Category: Profiles & Interviews

What was it like breaking into wrestling in the post-television era?   I just started training about 88, 89 when they’d just come off the TV and then I had my first match in 1991. Even by then the business was still quite busy. There was still lots of shows going on every night. I…

When FSM originally profiled Kendo Nagasaki for the Greetings Grapple Fans series, he became the only living subject we did not interview. At the time he was continuing a life-long policy of not merely protecting the character but literally maintaining a silence when it came to speaking on his career. Now he has chosen to…

As anyone who remembers Diamond Dallas Page’s WWE character will know, life looks very different when change your perspective. There’s certainly an argument that Doug Williams was the victim of unfortunate timing with the bulk of his career falling between British wrestling’s post-World of Sport slump and its more recent revival. But viewed as a…

It’s not unusual for wrestlers to get into the business by following in the footsteps of family members. But for Frankie Sloan – a cousin of Robbie Brookside – the kinship brought him few if any advantages in his early years.   “These days my son or my daughter or my best friend, whatever, if…

You famously slapped Miss Elizabeth after a match, which stood out as shocking at the time. How would you get such a reaction today when crowds have seen every outlandish thing you can think of? I think it has to do with the characters. We could do the same thing, all of us, but there’s…

To celebrate Kris Travis’s career in and out of the ring, FSM asked his peers to share their memories of the time they spent travelling and working with him. (This piece was published after Travis’s retirement and before his death from cancer in 2016. Numerous promotions held fundraising events in his memory and you can…

James Mason is a 22-year veteran of British wrestling, widely respected for his work ethic and experience. That’s not bad going given he’s only 36.   Mason — born James Atkins and renamed after the movie actor — was once billed as Britain’s youngest wrestler, starting out in 1993 when he was just 14. He…

Many wrestlers have told FSM that their parents were a key part in them becoming a professional grappler. Sometimes it’s by being in the business themselves. Sometimes it’s through supporting a dream. With Leann ‘Lana’ Austin, however, it was a unique legacy. “My dad’s name is Stephen Austin. So straightaway when we saw Stone Cold…

What surprised you most about your transition from amateur to pro wrestling?   You would think being an amateur wrestler would help you in pro wrestling but it was the complete opposite. It was a big surprise when I tried out for WWE and found it was more about acrobatics: learning how to bump, learning…

15 years ago a security guard from Gravesend became the NWA World Champion. John Lister looks back at the unlikely story of how Gary Steele entered the history books.   On the afternoon of 25 September 1999, Gary Steele met Ricky Steamboat at a fan convention in North Carolina and explained how Steamboat had inspired…