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New to Wrestling Podcast
Inside Nevermore: Raven & Geordie Day on Wrestling’s Darkest Mind
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This week, we sit down with wrestling legend Raven and filmmaker Geordie Day, director of the new documentary Nevermore: The Raven Effect.
It’s part wrestling psychology deep dive, part emotional reckoning — a candid conversation about the blurred line between character and self, the chaos of ECW, and what it means to wrestle with your own legacy. Raven opens up about therapy, mental health, and how he turned personal pain into one of wrestling’s most complex characters.
Geordie Day shares what it was like to document that process, from uncovering rare footage to capturing the genius (and madness) behind the man who defined the extreme era.
We also talk creative freedom, why ECW felt realer than real, and how Raven’s story mirrors the evolution of pro wrestling itself.
🎥 Nevermore: The Raven Effect premieres in Philadelphia at Philamoca October 11–12, with streaming available November 18.
📲 Follow us @N2WPodcast for more interviews, recaps, and unfiltered takes from the world of wrestling storytelling.
The New To Wrestling Podcast follows two friends who enjoy wrestling but are in different stages of their fandom. Xavier Cruz serves as your guide through generations of professional wrestling while Kelsey Silva experiences these matches for the first time. Climb into the ring weekly to relive the famous matches beginning with the Attitude Era!
Viewer discretion is advised.
SPEAKER_04Good evening, everybody, and welcome to another edition of the Nude Wrestling Podcast After Dark. If you're watching on YouTube, just take deep breaths. You can already see our guests, and it's very exciting. Take deep breaths. We'll make it through together. Um so tonight, joining us, I have the absolute honor and privilege. Um, not only do we have Geordie Day with us, who is a documentary filmmaker. He has other greats, um, like Tough Guy, Unnatural Enemies, um, Born Blue that I can think of off the top of my head, among many others. And we also have joining us the latest subject of his most recent documentary that we had the absolute privilege of watching. Um, Nevermore, The Raven Story. We also have Raven with us tonight. Um, thank you so much, uh, both of you for joining us. This is uh such an honor, and I'm really excited to talk about this. It was uh amazing, this documentary.
SPEAKER_02Oh, yeah. Thank you so much for letting us peep it a little early. Yeah, it was it was fantastic. Thank you.
SPEAKER_04Um, I want to talk, uh I want to start off by talking about like the documentary filmmaking process because I feel like documentary is such an interesting medium because I feel like a lot of times it starts one place and kind of when you meet the subject, it ends up maybe someplace totally different, or you like really never know what you're getting into. So you guys, I believe, met like 2022 or 2021, or like got in touch and then started like having discussions. How like what was that process like in meeting and like where the genesis of the uh documentary began?
SPEAKER_01Yeah, that's right. Uh so I I had heard uh Raven on the Stone Gold Steve Austin podcast and was kind of blown away by his perspective on the wrestling industry. It felt very uh unique. He's obviously a really brilliant guy. And in particular, I was fascinated by you know, there are actors like Daniel Day Lewis that are so-called like method that let the character kind of take over their lives, and he was sort of talking about that as like a as like a character in in wrestling, and he was certainly like drawing from some unresolved trauma into his character, and then he kind of was now reliving that trauma, and the line between character and who he truly was was kind of blurred. So I was like, wow, that feels kind of original storytelling. Like I haven't really heard about a wrestler kind of going that deep and somebody struggling with the psychology of a character in that way, and I was like, I think that this would make for an amazing documentary. And then I reached out to Raven, and uh it was clear that he, yeah, he's a brilliant guy, and he seemed relatively open to doing the project, and I think we get along pretty well. So yeah, we're off to the races, and we started at the very tail end of 2021, really 2022, we started shooting, and we're excited to to share the project.
SPEAKER_04Yeah, it's um you guys really need to go see it, but also I I am curious about because I know that Raven, you were talking about um it being difficult to watch back, like in terms of the editing process. And I am curious, like, how involved were you in the editing process? Because it like you are so brilliant, like you have just even like on paper, a very high IQ. And a lot of people in the documentary mentioned you have such an incredible wrestling IQ. And so I was like, I think that's so interesting, too, to like if you put that into a um like a documentary landscape where it's like how your brain can work on putting the pieces together even in editing. Were you very involved in that process at all?
