Latest / The Christian Reeve Podcast / Iain J Christ | The Christian Reeve Podcast #366

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Iain J Christ | The Christian Reeve Podcast #366 · The Christian Reeve Podcast

• 0:45
  Hello, and welcome to another episode of The Christian Brief
• 0:49
  podcast. Today's guest is a retired
• 0:51
  wrestler, an actor and a professional musician from
• 0:54
  Manchester. His name, I think, is Ian J
• 0:58
  Christ. You've gone by many names.
• 1:01
  Welcome to the show. That's the overarching one that
• 1:05
  I've used for longest, I guess. Thank you.
• 1:08
  Thank you for having me. Great intro as well.
• 1:10
  Thank you for you know, I always find when I'm like introducing
• 1:14
  myself to people, I always have to like lead with the day job.
• 1:18
  Or if I say these things that I do, which I do do, you know,
• 1:22
  wrestler or musician, paid musician.
• 1:28
  And then I always have to go at the end.
• 1:29
  Oh, I have a day job and I feel like I have to like cue that in.
• 1:33
  So I've done it again by saying it now, but I'll take all the
• 1:38
  other things you said. Thank you.
• 1:40
  It's, it's true, because I think there's a general lack of
• 1:43
  respect for their arts. It's, it's the only career path
• 1:47
  where people have that kind of attitude.
• 1:51
  You know, like I was talking to a friend the other day about
• 1:53
  this. Like, for example, have you had
• 1:57
  a lot of questions over the years about how much you earn
• 2:00
  doing, say, wrestling or music or acting or whatever?
• 2:05
  If if I do, they're always very short conversations because
• 2:07
  they're essentially, yeah. I mean, people don't tend to
• 2:09
  follow that line of inquiry too long before they.
• 2:11
  Yeah, before they find out. I just find it interesting
• 2:15
  because I mean, I mean called me old fashioned, but I think
• 2:19
  that's kind of rude. You know, what businesses of
• 2:21
  anyone, how much you earn, you know, and, and it's, it works
• 2:25
  both ways as well. Like if, if someone works in say
• 2:27
  like an office job and you go, oh, great, so how much do you
• 2:30
  earn? It's like, excuse me, so how?
• 2:32
  What's the difference? Yeah, I wonder what somebody
• 2:35
  would have to do. Maybe if they actually said they
• 2:37
  were a rocket scientist or brain surgeon, one of those.
• 2:40
  Maybe I'd then just to find out. It's just one of them.
• 2:43
  And I mean, I think at the end of the day, maybe one day the
• 2:47
  arts will get more respects, particularly at sort of the
• 2:50
  entry level or if you've been doing this a while.
• 2:53
  I know that I've always been judged on, I don't know, the
• 2:56
  level of followers I have or how what, what's the biggest project
• 3:01
  you've done? Something like that, yeah.
• 3:03
  And I just, I stopped caring after a while about what people
• 3:07
  thought because it's always based in, I don't know, like it
• 3:13
  just comes from a general judge mental place and they don't know
• 3:17
  what the fuck they're talking about and they're doing.
• 3:19
  Second point maybe true. I would like to think it's it's
• 3:23
  more curiosity, but maybe we're in different parties.
• 3:28
  Yeah, I would. Hey, I'm I'm all for general
• 3:30
  curiosity. If if someone's asking like, oh
• 3:33
  hey, what's the earning potential for say acting or
• 3:37
  voice acting or music like that's that's if.
• 3:40
  They use the phrase earning potential.
• 3:42
  Then you might just be on LinkedIn instead of a a normal
• 3:44
  social situation. But you take my point, right?
• 3:47
  Yeah. Like there's a big difference
• 3:49
  between someone trying to learn about what you do because maybe
• 3:52
  they want to do the same thing or they just want to learn
• 3:55
  versus someone who's like, because it was it always be this
• 3:59
  conversation, It'd be, so how much do you earn?
• 4:02
  OK, so don't you think that you should like, you know, go get a
• 4:05
  real job? No, I don't know.
• 4:08
  People must know better than to than to ask me that.
• 4:10
  I don't know because I always say, as I said, I always end
• 4:14
  every sentence of describing my Arctic artistic endeavours with
• 4:17
  oh, and have a real job. So maybe that's why I don't get
• 4:21
  it quite so much. What's your What's your real
• 4:23
  job? I work for an IT company like
• 4:29
  everybody in the band, I think. Nice.
• 4:33
  Yeah, so I'm just working from this room right now.
• 4:39
  Oh, cool, working from. OK, let's talk about that for a
• 4:41
  second. How long have you been working
• 4:44
  from? Home since COVID.
• 4:47
  Wow. Would you say you prefer it?
• 4:51
  Is it better? Is it worse?
• 4:52
  What's, what's the kind of feeling generally for you?
• 4:55
  Isn't that when I think there were elements of things that I
• 4:58
  miss out on? Like I don't have to commute, I
• 5:01
  don't have to have immediate supervision, you know, which is
• 5:07
  nice. But I do, I think at least going
• 5:14
  into the office and like just seeing people every day and
• 5:17
  talking to people every day, I think does give you a degree of
• 5:20
  like energy that you don't get if you don't see people for a
• 5:27
  few days. You know what I mean?
• 5:28
  Like just that's even even just getting up from your desk to to,
• 5:33
  you know, I don't get up from my desk.
• 5:34
  I just turn and look at something else.
• 5:38
  You know, it's. But yeah, I do miss the people.
• 5:40
  I think I got a certain amount of yeah, fears and energy off
• 5:46
  off of me and people. But if it shows between that and
• 5:51
  not to, you know, getting an hour at least back every day
• 5:55
  from commuting, then I'll take that hour every day.
• 6:00
  I think This is why the whole hybrid option where it's
• 6:02
  probably like the best scenario because it kind of it's the best
• 6:06
  of both worlds, gives people the flexibility they need.
• 6:10
  And as you say, some of some of the access to that social
• 6:14
  element that maybe is lacking by the way, companies seem to have
• 6:17
  a very weird way of positioning this now.
• 6:20
  It's almost like a incentive that's added into contracts,
• 6:23
  like, oh, we'll give you this, but you got to earn it.
• 6:26
  That's like, all right, strange. Fuck it, let's talk about this,
• 6:34
  this name situation. So.
• 6:37
  Yeah. Ian J Christ, you've also gone
• 6:40
  by Ian Korea. Yeah.
• 6:41
  What's what's, what's the deal? What's what's?
• 6:44
  I just never liked my real surname, which I won't stress
• 6:51
  and affect myself by disclosing here.
• 6:53
  She's never a fan of it and then started a band in high school
• 6:57
  with my mates and I went with Ian Credible, which was just a
• 7:03
  RIP off from a wrestler. There's a wrestler called Just
• 7:06
  Incredible, which is a much better version of it that I just
• 7:08
  sort of lifted, but then soon abandoned that for Ian J Christ,
• 7:13
  which is self basic, you know, blasphemy standard classic
• 7:19
  stuff. But in Red Dwarf, Rimmer's
• 7:24
  middle name is Judas Arnold, Judas Rimmer.
