out, running on the treadmill.’ Stuff like that. He said ‘Well what are you running?’ I said I was running a 10 minute mile. So he goes ‘[scoffs] 10 minute mile? That sucks!’ He starts getting on my case and doing that, we start going back and forth and he is like ‘I could beat you by 30 seconds.’ Cole then says ‘Well we are doing TV in a couple of months at state college in Pennsylvania. There is a track outside the arena, you guys can race and bet.’ So the bet was Coach would have to beat me by 30 seconds. I could either have a 30 second head start or start at the same time, whatever I wanted, but he would have to beat me by 30 seconds. I was actually starting to train and practice, Coach wasn’t doing much of anything. [Chris asks if Shane McMahon trained him] Well no, not necessarily. A secret promoter gave me some advice and bought me some new running shoes as well. I don’t know if it was Shane or not, it could have been. But anyway, I am training for this race and getting some advice from somebody, whose last name may have been McMahon. So we have this press conference backstage, this is all while work is going on at TV. I say ‘I’m training and I’m trying my best, cutting down my time, working out and eating better, this and that. I just hope I have a good race.’ Then Coach gets up and starts blabbing his mouth and saying this and that, he’s like ‘30 seconds? I’ll beat him by a minute!’ The Rock is at the press conference and he is like ‘Well why don’t you put your money where your mouth is? Make it a minute.’ So Rock called him out and Coach had to then beat me by a minute.

So the day of the race comes, and most of the company wanted Coach to win. There was only [Mike] Chioda, maybe the person that bought me the sneakers wanted me to win. But there wasn’t a lot of people that wanted me to win. So we are setting up for the race at college, and they bring out camera guys, Cole was doing commentary with The Rock and Kevin Kelly, they were doing commentary on this thing! I don’t know where the tape is but that’s got to be worth some money. I started to start the race at the same time as Coach. I was down to a 7 minute mile at this point, so I’m like he’s got to run a 6 minute mile, so God bless him. We started the race and Coach is maybe 20 or 30 feet ahead of me. Bruce is timing us on the first lap, we go around and it’s like 1 minute 25. We do another lap and Coach is still a little bit ahead of me, so he is going to have to start opening it up. We go around the 3rd time and he is only 30 feet ahead of me. I’m like Jesus, we are on the 4th lap, he’s really going to have to start opening it up. We are coming around and it’s the stretch of the race, I feel good so I start kicking it. I’m running and running and as Coach got to the finish line he ran a 6 minute 35 race I ran 6 minute 36, so he beat me by a second. So I won the bet. So the bet was if I lost, I would have to do a push up every time he said ‘Give me a push up.’ and I would have to say ‘I am a fat piece of sh*t.’ But I won, so he had to do a push up whenever I said and say ‘I am Tony Chimel’s bitch.’ So every time he did a push up, he had to say ‘I am Tony Chimel’s bitch.’ I had 100 push ups I could use at any time. We couldn’t do it like if he was doing an interview or if I was announcing.

We do the show and there is a production meeting the next day. Vince is in the meeting and he says ‘Hey Chimel, I hear you won the big race yesterday?’ I’m like ‘Yeah I did.’ He’s like ‘Any chance you can have Coach come up here and do a push-up on the table in front of me?’ I said ‘Yeah. Coach, get your ass up there.’ Vince was loving that. Then during the show, this is when they are having it taped, the timekeeper says to me that they want me to call Coach out in the middle of the ring. I’m like I can’t do that because we are at work. They say ‘They are on headset, they want you to do it.’ The next thing I know, Michael Cole comes down the ramp and he is explaining the race and the whole thing that happened the day before in front of 20,000 people. He calls me in the ring, calls Coach out and I made him do it.”

Did you use all 100?

“No, I saved 2 for when he is ready to deliver his first child and when is at the altar waiting to get married.”

So what was the timeframe between push-up one and push-up 98?

“I don’t know, 5 years?”

What advice would you have for an up and coming ring announcer?

“Well if you are going to be a ring announcer, try to get involved in something else other than ring announcing. They love it when you can do something else as well. I was given a microphone and grew with the job as the job grew. Another important thing is that you are not more important than the talent you are announcing. Put over the talent, not yourself.”

I end every interview talking about gratitude. What are 3 things in your life that you are grateful for?

“My wife, my kids and my grandson.”  

Featured image: WWE