SPEAKER_00No, I I didn't want to be. Um I just wanted to make sure I had final say, like not final cut, but you know, like if I wanted something not brought up or or something brought up, I want you know, I wanted to be able to have my way with that. But uh but I did tell him I wanted it to be warts and also I mean so there wasn't much I was gonna there's almost nothing I was gonna take out, but you know, but I wanted it to be a quality production. I I didn't want it to and I think I gave some you know a few editorial notes about this uh you know, like saying they shouldn't have this footage of this people here because they have nothing to do with it and um you know just minor stuff that didn't affect the whole thing. But uh the reason it was hard for me to watch was because I wanted it so personal and and to show my complexities and my um and my uh tortured poetic genius quotation marks, you know. Um you know, it's gonna have all my baggage, you know, and which I wanted in there because I wanted people to see it, because I want people to, you know, mental illness is you know a pain in the ass, you know what I mean? But it should be something that should be spoken about publicly, right? Not you know, hidden away. But uh by the same token, you know, I mean, I've dealt with all the issues that I talk about in the movie, and I'm fine with them, but having them all thrown back in my face in a two-hour window with uh you know, with and on visual and visual and audio visual component, you know, of uh seeing the whole picture, seeing it is just uh it's it's taxing emotionally.
SPEAKER_03Yeah.
SPEAKER_00So I really enjoy the movie, but but for me, it's hard to watch. You know, and it was hard for me to watch to like to get around to what I I think that's what you're talking about with the editing. It was more hard for me to uh to get around to watch it to give even give my editing opinion because I didn't want to uh I didn't feel like dealing with the baggage, you know?
SPEAKER_04Yeah, and especially because it's like editing your story, like you're saying it's like you want it to be warts and all, so it's like hard to edit like how you were actually feeling because it's raw footage, you know. So it's really that's such an interesting point. That's really crazy. Um crazy?
SPEAKER_00Yes, I'm kidding, but that we knew. Yeah, we didn't know that. We did know that.
SPEAKER_04If you've watched any of Raven, you know he's there's a little something, but you had to be a little bit to be an ECW, also, I think.
SPEAKER_00But I so the the whole the whole motto was of ECW if you pass the drug test, you were fired.
SPEAKER_04You were fired. Oh my god. And I and I think that that's why it just um it makes it was so interesting. Like that's why it was just there's very few adjectives I can draw to describe what ECW is to watch, even. So I can't imagine being a part of it, especially like when it really was kicking off and being such a huge part of it. Um but I I'm curious, Jordy. Did you so you were a wrestling fan? So you because you are you a Canadian boy?
SPEAKER_01Canadian, yeah.
SPEAKER_04So that's I mean, wrestling has to be involved in the blood. It's wrestling and hockey, I feel.
SPEAKER_01Yeah, for sure. Like my I my family was fairly friends with the heart family. So like oh wow, yeah, you know, Calgary's not that big of a city, but it's known as a wrestling city because of the hearts and because they had that school there. Um, but I just yeah, I I loved wrestling and I particularly loved ECW. Um I think like with ECW is for me as a kid, like I heard I heard someone once say that like when they when they first heard like NWA, like they were like ended up becoming a rapper, they were scared of NWA. That's like how I felt with ECW. Like, yeah, I had like I cut because I like my family knew wrestlers, and like I mean, it was relatively well known that like wrestling was a work, but with for me, like ECW didn't feel like a work. It was like wrestling's a work, but these guys are actually crazy. Like this thing that they did was actually real. It was that like, but this was real kind of feeling. Yeah, and I was scared of the wrestlers as a kid, like the ECW wrestlers. Um, I thought they were actually maniacs, I thought they were crazy, and so um, yeah, it was like that that and and the fans scared me too because they were so bloodthirsty and would go crazy when things looked genuinely disconcerting through the TV. That's amazing.
SPEAKER_04That is the best way to describe ECW. When we watch, it's like if I could go back in time and be in that crowd, I don't know if I would. Like, or like I would, but would you know what I mean? And I think it's hard for it to feel like a work when people are getting thrown through flaming tables. You know, it's like how is that a work? That feels good.