• 7:27
  And I thought that was that was funny.
• 7:29
  So I stuck that in in the middle and yeah, when when with that
• 7:36
  and then, you know, started wrestling.
• 7:38
  So I needed a name for that and there was open the radio show
• 7:42
  for a bit. So I used a different name for
• 7:44
  that and I had a couple of wrestling names.
• 7:49
  Ian Korea was the name I used on the radio.
• 7:52
  But then when I semi retired from wrestling and started the
• 7:58
  band, I was using my name Ian. There's like, you know, Bass
• 8:02
  Ian. So I was like, OK, well I can't
• 8:04
  use my wrestling name. Jet Fashion reverted to in Korea
• 8:10
  because it's got a sort of nice ring to it.
• 8:12
  So, fun fact, I've been a fan of wrestling possibly my entire
• 8:17
  life, certainly since child. Yes, that explains why you got
• 8:20
  me back on Phenomenal. You can.
• 8:22
  Any wrestler will be able to, you know, unhappily talk to you
• 8:25
  for hours about wrestling. I go, I go back and forth on it.
• 8:31
  I think I I was really into what it used to be.
• 8:36
  Nowadays I'm kind of, it's not completely died, but it's
• 8:41
  changed so much that I don't really recognise it anymore.
• 8:46
  It's, yeah, it's, you know, things, arts and things do
• 8:49
  evolve, but certainly the WWE is not been great for a while.
• 8:56
  And it's in in my view, something about the prevailing
• 8:59
  style of wrestling was a bit samey.
• 9:03
  You know, everybody was there was a dive over the top rope
• 9:06
  every match and then there was a super kick.
• 9:09
  Well, not watching WWE the Super kicks, but in the in the NDC and
• 9:12
  super kicks can't took over for a bit And everybody has like a
• 9:17
  wake up. It's a Smackdown video game
• 9:19
  term, but a wake up taunt. So like Roman Reigns does it.
• 9:23
  He was a fine example of a wrestler, especially relative to
• 9:27
  everybody else these days. His opponent's down in the
• 9:31
  corner. He will then go and do something
• 9:34
  and the opponent will slowly stand up and then turn around
• 9:36
  and then hit with the with the finish.
• 9:39
  And that's just like very prevalent, like everybody's got
• 9:43
  one and all kind of hat. Yeah, everyone hits the same
• 9:47
  things. Yeah.
• 9:48
  Slow formula. And everybody has to say their
• 9:51
  name when they call a promo. They have to say their name.
• 9:53
  They have to say their catch phrase.
• 9:55
  And these are all, at their core, good tips for presentation
• 10:01
  and marketing. But when absolutely everybody is
• 10:03
  doing it every time, Yeah, not, not for me.
• 10:07
  It's always so I think about, I've always agreed with this
• 10:11
  concept of like less is more. And I think that does apply in
• 10:14
  wrestling, like the concept of selling.
• 10:17
  So if those who don't know about wrestling, it's like a so if
• 10:21
  you're in a fighting situation in a wrestling context, it's how
• 10:27
  much you, you know, show that you have felt pain from this
• 10:32
  particular move that you've taken.
• 10:33
  So if I slam you on your back, in theory, you shouldn't really
• 10:37
  get up back up from that for a long time because I've just
• 10:39
  slammed you on your back. You know, that hurts.
• 10:41
  But then the modern product it's, it's just like you just
• 10:45
  get up straight away and I'm like, so the means are the moves
• 10:48
  are meaningless, then nothing, nothing, you know.
• 10:52
  Yeah, that is old fashioned in some respects, but also sort of
• 10:58
  timeless in others. You know, it's not.
• 11:02
  The problem is you're in a wrestling scene with everybody
• 11:10
  else, you know what I mean? And they're all doing more
• 11:13
  insane moves. If everyone's doing this popular
• 11:18
  thing and you're not, does that mean that they're right and
• 11:21
  you're not? No, but I personally would
• 11:24
  advocate for a a reduction of of intensity.
• 11:30
  I was always a low risk worker as it was what?
• 11:37
  Was your go to move? Yeah, I was also one of my
• 11:41
  flaws. I didn't have that many moves.
• 11:42
  I was I was good at the the pageantry and the talking and
• 11:46
  the taking my shirt off bit nailed all that.
• 11:52
  The jetpack was my finisher. So that is a crucifix pin
• 11:58
  driver. If anybody wants to get
• 12:01
  technical about it is. That kind of like the razor's
• 12:04
  edge? Oh, no, no.
• 12:07
  Oh. Are you, are you aware of the
• 12:09
  crucifix pin as a as a move? Heard of him?
• 12:12
  I can't visualize him. I know I'm sort of, it's
• 12:14
  difficult to describe, sorry. Audio listening.
• 12:18
  I would, let's say duck to your left, so I took your right hook
• 12:25
  under your arm and then go round the back of you and with my leg
• 12:29
  hook your other arm and then fall backwards, putting your
• 12:35
  pinning predicament and shoulders to the mat.
• 12:38
  But I would do that rather than rolling down in a normal pin, I
• 12:41
  would sort of thrust it down. I don't want to finish it.
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  I did try to invent some of my own moves once.
• 12:49
  Nobody understood. Nobody understood what was going
• 12:52
  on with the human 619. Legibility is key.
• 12:56
  Like this is what we're saying. Like when everybody's moving
• 12:58
  very fast and if you're if there's people doing lots and
• 13:02
  lots of moves really quickly and you'll keep moving from one
• 13:05
  thing to the next, the audience doesn't have time to read what
• 13:09
  is happening. I mean, that's, that's the crux
• 13:12
  of my entire argument. It's not not so much that things
• 13:15
  have changed and that it's more fast-paced.
• 13:17
  I accept that like the the the average wrestler just is more
• 13:22
  athletic these days. But still, like you say, if
• 13:26
  there's loads and loads and loads of stuff going on, it's A
• 13:30
  difficult to pay attention to what's going on.
• 13:32
  And B, telling a story within the context of that is a lot
• 13:36
  harder because nothing really means anything.
• 13:40
  You know, like if if like I don't know something simple when
• 13:43
  I think I like the best wrestling matches I've ever seen
• 13:46
  where it wasn't really about the story going into the match, but
• 13:50
  just about the match itself. It'd always be something as
• 13:53
  simple as like there was a move early on and someone smacked
• 14:00
  into another guy's knee or something.
• 14:02
  And then for the rest of the match, no matter what, that's
• 14:05
  figured in in some way. And that's like, you know what
• 14:08
  I'm saying? Like that's and it can even be,
• 14:10
  it could be really literal, like they just the guy attacks the
• 14:13
  knee the entire time. Or it could be something like
• 14:15
  whenever he goes for a move, let's say he goes for a drop
• 14:18
  kick, but he stumbles because he injured his knee earlier.
