What’s the biggest mistake trainees make?
Having their t-shirts made before they’re any good! A lot of the mistakes are because they watch it on the telly and they instantly want to be top of the bill or have an amazing moveset, stuff like that. They need to slow down, walk before they can run and possibly even crawl before they can walk. At a couple of training schools I’ve been to, lads have come in and I’ve asked them to link [lock] up. 85% can do it and do it well because it’s quite simple and the first thing they should learn really, but a lad couldn’t do it. I said to him “But I bet you’ve got your finishing move” and he said “Yeah.” And I said “I bet you’ve even got a name for it” and he said “Yeah.”
How much can you learn at a training school and how much has to be learnt on the job?
Learning the techniques and the moves, that all comes in training schools. You practice and practice that to make it nice and smooth. But you can practice that until you’re blue in the face, but personality, timing, reading the crowd, adaptability, facials, positioning, that all really needs to be learned in front of a crowd. You can tell them to a certain extent, but people feel daft doing it in an empty room or in front of 10 other trainees. The majority of it is getting out in front of people. I know fellows who could do a million moves and they could do them brilliantly, but put them out in front of an audience and it’s woeful.
What can inexperienced wrestlers learn from the holiday camp circuit?
The camps are the best place to learn, to try out new things, new costumes and gear. What the holiday camps do for you is teach you how to be in front of an audience and experiment. You can try something and if it doesn’t work, you can try it again if you want, and if it doesn’t work again then it’s not going to.
Learning the entertainment aspect, the facials, the interaction with the crowd is a big thing. You can be as serious as you like and still interact with people: that’s how people get on your side. If you’re a blue eye, give them a nice smile when you go out, a big high five, whatever. I smile my little head off when I got out, then once you get in the ring, that’s when you can have your serious face on.
There’ll be times when the person that’s running the holiday camp will think it’s funny to give you music you don’t like or silly music or whatever and then you prove yourself by making that work, making everything work in your favour.
Everything I say is part of the job, you can learn it on the camps. Never again are you going to get six weeks of working every day and hopefully working with people who’ve been working a while and can help you.
What changes should you make at a venue that runs regularly from one where it’s a one-off show?
It’s easier in front of a regular crowd because with a bit of luck they’ll know who you are, and more often than not there’s underlying storylines which we can work with. A one-off show is more like a camp show, but with the audience being a bit more wrestling-savvy. But still they just want to be entertained so that if you go back next year they’ll go “Yeah, I enjoyed that, it was good. I’d like to go back.”
I try not to change what I do whether they’re coming every week or it’s a one-off show. At the end of the day it’s my job, so I want that one-off show to become more than a one-off show. [The venue] could say “we want it to be every six months” and then “we want it to be every month” and I just think “Sound, I’ve just earned myself 11 jobs” because we all pulled together and people enjoyed that one show.
How important is it that a promoter gives clear instructions to wrestlers?
I always preach that we’re all tiny cogs in a machine and we need to pull together to make that machine work. The promoter has got a lot to do with that. I’ve been with promoters who come in with a precise idea of what they want you to do and what they want other matches to do. And I’ve been on wrestling shows where the promoter’s said nothing, so you end up with five matches that are exactly the same and the crowd are bored because they’ve seen the same thing in five matches.
[The wrestler’s] haven’t been given any instruction like don’t do certain moves or don’t go outside of the ring, and if they’re not told that, I guarantee whoever’s on first will do everything they can, every single move, every single scenario and [they think] it’s all about them. I prefer it when a promoter gives you a set piece of what he wants from every match because that shows me he’s bothered about what he’s doing.
How can young wrestlers get their heads around the contradiction of working together as a team but also competing for the top of the bill slot?
It is kind of hard, that! A young lad will go out and do everything he can thinking “I’m going to show them what I can do.” But if a promoter’s telling him to do something else and he goes and does that, that promoter’s not going to make him top of the bill because he doesn’t do what he’s told or follow orders. Me specifically, I’ve opened shows, I’ve been in the middle of shows and I’ve closed shows, but I couldn’t tell you what I’ve done right or done wrong to get there — I’ve just done what I’ve been told. It’s like you’ve got a big pot and you throw all the bits in the pot and hopefully something boss comes out.
I was at a place recently where a lad was in a tag and it wasn’t his place to do anything through the match but it was important and integral at the end to help along someone else and tell the story. He was livid because he hadn’t been put in that situation before and he couldn’t understand. I was trying to explain to him that what he was doing was for the whole show and it wasn’t detrimental to himself. At the end of the day you have to help each other: if you ask any of [the other wrestlers] they’ve all been helped out by someone, and someone might not have wanted to help them along the way but they’ve done it. The better ones [understand] it anyway and the ones with egos probably won’t be getting used on other shows.
How should new wrestlers respond to being ribbed?
It’s hard to say now because it’s such a PC world and people moan about it, but you’ve just got to keep your head down, carry on and get on with it. A joke’s a joke as long as it doesn’t go too far. You’ve got to take the rough with the smooth and I guess it’s because I was brought up in the 70s, but [to me] it’s all character building. What better ship is there than a happy ship if you’re all having a bit of a giggle together? As long as it’s not derogatory and it doesn’t end up in the public domain, you just do daft shit to each other. If someone doesn’t like it, I just say “lighten up” because it’s not hurting them, it’s not bullying.
What’s one unwritten rule of wrestling you learned that no longer applies and one that still holds true?
When I first came in it was “Speak when you’re spoken too”: it was a big no-no to walk in and be a loud mouth and stuff like that. If you were cocky and loud-mouthed, you’d have been stretched probably. I don’t think that really counts now because I’ve met some lads who were really loud-mouthed and they don’t care.
But I was also taught you should always shake everyone’s hands, and everywhere I go that still happens. It’s just dressing room etiquette and you can liken it to any other job. If some fellows been sat in the same chair for 30 years you don’t just go in and throw his bag on the floor and sit down. You go in and see where you can sit. Be careful, play it by ear and keep your eyes open, your ears open and your mouth shut.