SPEAKER_00Here's the thing when wrestling at its finest is an emotional, it's an emotional play that is very visceral. You can feel it viscerally, and uh so when it's done right, and ECW was done right for 90% of it was done perfect, you know, or not maybe not 90%, but but 95% of it was done right. Whether it was done perfect, you know, that's to be debated, but but the fact is is that it it touched you on uh on an emotional level, which is when wrestling's at its best. Because here's here's the thing. Okay, you can punch somebody in the face, you can go to a stranger, punch him in the face, and he'll be in pain, but he'll be fine. You go to a stranger and you and you show that you've taken his girlfriend and he didn't know about it, that kind of pain, psychological pain, is so much more devastating. And that's what that's what I kind of dealt with as you is the Raven character. You know, I had my character always dealing with the emotional stakes. And wrestling when it's done to its fine, this is always done with emotional stakes. You know, yeah. The uh the title of belt means a lot, but in but you have emotional stakes tied to it, it means so much more than just the belt alone.
SPEAKER_04That is so yeah, that's a really good point. And I s uh I feel like ECW did such a great job of that because it did really blur those lines of like what's real and what's not. And so like those emotional things like felt so potent, like and so real. And um, I'm so curious because like the psychology of Raven obviously is a huge part of the film. It's obviously just a huge part of your life, um, goes without saying. And it's interesting because there's so many times in the documentary where you talk about how difficult it is for you to look back. It's kind of what we were talking about before. But Raven's character, like, he's kind of built on his past experiences. Like it comes up a lot like his dad, and like his whole reason for going to ECW is because of his like beef with Tommy Dreamer, because he was bullied and he's trying to get his vengeance. I just think it's so interesting that that character is kind of like um based or like foundationally on like past experiences.
SPEAKER_00But like but all but all human beings are. I mean, we're all built, we're all built with the memories they say well, whatever you learn from zero to five influences like 85% of your life or something, you know, because that's when you're that's when you're most it's your most learn it and your most ability to learn and to pick up stuff and you're because your brain's a tabula rasa, you know, it's just a blank slate.
SPEAKER_03Yeah.
SPEAKER_00And so when you so you know, so everybody's tied whether they think it or not, we're all tied and we're all victims of our childhood, no matter how great or how poorly they went, that's what informs us as adults, you know.
SPEAKER_03That's so true.
SPEAKER_00Yeah, and so I mean, so Raven was uh Raven was just showing that on the sleeve, you know, for everybody to see. He he felt he Raven felt he was a he felt he was um um a martyr for society, like Jesus Christ is uh is a martyr for for the whole, you know, for the whole real world or whatever, I guess. But but Raven, uh the reason I had that pose was because Raven was a martyr for society's dysfunction. And he was gonna feel their pain upon his back, you know, you know, in his in his grandiose visions, you know, in his heady dreams and nightmares, he was that person, um, which is uh kind of egotistical and uh kind of full of shit. He's kind of full of shit, you know.
SPEAKER_02No, it's that's great. I mean, Kelsey were talking about um just that rivalry with like Tommy Dreamer, and Kelsey was saying that like in if it were like to be watched as like a movie, Raven would be like the like the babyface protagonist. He was bullied in high school, he's getting like his revenge. But when you like are putting it in this like scenario of wrestling, like uh everybody's like all for you know Tommy Dreamer, he's like the golden boy of like ECW.
SPEAKER_00So like in real life, in real life, Raven would still be the heel because he has a as all good heels in wrestling do, they have a point, they just take it too far, right? And so Raven, he's whiny about it, he complains about it. Nobody likes whiners or complainers, you know. Um Red Hart, you know, Canadian. I don't know why we wrote Canadians earlier. I guess are you a Canadian-based show?
SPEAKER_02No, I'm in Philly, uh Kelsey's in Jersey. Um Canadian.
SPEAKER_00Yeah. Uh just the way she said it, the way she phrased it, but it might be a Canadian-based show.
SPEAKER_04Yeah, I yeah, I could totally see that. Yeah.
SPEAKER_00Yeah, yeah. But um the uh Bret Hart, when he was uh heel, he was so good because he he should have been the hero. And he and he and he but the reason but a real hero would have walked away. Right.
SPEAKER_03Yeah.
SPEAKER_00When things when things went when things went south, the a good a real hero would have walked away when the people no longer wanted to follow him. He would have said, That's fine, you can do your own thing. But he didn't, instead, he pressed the issue over and over, and he became such a fantastic heel. You know, it was it was an amazing you know turn because he had shown nothing of that ability prior, I think, you know.