• 14:20
  You know, like. Stuff like that, you got, you
• 14:22
  got a brain for this business, kid.
• 14:24
  I'll go, I'll get you in. But the other thing is there's
• 14:30
  so many wrestling matches happening.
• 14:34
  Generally, especially wrestling fan, you go and see a lot of
• 14:36
  them. Finding something new is is is
• 14:40
  very difficult. Let's find something new that is
• 14:44
  legible. You know, there's really
• 14:48
  something like a sun in a way that the restrictions sort of
• 14:52
  give you parameters to be created with, but it is
• 14:56
  difficult. I know what I would also say
• 14:58
  about the speed thing wasn't the sort of old head bit of advice
• 15:01
  is if you think you're going too fast, slow down.
• 15:06
  Because when you're in the ring and like so when you're on a
• 15:09
  stage performing a music, the crowds on, you know, in front of
• 15:12
  you for the most part in the ring, they're on at least three
• 15:16
  sides usually. And when you're stood in the
• 15:20
  ring, you're very aware everybody's looking at you and
• 15:24
  everything you do needs to be in service of the match and the
• 15:29
  story and the characters. And that goes from your facial
• 15:32
  expressions to how you move and how you talk and absolutely
• 15:36
  everything matters. So it is quite intense to have
• 15:40
  that in the round and you just like, oh God, got to do
• 15:44
  something, got to do something when really what you actually
• 15:47
  need to do is do very little and sort of soak it in, tell the
• 15:54
  story. Completely agree.
• 15:57
  It's so again, more insider wrestling talk, but I go with
• 16:03
  the the gym Cornette kind of school of thought, which.
• 16:06
  Yes, I'm sympathetic to that as well.
• 16:08
  I will say yeah. He he's, he gets criticized a
• 16:11
  lot and I'll agree sometimes when he's delving into
• 16:14
  something, he does have a tendency maybe to go a little
• 16:19
  bit crazy with certain people. But I do understand to some
• 16:24
  extent because like when you see the modern product and then you
• 16:29
  look at like what he was talking about and say the 80s, nineties
• 16:31
  or whatever, you can see his point a lot at the time.
• 16:35
  And he his point isn't always necessarily like everything
• 16:38
  that's modern is bad because he'll he'll, he'll bring up when
• 16:40
  things are good and he'll say when a guy's got momentum or a
• 16:43
  girl, or, you know, he'll say, like when a storyline is has
• 16:49
  potential. But what he doesn't like is
• 16:52
  anything that kind of exposes the fact that, you know, A,
• 16:55
  wrestling is, you know, not real and B, where it makes it look
• 17:00
  silly. And he and people like Jr. for
• 17:04
  example, always said like anything that just makes it easy
• 17:07
  to target the wrestling industry and in a kind of kind of
• 17:10
  comical, judgmental way is never going to be good for the
• 17:13
  business. And.
• 17:16
  That again is is one of the most difficult things now, whilst the
• 17:21
  best will improvise basically everything that's very uncommon
• 17:27
  on the sort of the indie circuit, especially for new
• 17:29
  wrestlers, because as I said, the pressure of like doing
• 17:31
  something and entertaining doors lend yourself like and how
• 17:35
  you've trained as to like, OK, we'll plan what we're going to
• 17:37
  do. We're going to do this.
• 17:37
  We're going to do this thing with this.
• 17:38
  Even if you plan out like a story that's nice and we've got
• 17:41
  a nice story planned out. We'll do this, we'll do this,
• 17:43
  we'll do this, do that without showing signs of collaboration
• 17:50
  or cooperation. That is the real good thing.
• 17:54
  And that's very hard. I never managed it.
• 17:57
  I was wrestling for 10 years and grant, that wasn't very good,
• 18:00
  but I never got to the point where I was just like so in it
• 18:06
  that it seemed organic. It was like I was always trying
• 18:10
  to like I was always doing moves, you know what I mean?
• 18:14
  It's really hard. So it's fun and easy as it is to
• 18:17
  criticize wrestlers of all levels, It's insanely difficult
• 18:23
  as a as a pastime because not only is it extremely physical
• 18:29
  mentally as well and presentation.
• 18:32
  And if there are any musicians listening who don't know or
• 18:36
  don't care about wrestling is 1 is one thing I can relate to
• 18:40
  you. OK, so in your messaging, let's
• 18:45
  say in your reels, in your promotional materials, even when
• 18:52
  you're on stage doing your stage raps, don't shit on the product.
• 18:57
  So when you're wrestling, if you are a commentator or even if
• 19:02
  you're there yourself, let's say I'm wrestler A and I'm going to
• 19:05
  challenge Chris in a, in a podcast match next Saturday.
• 19:11
  OK. What I don't want to say is this
• 19:15
  Chris, he's terrible. He can't do a podcast to save
• 19:19
  his life. I'm going to go in there and I'm
• 19:21
  going to walk all over him because where's the appeal in
• 19:27
  seeing me wrestlerate trounce somebody?
• 19:32
  You need to sell the fact this is going to be a tough match, a
• 19:36
  good match, something worth seeing.
• 19:39
  So I'd say Chris, he's been podcasting for years.
• 19:41
  He's a veteran, but maybe there's a weak link.
• 19:44
  Maybe he's, you know, getting. So you have to build them up and
• 19:47
  that goes for yourself. Oh, if you're on stage or if
• 19:50
  you're on social media, don't. As tempting as it is to be self
• 19:55
  deprecating, don't do it all the time.
• 19:58
  Try to do it. You know, you can leak it out a
• 20:01
  little bit and the same. It's sort of charming and fun
• 20:04
  and easy to do, but ultimately you are undermining what you're
• 20:09
  presenting. You need to be presenting the
• 20:14
  best, you know, just so that if anybody is seeing it, what
• 20:17
  they're seeing is you're presenting, as you know, in
• 20:20
  Swalk, A Stride's case, my band. The greatest band of all time.
• 20:24
  It's it's true. I remember reading something
• 20:27
  years ago about Vince McMahon's philosophy on on marketing with
• 20:33
  with wrestling. It's one of the best marketers
• 20:36
  and promoters in world history. You know, there is is many, many
• 20:40
  flaws. He's knows what he's doing in
• 20:44
  that respect. There were little things that
• 20:46
  that I found really interesting, like for instance, when the WWE
• 20:49
  Network was a thing, instead of saying something like limited
• 20:53
  time only it's, it's going off soon, you'll never see it again.
• 20:58
  He would avoid using anything like that and only use positive
• 21:02
  terms like, I don't know, just just like this is the greatest
• 21:05
  pay-per-view of all time or this is, you know, and yeah, it's
• 21:10
  maybe it's embellishment a little bit, but it was always
• 21:12
  positive, never negative. And that's interesting.