SPEAKER_02Right.
SPEAKER_00Because he'd always been a baby face, or you know, or you know, the heart foundation were kind of heels, but they really weren't heels, you know what I mean.
SPEAKER_02Yeah, yeah, yeah. No, and I that we recently like just watched that heel turn, like as it progressed. Um, and that's definitely it's so I was talking to Kelsey, he was like, I was like, the reason I or at least the reason I felt like um the ECW crowd like was so game to just like hate on Raven, it's just like no one wants to like no one likes when someone's playing the victim. Like, we all can like sympathize with a victim, but when we feel like someone's playing that part, we're like, oh, I don't what what is this? Um, so I it just I feel like it'll enabled you to kind of just like to like play that line where like, oh, he has a point, but like, oh why, why is it like this, you know? Um, it was great. He was a hero, he would just keep it to himself.
SPEAKER_04Yeah. Especially in wrestling, I feel right.
SPEAKER_02Baby faces just take it on the chin.
SPEAKER_00Every everything is in wrestling, is uh Rich Right. It's life, it's life uh to a uh times a hundred. You know what I mean? It's it's it's it's ba it's rooted in the the basics of life. Good, you know, good guy, I mean uh winning and losing, but it takes it to an extreme, no, no pun intended, it takes it to an extreme of you know of the good guys and bad guys, and and bad guys have to show their ass, you know. At some point, at some point they have to show the why they're a bad guy, you know, why they're a cat. When a push comes to shove, they have to be cowardly, you know, it's at the when it's time to stand their ground, or they have to whine or complain, or they have to they have to show a heel quality that is is called showing your ass. Um not to be confused with mooning somebody. Um and and a good and a baby face has to you know stand for determination and in the face of adversity, and it takes it to an extreme, it's like an opera, you know, for the masses, right?
SPEAKER_02Yeah, I always called like the uh wrestling the last like theater in the round, like the last kind of like way that we take in entertainment like that. Um I my next question was um throughout the documentary, you talk about like conflating the person with the character, um, and kind of having to like do the work to kind of separate that. Like, how long was that process for you before you felt comfortable being like, oh, the wrestler is in this box, this is where you know he lives, and the person is back. Um, what did that process or how long did that process kind of take for you?
SPEAKER_00Um I don't know, I don't really know. Um it took, you know, it took a couple years, it took a few years on a therapist's couch, you know what I mean? Like on a psychologist's couch, you know. Um but uh but it's like it's like Will from Will and Grace said, being on in therapy, it's like you're on your own talk show and you're the only guest and everybody's fascinated by what you have to say.
SPEAKER_04Yep, it's truly the best. I I also love um in the documentary, there's so many pictures. And I and was it Jordy, was it you that went through all the pictures? Or like some yeah, had to like dive in and like find all of the pictures. Like, first of all, I love that there were so many pictures. I was gonna say, not to be confused with mooning, even though you did a lot of that as well. Um they're showing your ass and mooning, you are an expert in both. Um but I loved all those pictures. And like, what was I feel like you are kind of like me a little bit, where it's like once I latch on to a subject, I have to know everything. So to me, that process is enjoyable, where it's like I to see these pictures, even though it's nothing to do with me objectively, like and how long did that take? Like just kind of parsing through what was there, what was usable, um, any like just what that was like.
SPEAKER_01Yeah, I mean, it was really yeah, I'm with you. I think we share that uh like fascination with people, I think, and like it's it's just like such a privilege to get to kind of go on these deep dives as like a career and kind of examine someone's life. Um like Raven, like I I think that's what got me fascinated in the project is you know, like Raven's kind of known as the master of psychology within wrestling. So you're kind of like, well, what's this like the the master of psychology of wrestling? That's a mind that brought us that genius kind of drove himself crazy. So like what a great, like what an interesting uh subject and an interesting life to sort of examine. And so get getting to go through all the photos and and like all the video tapes and everything else was really, really cool. And it was, yeah, like it wasn't just the photos, you know. Like we we went through a bunch of old matches, streamed like all these um boxes of VHS uh tapes. It's hard to put like a specific timeline on it because I edited the film, so it was like sort of like a I mean it it it like on and off basically took you know like a year to edit it. So it was wow kind of going back and forth between finding footage, sorting out the narrative, going back and forth.
SPEAKER_00How many times how many times do we uh did you fly in to meet with me? I forget. I think I keep getting asked that.
SPEAKER_01Flew in uh twice.
SPEAKER_00So like I yeah, that was like like I first edited the documentary, and it was I mean it's all total, all to all your visits to get the material too and to film it.
SPEAKER_01Oh yeah, like 10 visits, including including shooting. I don't know if it was 10, but yeah, like maybe like five or six or something. Something like that.
SPEAKER_00Well, including the ones including the ones where you met me on the road, too, right?
SPEAKER_01Oh yeah. Yeah, we're back, I was back and forth between Atlanta for like those couple years there. And wow, it was uh it was awesome. Uh like I said this too, like in other interviews. I was like kind of expecting uh Raven to be tougher to work with, just because he said, like he said in the interviews, he's like, Oh, like I like had basically had this reputation in wrestling, and I know he's he's grown a lot, but it just wasn't my experience that he was difficult to work with at all. Uh it was always like kind of I should have been more difficult. Yeah, you should have been. You didn't live up to the Raven character, though. You're a pretty nice guy.
SPEAKER_04Oh my god, that is so funny. Because it's like, you know, you you want a taste of the of the raven, of the subject. I get it. I'm glad that he was that he was you're like, I'm actually okay.
SPEAKER_01Yeah, you're like, there's a there's a reason.
SPEAKER_04I'm actually okay with it. Thank you.
SPEAKER_01Yeah, it was great. It was great. It was it was a lot like I mean, I don't know. That was a bit of a rambly answer, but basically it was uh it was a lot of fun.
SPEAKER_04I love that. That's not a rambly answer. I'm really enjoying everything. Um and going back just quickly to uh Raven, you're so candid about talking about therapy, which I love. And I feel like we have really moved into this day and age in just the world in general, where it's like way more common to talk about it. But I feel like especially wrestlers and even um in the documentary showing all the physical therapy that you do for your body and like how you take care of your body, your um mental health, like all of that, I feel like is so great because especially in wrestling, and Xavier and I talk about it a lot. You know, there's no like aftercare, healthcare, retirement plans for wrestlers. Like there's really kind of a lack of that in the wrestling business, and it is a lot better. But I I really think it's so great how candid you are about it. Um, and I think that's such a great, somehow like a great through line from the Raven character, because it's like you were always saying like the emotional, almost like taboo thing that people were like, whoa, like we're talking about like you know, neglect and and shithead dads, like on on like in promos and stuff. Like it feels like taboo, but you kind of have this ability like in your life to talk about those things with ease, even though you are separate people. Does that like make sense?
SPEAKER_00Yeah, yeah, I get it. Um but that that's what I wanted to show. I wanted to show that you know that I'm not that I wanted I wanted people to see that there's reasons for my behavior. Not that I not that it excuses it, because it doesn't, nothing excuses bad behavior, but there's reasons for it and and why I behaved the way I did, which you know, which wasn't always necessarily the best behavior. Yeah. Yeah, I wasn't trying to uh and but yeah, I'm not trying to make it like um I'm not trying to justify it or anything like that, because I don't believe it's you know that that's right. I think I think you you take your you take your lumps, you know, and uh and my career didn't work out quite as well as I wanted. It worked out very, very well, but it didn't make it work out quite as well as I wanted, but then I would I would think at least 50% both goes but the blame goes to me, you know, because of my attitude and stuff. I always I always had to be the smartest guy in the room, even if I wasn't, and I had and the worst part was I had to make sure everybody knew I was, right? And that's not an endearing quality, to be sure.
SPEAKER_02No, but it is like interesting now, like having seen the movie, like what informed that. You know what I mean? Um it's a little bit like um, you know, just as like a fan of yours, like growing up, um I was well, I want to say like in like 02, 03, towards like the tail end of you being in like the WWE, I saw I was always bummed. I was like, where's Raven? Like, because I was always drawn to like your misfit characters. It was always like Raven, your Jeff Hardy's, your McFoley's. Like, I was always just like, oh, like this makes sense to me. Um so uh so yeah, it's nice to like know that like to see like what informed kind of what happened. Um, because it for a lot of fans, I'm sure that's a big, you know, question mark.