• 21:16
  I think like with what you're saying, like I've made the
• 21:20
  mistake of being self deprecating many, many times.
• 21:22
  And some would argue it makes you more endearing, keeps you
• 21:26
  rooted. I don't believe in the extreme
• 21:28
  of just only ever being positive.
• 21:30
  No, I think there's room for that, but I see you can
• 21:33
  definitely overdo it on the self deprecation front for sure.
• 21:36
  And, and in the long run, it sort of undermines what is
• 21:40
  you're trying to achieve. You're trying to convince people
• 21:42
  that you are worth seeing, worth booking again, worth paying
• 21:47
  money to, worth buying ACD, worth putting into your, you
• 21:51
  know, music rotation. So if you're telling them you're
• 21:56
  no good, then what are they going to?
• 21:58
  What are they going to believe? Did you ever wrestle outside of
• 22:00
  the UK? No, no, never.
• 22:04
  I was never much of AAA good wrestler or BA good networker, I
• 22:11
  think. So those two combined really
• 22:16
  sort of gave me a limited, limited scope.
• 22:20
  What would you say? I know obviously you've not
• 22:24
  wrestled in other countries, but like, what would you say?
• 22:27
  Maybe the distinct, I don't know how to put this, like maybe the
• 22:34
  key elements of British wrestling that distinguishes it
• 22:37
  from other countries. Well, let's take a lot of
• 22:40
  influence from the attitude area.
• 22:43
  I think that was so era defining that I think the whole world's
• 22:49
  wrestling is has taken a big a big slice of that out.
• 22:53
  But the bridge style is based more in in character for sure.
• 23:02
  A lot of there's there's there's more humour in it, but of course
• 23:05
  you can, you can go too far. As I'm sure Jim Connor and would
• 23:08
  would tell you there is still a legacy of the world of sports
• 23:12
  stuffs. Wrestling in the UK was at its
• 23:15
  biggest in the 70s and 80s. And if you go to, you know, any
• 23:23
  wedding, the dads and uncles will will talk to you about
• 23:26
  giant haystacks and and big daddy.
• 23:29
  And there was the sort of belly bashing big boys at the top of
• 23:34
  the card. But beneath that there was a lot
• 23:36
  of technicians like a young, a young Stephen Regal, Rollable
• 23:39
  Rocco, Mick McManus. And these are all like proper,
• 23:46
  proper wrestlers, you know, knuckle locks and and things
• 23:49
  like that. And that is still in the right
• 23:52
  in the right schools. That is still taught as part of
• 23:55
  the British style. And there's a lot of all British
• 24:00
  wrestlers in the WWE now in the training centres.
• 24:02
  So the WWE recognizes the elements of that style that that
• 24:06
  work so well. And they've they've integrated
• 24:09
  basically. Robbie Brookside was a British
• 24:12
  wrestler for a long time. He's the WWE Academy.
• 24:15
  Dave Taylor I think is there. And yeah, it's also high.
• 24:20
  It's also very character based. You know you are no doubt as to
• 24:27
  what your character's up to. You know who they are and this
• 24:32
  is again something you can you can relate to.
• 24:33
  Music, the character and who you are should be a parent within 2
• 24:38
  seconds. You know the opening 4 bars of
• 24:41
  your theme music, your expression when you come through
• 24:43
  the curtain, how you walk. The audience should know
• 24:48
  everything you know. They should be able to get an
• 24:50
  impression and judge on what you're trying to.
• 24:55
  Well, this is something you, it's just about electing the
• 24:59
  response you want. So you should be able to get
• 25:02
  that within, you know, 20 seconds less just about how you
• 25:07
  you enter and and the choices you make doing that.
• 25:10
  What would you say were the biggest challenges you
• 25:11
  experienced as a professional wrestler?
• 25:16
  Getting bookings, yeah, but that was probably in large part due
• 25:21
  to my other challenge, which was I'm quite clumsy physically.
• 25:28
  I like my, my hand eye coordination is OK, but my
• 25:31
  physical, my spatial awareness is bad.
• 25:33
  So like so flap around a bit or a hand will go where it
• 25:39
  shouldn't do or like I'll accidentally tread on somebody
• 25:41
  if I'm walking past them or things like that.
• 25:44
  So though I trained, you know, very hard for, for years to get
• 25:49
  on shows and get and get bookings, you know, I think I
• 25:52
  had sort of 67 in total over the years.
• 25:55
  It's matches I would have taken a whole new level of dedication
• 26:00
  to to knock that out of me, you know what I mean?
• 26:03
  And when your moves, when your movements aren't crisp, there's
• 26:07
  a lot you can do with shouting and and flailing and like
• 26:10
  character work. But at some point you've got to
• 26:14
  like hit some moves together and if they're not crisp and on
• 26:18
  rhythm and they look good, it's not legible.
• 26:22
  The crowd don't pop in the way that you see a season,
• 26:26
  Professor. I don't know, I'm just going to
• 26:27
  name drop Martin Kirby because he's one of the Britain's best.
• 26:30
  But when he wrestles, it's like boom, click up, down, turn
• 26:34
  around, hit there, hit there. It's all really nice.
• 26:36
  All Super Chris, the crowd know how to react because you know to
• 26:41
  some extent they've been trained.
• 26:42
  As you say, there's only so many ways you can do a wrestling
• 26:45
  match, but it's also easy, whereas I made it look
• 26:48
  difficult. I know.
• 26:49
  I think maybe you're too hard on yourself.
• 26:51
  I mean it's. It's it's a good profession.
• 26:54
  You know how much there is to know about wrestling and how
• 26:56
  much goes into it. It's like the point you said
• 27:01
  before, like I really agreed with the concept of like it's so
• 27:04
  easy to criticise wrestling, but then to actually do it is
• 27:08
  something else. Because that's always been my
• 27:11
  perspective is you should only criticize the lack of realism or
• 27:17
  anything that kind of makes wrestling look silly in some
• 27:20
  way, which is purely choice based.
• 27:23
  As far as like just the physicality of it and stuff like
• 27:26
  it's hard. Like when you see someone who's
• 27:28
  training, like I remember back in the day, people would be
• 27:32
  like, oh, Shane McMahon is not a great wrestler.
• 27:34
  And it's like, but he was never really supposed to be.
• 27:38
  No, but it didn't matter. That's some of the most
• 27:40
  legendary moments, yeah, in. Absolutely.
• 27:43
  And and you know, it was like you, you bought it.
• 27:46
  You bought that. This was a guy who'd been
• 27:49
  training but just, you know, wasn't a professional, but that
• 27:51
  worked with what they were trying to achieve.
• 27:54
  Yeah, and he was the son of the boss.
• 27:55
  It fit his character really well.
• 27:57
  Yeah. So that was that was OK.
• 28:00
  There is, you know, even if you are bad at the crisp technical
• 28:05
  elements like I was, the way wrestling is, there's always
• 28:09
  going to be room. As long as you can get bombs on
• 28:11
  seats, you'll be able to get bookings right.
• 28:15
  That's that's the end of the day.
• 28:16
  That's what it's about. If you can draw a crowd and
• 28:19
  entertain a crowd, do however you want.
• 28:22
  You know, it's like I say with music sometimes, you know, it's
• 28:26
  off easy to fret about mixes and Eqs and like recordings and
• 28:32
  stuff. But as long as something comes
• 28:33
  out when you press play, that's, that's what you've that's that's
• 28:39
  all you need. Anything else is is up to you.
• 28:42
  But obviously there's, yeah, there's me wrestling and there's
• 28:46
  Brett Hart. You know, we both do the same
• 28:48
  thing. So you still did it man.
• 28:50
  Not many. People I am proud of, of what I
• 28:52
  achieved, the fact I got to have matches and I was A tag team
• 28:55
  champion, Grand Pro Wrestling, 2 times.
• 29:01
  There's some excellent photographs.
• 29:02
  You know, that's the main thing isn't it?
• 29:06
  Yeah, I'm proud of what I changed my life completely
• 29:08
  before I took it up. I'd had meningitis when I was
• 29:15
  18, very lucky to survive with my life and limbs, but it did
• 29:21
  sort of any of the casual sports and rough and tumble muscle or
• 29:25
  atrophy because I was in hospital for six weeks.
• 29:30
  And then when I came back from university, I was, well, I met a
• 29:32
  guy at university, happened to wrestle as well as working at
• 29:35
  Blockbuster. And then before that, I didn't
• 29:38
  really know it was an option. Like I was a fan.
• 29:39
  I used to watch WCW on Channel 5.
• 29:41
  You know, I play the video games.
• 29:43
  I was into it and I didn't realize you could just go along
• 29:46
  and do it. Yeah, when I go back to
• 29:49
  Manchester, I, I looked it up and yeah, very proud that I
• 29:54
  stuck through the hard training for two years.
• 29:57
  So I got my first match and it changed my life.
• 30:00
  Before then I was like, I'd like run around and play sports, but
• 30:03
  I never ate properly or, or started weightlifting or
• 30:07
  anything like that once I applied those.
• 30:10
  And if you go, you know, if you go on a proper shred and like
• 30:15
  eat like a bodybuilder and train like a bodybuilder for 12 weeks,
• 30:19
  16 weeks, it is a life changing experience.
• 30:23
  You're like you, you, you. It's quite profound how you
• 30:26
  connect with your body at that point because it takes 1/2 time,
• 30:30
  unfortunately. But like you feel and see the
• 30:34
  direct results of, of what you've done over this, this long
• 30:37
  period. And I've, I've not looked back
• 30:40
  like I've, I've been into health and fitness ever since.
• 30:43
  And I was a much happier person who got much more attention from
• 30:50
  people, probably because I was happy.
• 30:52
  I know I had pecs, sure, but I was also like a lot sunnier as a
• 30:56
  person just because I was like eating well and you know,
• 31:00
  occasionally having sex and just like completely changed my life.
• 31:03
  So recommend recommend to anybody.
• 31:06
  What would you say was your most memorable moment as a wrestler?
• 31:10
  Probably the second dumpster match.
• 31:13
  So I have to how long have we got?
• 31:17
  Because it's, you know, it's a bit of a tale, right?
• 31:23
  So when I first started my first tag team, it was 2012, the
• 31:29
  Olympics were on me and my other trainee pal, we put together as
• 31:36
  a team just to get just to get hammered by the reigning tag
• 31:39
  team, you know, job as as the inside term goes.
• 31:45
  We were Mike track, Ian Field, track and field, and it was
• 31:51
  essentially A118118 lift off. We had the vests, we didn't have
• 31:54
  the tashes, but it was that level of enthusiasm and
• 31:59
  silliness with themed moves like, and we'd do press ups and,
• 32:04
  you know, all kinds of things. And we got over somehow and, you
• 32:12
  know, lost again and again. There's that, there's that
• 32:15
  arrangement. But then after a while, this
• 32:17
  manager figure who was who was in the federation was looking to
• 32:21
  form a new tag team, the Midnight Dream Connection.
• 32:25
  And he gave me his card and sort of, yeah, took that away.
• 32:31
  Meanwhile, on elsewhere in the tag division here at Grand Pro
• 32:34
  Wrestling, you had Bin Man and Cyanide, known as Toxic Waste,
• 32:42
  and they were up against the Bad Lads for the number one
• 32:49
  contender, right? For this, for this, for the tag
• 32:50
  team titles, only the Bad Lads jump Cyanide.
• 32:54
  Before the show it was just Bin Man and the Bad Lads in a
• 33:00
  handicap match, two on one. They hammered him down, but the
• 33:03
  Bad Lads are sort of like stupid in a way and let it slip.
• 33:07
  Courageous Bin Man managed to get the win.
• 33:10
  All the others are against him. He's the number one contender,
• 33:12
  right? But then it comes the manager of
• 33:15
  the tag team champions, the Island Brothers, and he's like
• 33:21
  Bin Man, your tag team title shot is right now every just had
• 33:25
  that handicap match and he's not got A tag partner, so he's
• 33:29
  getting circled by the Island Brothers.
• 33:33
  I can't say it. And then who came to the rescue?
• 33:37
  I came flying out to form this tag team, the Midnight Dream
• 33:41
  Connection with Bin Man and we flipped down there and we won
• 33:46
  the title first time out together, 2 five minute win and
• 33:49
  the Midnight Dream connection became the Midnight Bin
• 33:53
  Collection. And yeah, we went on to be two
• 33:55
  times tag team champs and at one point we had three dumpster
• 34:00
  matches too because we had a bin man on my team.
• 34:04
  So that was always going to happen.
• 34:08
  At one point you have to throw them in the, you know, big
• 34:11
  wheelie bin and close the lid, crucially to win the match.
• 34:16
  And there's a point I got hooked in there and inside there was
• 34:19
  like a fur coat and a a change of vest.
• 34:21
  So whilst the match was going on, the lid was still open.
• 34:24
  I was able to change clothes and then burst out with a fur coat
• 34:27
  on and start laying into people. And then I got hit with a chair.
• 34:32
  So what? Was it like that's?
• 34:36
  Probably the one I remember the most.
• 34:38
  What? Was it like getting hit with a
• 34:39
  chair? With most of the things in
• 34:41
  wrestling, the adrenaline is going so you don't really notice
• 34:47
  it that much until afterwards. You know, most, most things.