SPEAKER_04Yeah, yeah. And I feel like um, in terms of mental health, I and I don't know if this experience is similar to you, but I like I feel like with mental health, it's like your whole life, you're kind of like fighting something you don't understand. Like, so you're using like a knife, you're using a weapon, you're using a hand, like whatever, and then suddenly someone's just like your therapist or whatever is like it's a werewolf, and you're like, Oh, and so you use silver bullets. Does that make sense? Like you kind of you get the tools, totally it, you know.
SPEAKER_00When my therapist um he left on it on his desk my uh one of my my diagnoses, uh my shrink. My actually he was my dictionologist, but he's a he's a psychiatrist, and uh he left my diagnosis of hit of uh narcissist disorder and narcissistic personality disorder and and um and uh histrionic personality disorder, and so and blah blah de blah. And I was able, and he left the office, and I was just happening to glance at his desk and I could read upside down what it said, you know, because you can yeah, I yeah, yeah, you do that when you read somebody's yeah, yeah, and so and then I go, ah, so that's what I have, and he goes, and he goes, Oh, you weren't supposed to see that. And he goes, it's not good for patients to know their diagnosis. And I go, why? I go, this is good for me because now I know there's a reason for my behavior more than just I'm a fucking idiot, you know. But it's true, you know. I mean, yeah, it's you know, like it gave me something to like to go, okay. I'm not using this as a as an excuse, I'm not using this as a reason to I'm not blaming my problems on that, but now I at least I understand why I'm behaving in these ways that I can't understand. And so I think it's depending on the patient, sometimes it should be told, the patient should be told what their diagnosis is as opposed to being kept from them. But I can also understand why they would keep it from them because it might sometimes it might make you act in that way, you know, to live up to the diagnosis. Yes, yeah, you know, but to me it was a revelation.
SPEAKER_04Yeah, I feel that. I feel like it would be to me, it would be like a oh, I'm not just a piece of garbage. Like I there's something, there's like a jumping point for me to work through it instead of let it work through me, if that like to be cliche about it, I guess. Um I also I'm so curious because if we're also is it okay if we if I ask you a few more questions? I want to be respectful of both of your time.
SPEAKER_00I got a few more questions in me.
SPEAKER_04Okay, thank you.
SPEAKER_00Jory, you got a few more? I'm good.
SPEAKER_04Okay, great. Um I'm so curious because I did not know that you started as kind of like on the back end or like behind the scenes at WWE, or like not quite behind the scenes, you had like your your gimmick, and but you were doing like you were in those rooms, and I were they I think correct me if I'm wrong, they were kind of setting you up to be like a like higher talent, like eventually at WWE.
SPEAKER_00No, they what it was was I was an as uh when I got there, they made me an associate associate producer of Monday Night Raw. And so but that was when I was there in '94, and they were grooming me to be on the booking committee.
SPEAKER_04Yes.
SPEAKER_00Um not to be a higher talent, but to be a behind the scenes higher positioned. And uh, but I didn't, but I didn't want to be a booker. I wanted to I wanted to wrestle, you know, that's what I got in the business for. And uh, and uh, but I was as an associate producer, I was also getting paid. Um I got health care as a wrestler, I did a wrestler I didn't, but I got health care because I was an office employee. I got a six-figure contract, but at the end of the day, it wasn't doing I wasn't doing what I wanted to do, and I was like, I can't, I have to quit, you know, and and see where my luck takes me, you know.
SPEAKER_04Yeah. And I feel like um because like many, like in the film, many people said you have this high wrestling IQ, to go to an organization like ECW that's so um collaborative, like in terms of storylines and like character development and things like that, like I feel like it's way more of a discussion versus when you went back to WWE. And also I think your run in WCW is also great. Um, but when you go back to WWE and it kind of feels like things are just coming down from the top, and it's like this is your story, like this is just what you do. I sometimes I'm like, I just think that, and it's just like, I don't know, maybe a hot take, but I just feel like at ECW, you had all this like creative freedom to develop your character and like you had this great, fully formed character when you went back to WWE, and yet somehow they just kept putting you in hardcore matches. Like I and like you weren't as much on the mic. And I feel like that is one of your strongest abilities aside from your wrestling talent. I feel like you do promos that uh are so amazing and like intelligent. And like I just watched one today where you were doing a promo on Jeff Hardy and you like quoted Napoleon, and like you said you did like a little kind of like uh the poetry at the end. I mean, it's just so brilliant. And I do you feel like um like your creativity was like maybe a little inhibited when you went back to WWE?