• 34:50
  Even when I got my like I got my head slow open because in my
• 34:54
  well, Long story short, bin man turned out to be a bit of a you
• 34:58
  know, we lost a few title shots and he started blaming me for
• 35:02
  taking the pins. I did take the pins, but usually
• 35:06
  he'd tried some sort of mad dive out the ring like a high risk
• 35:09
  maneuver, ended up getting wiped out, leaving me with A2 on one
• 35:14
  and I would eat the pin And then he says that's my fault, turns
• 35:17
  on me. We had to have a dumpster mash
• 35:20
  to sort that out. But at some point he kicked me
• 35:23
  in the head with some like steel toes and I literally just split
• 35:27
  my head open and I remember like just going like oh that.
• 35:31
  I'll just lie down here for a second and then there's like
• 35:35
  blood on the mat and everything. That was it.
• 35:39
  That was the extent. It was like, oh, that hurt
• 35:42
  because you just the adrenaline is so, so pumped from the crowd.
• 35:44
  And because you've been jumping around for three minutes
• 35:47
  already, you know, you don't, you don't really notice that
• 35:50
  unless it's again, it would have to really, really be something
• 35:53
  bad to take you out. You know, you just, you just hit
• 35:56
  and go on. And then in the next two days
• 35:59
  you go, oh, bruise there, a bruise there.
• 36:02
  Well, that hurts. So one thing it does teach you
• 36:05
  is durability, learning to pro wrestle, I reckon, you know, you
• 36:10
  can get by a car and sort of bounce off a little bit just
• 36:14
  because you're just so used to getting pounded.
• 36:18
  Would you say the maybe some of the worst experiences you had
• 36:22
  wrestling, if any? Mostly positive, you know, like
• 36:25
  I just, I sometimes feel like I, I didn't, you know, connect well
• 36:33
  enough with, with the people around me.
• 36:34
  I think I had like a couple of people who was like really close
• 36:37
  to, but outside of that home federation.
• 36:40
  I don't think I, I think I used to like do the training and then
• 36:45
  go like, Oh, that was a tough couple of hours training.
• 36:47
  I'm going home by and just like walk straight off.
• 36:49
  Probably could have made more of like talking to people and then
• 36:54
  getting to know people. And and as time went on, you
• 36:57
  could see these like groups form.
• 37:01
  Do you know, friendship groups, you know, fair enough.
• 37:04
  I wasn't making much of an effort to to ingratiate myself,
• 37:08
  but it did feel a bit, you know, like, Oh yeah, they're all,
• 37:10
  they're all in the car, they're all going getting bookings over
• 37:13
  there. They're all doing this and that.
• 37:15
  They're all having a, a great time.
• 37:18
  So yeah, I think that's probably due to me being a bit blithe to
• 37:24
  social skills. But yeah, and there was a time I
• 37:29
  tried to do the high jump. So when we were track and field,
• 37:33
  I was like, right, let's get some themed moves here.
• 37:35
  What I'll do, I'll do the Fosbury flop over the top rope
• 37:39
  to the outside. Seems, you know, thematically
• 37:43
  perfect. I'm sure you'll agree.
• 37:45
  We were in training and I was just practicing it.
• 37:48
  We had a sort of crash map down. So I'd be like, here we go.
• 37:52
  I did the year 7 sports day high jumps.
• 37:56
  I was like, I could do a Fosby flop easy.
• 37:59
  Did it and sort of clipped the rope and messed it up.
• 38:01
  And I was like, no, that does feel a bit high risk because
• 38:04
  from the ring to the top rope is like what 5 1/2 feet or
• 38:09
  something. But from the top rope to the
• 38:11
  floor is more like, you know, 8 to 9 feet.
• 38:15
  And so someone's oh, I missed that.
• 38:16
  I'll do it again. So I tried to do it again,
• 38:19
  clipped the rope again, ended up landing on my face on this crash
• 38:23
  mat and then my legs scorpioned over like over the top when I
• 38:29
  had this sort of strange warm feeling in my neck.
• 38:34
  But that's fine, you know, but that's that's probably as bad as
• 38:38
  it got danger wise. And then that's when I started
• 38:41
  to lean towards a low risk style after that because I do do not
• 38:47
  have the coordination for anything other than.
• 38:51
  That Why did you decide to retire from professional
• 38:54
  wrestling? Well, COVID, I mean wrestling is
• 38:58
  the most non COVID thing possible.
• 39:01
  They had a quick go at it in in a few feds doing like no crowd
• 39:05
  matches. But it's just there's so much
• 39:08
  about the crowd, it's kind of stupid to not do it.
• 39:13
  So not only is wrestling itself not COVID, not I mean, crowd was
• 39:16
  not COVID. So there was that.
• 39:18
  And then my home fed didn't run shows for a couple of years.
• 39:22
  I was getting spot bookings here and there.
• 39:25
  But as I got into like after COVID, I say I was getting a few
• 39:28
  bookings here and there, but I was so up to the point where,
• 39:34
  you know, and we, I was still scrambling for connections and
• 39:39
  networking and booking as if I'd just started.
• 39:42
  Even though I've been doing it for over 10 years and had that
• 39:46
  much experience and knowledge about it, I was still scrabbling
• 39:54
  for bookings like I hadn't done anything, you know, And like I
• 39:59
  said, I was never like I was. No, I was fully aware of my
• 40:01
  limitations. Like I was under no illusions
• 40:04
  that I wasn't particularly good. And then some like younger
• 40:08
  people came through. Some of them were just like
• 40:11
  little and. You know, didn't lift that much,
• 40:14
  but then every so often you'd be like, oh, this guy's 20 jacks
• 40:19
  and like, moves incredibly. I say, oh, that's shit.
• 40:22
  That's not me anymore. Yeah, it wasn't.
• 40:24
  It was those little things, like I wasn't a preventer.
• 40:25
  The prevailing style, lots of dives, lots of kicking out at 2
• 40:29
  is still an epidemic. You can thank Shawn Michaels,
• 40:37
  The Undertaker for that one. Like, they had that one
• 40:39
  WrestleMania match where they just kicked out of everything
• 40:41
  and it was incredible. But then everybody now wants to
• 40:45
  do that on every show in every match.
• 40:50
  That happens a lot. Lots of dives, which I didn't
• 40:52
  really do and look a bit coordinated most of the time,
• 40:57
  you know, people will gather outside the rain and go, oh, we
• 40:59
  go staggering, looking right at him and where he comes us.
• 41:04
  So, yeah, the prevailing. I wasn't good enough to be a
• 41:05
  vanguard of a different style. You know, I wasn't like, yeah,
• 41:09
  let me show him how you do it real style.
• 41:11
  You're just like, you know, And then, you know, I got that I'd
• 41:14
  got into as far as the Northwest had gone anyway, like I would.
• 41:18
  I'd got at least to the level where, like, people knew me, my
• 41:23
  face and name, even if they weren't like, you know, seeing
• 41:27
  me on shows all that often. I was still like around and
• 41:29
  like, you know, I'd sort of made the scene and the next high
• 41:36
  level was kind of the highest level, or at least, you know,
• 41:39
  one in between level maybe. And it wasn't as aspirational.