SPEAKER_00Yeah, um, but uh that was because of behind the scenes baggage I had. And uh, but yeah, I would have loved to have been used better in WWE, but yeah, that's not the way the ball went. Yeah, the ball was tossed the other way to somebody else's. And I was standing there with my hands open, ready for it, and I was like, Amazing. No, it just did that's the way uh that really did me my psychologically did me a lot of damage. Because at the time I I I like 90% of them, but the world equates what what I did with who I am. Right. Most people equate what they do with who they are, not who they are with who they are. You know, we we take what our job does, so if our job treats us like shit, then we feel like we're a piece of shit. You know, and vice versa. You know, if our if if we're not being used to our fullest at work, then it leaves us feeling unfulfilled at home. And I had to learn the difference, then thanks to the Shrink Scouts, the psychologist scouts, I learned that uh one has nothing to do with the other, you know, and that helped me, that freed me up to become a better person, too, because I wasn't so worried about my career. I mean, I was, but I was able to not let it affect me any more than it already had as a person.
SPEAKER_04I love that, and I'm um I just think that's so interesting to again like to be so candid about that, especially in a business where it's like you are the product, like you are, and I think you've said this before, where it's like you're not just and it might have been on the the Stone Cold uh podcast episode where it was like you're not just talent, you are like um behind the scenes, you're almost like your own travel agent, you're your own stunt coordinator, like you do all of these things. So I feel like especially wrestling, it makes complete sense to kind of get lost in it because it's so all-encompassing. Yeah. It's called the bubble.
SPEAKER_00Yeah, people get stuck in the bubble. It's why wrestlers had mullets 15 years after mullets went out of style. You know, because they were too busy being they were too wrapped up in the bubble. That's part of what made ECW so great was it took it captured the cultural zeitgeist. Right. It played music, it played current music, it didn't play, you know, it didn't play stock music, it it played uh, you know, trendy uh you know hip urban music. It um it treated it it stepped up Paulie was great about stepping outside the bubble, finding what was culturally happening and tying it in. Like um after uh Devine Brown, the prostitute, got uh got arrested for blowing Hugh Grant and on California and Los Angeles or Hollywood or whatever, we we got Devine Brown to come on the show, and then Stevie was gonna bring her as my valet, and uh said she wasn't slutty enough.
SPEAKER_04Which is brilliant, it's so brilliant. Um speaking of this kind of like candid conversation, what Jordy, I'm curious what because there are a lot of crazy, incredible stories in this documentary. Like that Xavier and I were watching, and there were a few parts of you were just like um what was the most surprising, or like, did you have a moment where you're like you're recording, you're filming, you're like, oh my god, this is so insane.
SPEAKER_00I assume we were talking about the uh the slip and slide for sure.
SPEAKER_04Well it's the not the elephant in the room, it's the rhino in the room.
SPEAKER_01Literally, right? Yeah, and it's it's it was really fascinating. Like the the crazy stories like ended up in the documentary, so it's like it's hard, like the slip and slide one is is awfully crazy. Obviously, uh Sam and overdosing is kind of crazy, but it's insane. But the stories are in there to kind of capture uh like I I think wrestling kind of had this crazy rock and roll kind of behind the scenes thing going on for a while, and then it blew up to something so big, and it took a really like the thing that's surprising to me is it took so long, given the popularity, for wrestling to actually develop into a more corporate culture. Like I think things are more like professional behind the scenes now, but it's amazing as long as it did to get there.
SPEAKER_02But I I feel like part of that's like it's like WWE was like a family business for so long that like before it was like publicly like traded, it was really like you know, whatever Vince wants.
SPEAKER_00Because of the pan, because the Pentagon, you know, admitted that the UFOs they saw the UAPs were real, you know, they weren't they weren't made up or whatever, you know, it took it it took the stigma off being a UFO believer. And uh yeah, wrestling, wrestling had the stigma of being fake, so nobody took any paid any mind to what they did in the corner. I'll let the children play in the corner and do what they want to do. Yeah, and nobody put any stock or barrel into what was going on behind the scenes. Wow.