• 41:43
  You know, once I'd got on shows and I'd seen the scene, I was
• 41:47
  like, yes, it sounds unique, but there wasn't a there wasn't like
• 41:51
  seeing shows and people, I mean, like, I've got to be with them.
• 41:56
  I've got to be on that show. I've got to be hanging out with
• 41:58
  these cool dudes. You know, that side of it wasn't
• 42:01
  really there. And I just wanted to, you know,
• 42:04
  just what I found was going to hustle around performing in
• 42:07
  front of 20 people. I'll do it for the band, you
• 42:09
  know, and what he said at the start, I've already, I've been
• 42:14
  in this band 2 years. I've already been paid more than
• 42:17
  I was in 10 years of pro wrestling.
• 42:20
  Wow. And that's like, you know,
• 42:23
  getting paid to be in a band. Not that blue grave or common.
• 42:29
  So I guess you show what it's like in pro wrestling because
• 42:32
  it'll always be somebody wanting to work for less because they
• 42:35
  love wrestling, you know, and there's always a promoter
• 42:37
  willing to pay them less. What did professional wrestling
• 42:39
  teach you about life? I mean you can't turn it off
• 42:42
  like in terms of I, I say it to like my partner sometimes I am
• 42:47
  like presentation pilled completely.
• 42:50
  So as you were saying before about like not self deprecating
• 42:53
  or when you come out of the curtain, everything within 20
• 42:56
  seconds will give people enough of a thing to go on.
• 43:00
  You can't, you can't turn that off.
• 43:02
  And the minutiae of of pro wrestling is infinite because
• 43:07
  all of it is like a list of tiny details in this big House of
• 43:10
  Cards and yeah, just bleeds into your whole life.
• 43:15
  So anything related to presentation whatsoever, which
• 43:18
  is everything, how anybody sees the world or how you see the
• 43:24
  world, especially if you are like making an effort to present
• 43:28
  something, Yeah, you can't turn off the wrestling brain of like,
• 43:32
  what am I saying with these choices?
• 43:34
  How many more choices can I make to better get across what it is
• 43:39
  I want? Thanks for sharing.
• 43:40
  Appreciate it. Let's move it forward.
• 43:43
  Tell me about your experience on the television show Naked
• 43:48
  Attraction. Yes, great.
• 43:49
  I mean, it's it's like for all the things that I've done,
• 43:54
  wrestled and played gigs and been in a Bollywood movie or
• 43:56
  whatever, that's people stop me in in Manchester to say like,
• 44:02
  oh, I'm more accurate. The more often they say how do I
• 44:05
  know you from somewhere? They're not usually grassroots
• 44:09
  punk or pro wrestling fans. There's usually because they've
• 44:12
  seen me on that great. I mean, recommend it to anybody,
• 44:19
  you know, It's a great icebreaker.
• 44:22
  People love. People love to talk about it.
• 44:24
  I've spent my whole life collecting Ice Breakers by the
• 44:26
  sounds of it. So I'm really good at weddings
• 44:28
  and inductions because I can just talk about wrestling or
• 44:32
  naked attraction the whole time. I'd do it again.
• 44:36
  No, but I've been on twice. I don't think anybody's done 3,
• 44:38
  so maybe I'll go for the three. So there's a few things I wanted
• 44:43
  to ask you about. That Oh yeah.
• 44:45
  Yeah. Largely an open book.
• 44:46
  It's incredible to go on at once, twice.
• 44:49
  I mean what? What was the reason in there?
• 44:52
  That was in the booth. I just applied to go on anyway.
• 44:55
  And then the the producers just decide, you know, how they're
• 44:58
  going to fit everybody and who's applied.
• 45:00
  Friend of mine saw they were auditioning on Facebook, sent to
• 45:04
  me and said seems like the kind of thing you'd want to do.
• 45:07
  So yeah, yeah. Being naked on TV's, funny idea,
• 45:14
  I think it's definitely been naked on TV is not a big deal as
• 45:20
  it would have been because people don't watch TV.
• 45:22
  But there's still enough, enough, enough of a stunt in
• 45:29
  there to appeal to me to be, to be naked on TV.
• 45:33
  So that's just, that was my main motivation was just to be naked
• 45:37
  on TV because like, wow, what an opportunity.
• 45:40
  Why would I not do that? What a, what a way to separate
• 45:45
  myself from other people. And I was first in the booth and
• 45:50
  then that is dancing in the booths.
• 45:54
  And I was obviously doing a great job.
• 45:57
  So they were like, let's have your back.
• 45:59
  Let's have you back as a, as a, as a chooser instead.
• 46:02
  So they did in the next series, brought him back to to to do it
• 46:04
  again. That's right.
• 46:05
  I forgot that they do that. Yeah, OK.
• 46:08
  Like, OK, I'll, I'll ask some questions about just just your
• 46:14
  general feeling and we'll go back to kind of like the
• 46:15
  logistics and how it works and stuff.
• 46:18
  Would you say it improved your confidence in your body and just
• 46:24
  yourself in any way? No, I also always been since
• 46:30
  school. I mean, I was in A and the band
• 46:33
  I mentioned in high school was a, was a hair metal band.
• 46:35
  So like, that's the kind of affected arrogance I've been
• 46:41
  training my whole life. So it's like, you know, I was
• 46:47
  just like, yeah, great. I've been, you know, wrestling
• 46:50
  away I think for 10 years up to that point.
• 46:51
  And again, that's all very much like exhibitionism, you know.
• 46:54
  So I was just happy to do it. Hasn't really changed the way I
• 46:59
  looked at myself. No, those things that were done
• 47:04
  differently if I went back round again.
• 47:07
  But I certainly don't regret it. What's it like being naked in
• 47:13
  ATV studio in front of people? Fun.
• 47:17
  At the front of the crowds, look at the the crew and the the host
• 47:21
  and they're all like super friendly and welcoming and stuff
• 47:25
  and then when you're in the booth you've got like a crew of
• 47:28
  other booth people that you walk around with for the afternoon.
• 47:34
  Yeah it's all so really nice. I made the mistake the first
• 47:38
  time I went in of like thinking, Oh, I need to, you know, have as
• 47:42
  much abs as as possible for this.
• 47:44
  So I like under 8, but any anybody with a decent amount of
• 47:50
  muscle, if you don't eat to keep to maintain what your body
• 47:55
  requires, you start like shivering and going cold as your
• 47:58
  body's like, oh, what are you doing?
• 47:59
  I need a certain amount of calories to to maintain this.
• 48:02
  So I ended up sort of shivering in the booth and like going into
• 48:06
  retreat for one of the which is the worst thing I could have
• 48:11
  done. So don't do that.
• 48:14
  Pro tip, if you're ever going on, just eat.
• 48:16
  Eat enough food. Did you did you?