SPEAKER_04That's such a great point. And I think I think you may have said this that you were like, I'm actually okay that Hey Fabe kind of broke because it like freed a lot of us from just being like, Yeah, well, it's not fake, it's like just this incredible, it's a it's a show. It's like you come to see a show, it's like I I forget what interview this was recently, but someone was like, Yeah, Superman's not real either. Like, you know, he doesn't actually fly. They use like stuns, like they it's like a show, a performance. It's like so. I think it's weird that wrestling gets this um thing over it where it's like, but it's fake. It's like okay, but like there's people are still flipping through tables, like doing pile driver. Like it's still there is it's actually like an aspect of realness that people just don't if you don't get it, you don't get it. Does that make sense?
SPEAKER_00Yeah, pee people the um the best thing they ever did was uh Vince was saying that wrestling was predetermined, the outcome was predetermined. Um, because it allowed people the owners of go, uh instead of them going it's fake, it's fake, it's fake, they could go, it may be fake, but the outcome is I mean, but the the the athleticism is off the charts.
SPEAKER_04Yeah, exactly.
SPEAKER_00And so they could respect it for an athletic and you know, gymnastics, you know, you're not trying to it's it's it's won by scores, you know what I mean? It's not uh there's not it's a it's opinionated, you know. It's wrestling's the same way, you know, it's opinionated. It it it appears um how's I gonna phrase that? I don't know, it doesn't matter. You get my point.
SPEAKER_04I love the the UFO metaphor too. That's like so great. I that makes a lot of sense. Um and I was I just kind of do you have a question?
SPEAKER_00I know I know my point was. Sorry.
SPEAKER_04Go ahead. Yeah.
SPEAKER_00Yeah, but it's like it's like gymnastics or the opera. It's not an actual gymnastics is a is a competition, but it's also a show, and you and you grade them on a score, the opera is is is not real. It's just it's a it's an action, it's an activity that um that expresses the moral complexities of life to a show. And wrestling is a show that you can look at like gymnastics or athletics, you know, but it just because the outcome isn't predetermined doesn't mean that the out the the the will what is accomplished in there isn't something spectacular when it's done correctly. When it's done terribly, when it's done wrong, it's the absolute worst. Unless it's really, really bad, and then it's great again.
SPEAKER_02Yeah, that's like most art, I feel like it circles back to being incredible, right? Um, but you guys are going to be in Philly this weekend, um, the 11th and 12th for um the premiere. Are you excited to be uh back in Philly in your stomping grounds?
SPEAKER_00Yeah, I'm looking forward to it. I'm gonna a bunch of my buddies are gonna show up and uh looking forward to seeing them. And uh yeah, the it's the 11th and 12th at Philomoka. And I'm looking forward to seeing the build the venue because I heard it's really cool. It's uh like an old mausoleum or something.
SPEAKER_02Yeah, yeah, yeah. And then I heard the the Blue Meanie is doing the QA. That's gonna be interesting.
SPEAKER_00Yes, the Blue Meanie will be doing the QA, and then uh that'll be on the 11th, and then the 12th it'll be a matinee show. We'll be doing uh meeting uh VIP tickets holders who get to meet meet and greet with me before the shows. And um after the show, I'll do a QA with Blue Meanie, as you said, and then the 22nd will be in Baltimore at the 7 p.m. at the Charles Theater. And uh the 21st will be in Baltimore the day before for uh meet and greet at Jimmy's Seafood. And then the 28th will be in back in Atlanta where my hometown, my current hometown, my hometown for the last 30 years, uh is the Plaza Theater. And then on November 18th, it'll be released on um streaming on Amazon, iTunes, Apple, YouTube, Voodoo. Uh so in November 18th, if we're not coming to your town, then November 18th, uh you can watch it on the on streaming services. Awesome.
SPEAKER_02Well, thank you guys so much for your time. I'm just gonna wrap us up uh real quick. Um, thank you all. This has been another edition of the New to Wrestling Podcast. Wherever you guys are, if you're in the Philly area like us, you can catch this weekend. Um, Raven is going to be premiering Nevermore the Raven effect um at the Philly Mocha. All right, guys. Thank you so much for your time for Raven, Jordy, and Kelsey. I'll catch you on the next one.
SPEAKER_04We'll see you there.