• 48:19
  Because I didn't watch the episodes.
• 48:20
  I wanted to just kind of keep open about it and just, and
• 48:24
  just, you know, because I've, I've seen this show, I know how
• 48:26
  it works. So did you get picked to go on a
• 48:32
  date? No, not in the no, not in the
• 48:35
  first person. No, I went out in the third
• 48:37
  round or something. OK, We're just there.
• 48:40
  They're like when you're a booth person, you don't have much
• 48:42
  choice anyway. And I think they we wouldn't
• 48:45
  have been a good match full stop.
• 48:47
  So I wasn't too too bothered about that.
• 48:50
  Yeah, I always, I always find, OK, I just going to, I was going
• 48:55
  to say this, right. Television is often fabricated
• 49:00
  bullshit. We know this, right?
• 49:03
  Yeah, I know. I'm blowing mine too.
• 49:05
  I, I, I, I was aware of the show many years ago.
• 49:13
  I rediscovered it with my partner.
• 49:16
  We were just in some hotel somewhere on a trip and, you
• 49:19
  know, we never watch TV. So it's like TV on.
• 49:22
  Oh fuck, naked attraction. Haha.
• 49:25
  And it was hilarious. There was a woman on who was
• 49:29
  sort of in her mid 40s and she was the chooser and she was very
• 49:33
  specific. She was like, I want a guy,
• 49:35
  early 20s, this kind of situation, long term boyfriend.
• 49:40
  And I maybe want to have kids. I'm pretty sure I want to have
• 49:42
  kids. And in the end, she chose a guy
• 49:45
  who was in his early 60s, built massively and just nothing, not
• 49:53
  in any way what she said she wanted.
• 49:55
  Yeah, they do the returned thing when they like show them dating
• 49:59
  and everything and then the aftermath.
• 50:01
  And I don't know, it kind of seemed like they slept and never
• 50:05
  saw each other again. And she was upset about that.
• 50:09
  And I was kind of like, OK, is this like, is that, is there an,
• 50:14
  is this authentic or is this just like made-up for TVBS?
• 50:19
  So bringing that back to your, to your own experience.
• 50:21
  Yeah. Obviously as the chooser, you,
• 50:24
  you were guaranteed to, to, to date someone, to pick someone.
• 50:27
  Yeah. So yeah, she chose, chose
• 50:29
  someone. You go out on the date.
• 50:32
  Now run me through this. So they set you up a date,
• 50:35
  right? They set you up a date
• 50:36
  situation. Place to go?
• 50:37
  And yeah, they make you drinks and film.
• 50:40
  You have a little chat, Yeah. So what's it like being filmed
• 50:45
  having a date? Well, they give you, you know,
• 50:48
  if you drink, they'll provide as much booze as you want really.
• 50:51
  So you can easily sort of knock that off.
• 50:56
  Again, I'm pretty familiar with like cameras and stuff.
• 50:58
  And the person I picked is very chatty, very like easy to get on
• 51:03
  with. So like we, it was, it was
• 51:04
  great. We we didn't have much problem.
• 51:06
  At all often with these situations on the show that
• 51:10
  people do end up dating for real, which is great.
• 51:13
  Sometimes yes, sometimes no. Did you guys end up dating?
• 51:17
  No, no. Felt like there's a story there.
• 51:24
  Yeah, yeah, they. You don't have to share if you
• 51:28
  don't want to. I was just.
• 51:29
  Curious, they ended up saying some shit after the day.
• 51:32
  Is that something? After we'd after we'd had the
• 51:35
  catch up chat and that was formally rejected again.
• 51:38
  Sidebar to the gym. Cornet school.
• 51:42
  Whilst this was just after COVID so it could have been a good
• 51:45
  springboard for more wrestling bookings, but what is this
• 51:49
  presentation saying about this wrestler?
• 51:53
  He does not, you know what I mean?
• 51:55
  Like if you want to present as a wrestler, especially one that
• 51:59
  leads into aesthetics as I did, you got to be presenting us.
• 52:01
  Like, yeah, sex machine gets all really cool.
• 52:05
  No problem in getting women, all that stuff.
• 52:08
  What happened to me is I got like quietly and nicely rejected
• 52:12
  and, you know, didn't get a semi.
• 52:15
  So like I think the Gym Cornett School of Wrestling
• 52:20
  presentation, this did not do well for my prospects as a
• 52:27
  nationally renowned wrestler. In fact, I don't think I've got
• 52:30
  any books off the back of it. Was there anything odd about the
• 52:34
  experience, the behind the scenes, anything that just was
• 52:37
  just kind of shocking or interesting?
• 52:39
  It's all very casual, you know, It was pretty novel.
• 52:45
  I had to sign a thing which said that they can use my
• 52:47
  contribution to do whatever, whenever, throughout the
• 52:52
  universe. That was quite interesting to
• 52:54
  read. But, you know, because I wanted
• 52:57
  to be naked on TV, I was just like, yeah, so if there's only
• 53:00
  holograms of me running around committing crimes in, you know,
• 53:04
  20 years time, that'll be where they got the that'll be where
• 53:08
  they got the data. But but it's for me, you know?
• 53:11
  Yeah, we're looking good. So that's OK.
• 53:13
  Overall, would you say the show is positive in terms of because
• 53:18
  the whole point initially when it was set up was supposed to be
• 53:21
  like to celebrate people's bodies and, and to promote just
• 53:27
  people's bodies in general? There is, there is.
• 53:33
  I mean, it is very, very superficial as a concept.
• 53:36
  It's a bit like Tinder before Tinder.
• 53:38
  Yeah. Do you do you think it's a
• 53:41
  positive show or do you think it kind of like sensationalizes
• 53:44
  sexuality or just. Like it in a little bit, but I,
• 53:47
  you know, you know, I'd do that if I could as well.
• 53:51
  And they do. It is in terms of bodies that
• 53:53
  you have shown on TV, they're definitely real bodies a lot of
• 53:59
  the time though. Yeah, most of the time they are
• 54:01
  like these are normal, normal people's bodies, which in terms
• 54:06
  of why it's presented on TV and on social media and everything
• 54:09
  like that, then there's not many other outlets that do actually
• 54:14
  put that kind of body out there. So that's a win.
• 54:19
  It's obviously the, the the appeal is like naked on TV
• 54:26
  picking somebody based on, you know, naked attraction.
• 54:30
  So it's a bit of how the kick and eaten thing.
• 54:32
  But yeah, why not? It's a good thing, I think.
• 54:35
  Like it's breaking. It's breaking ground, at least,
• 54:38
  you know? I agree, I just can't
• 54:42
  constructed the question in that way just to kind of see how you
• 54:46
  feel about it. I personally completely agree
• 54:49
  with you. I really like the presentation
• 54:51
  of the show. I think it's, I never got
• 54:53
  anything really negative from it.
• 54:55
  I just thought like, OK, it's a bit kind of like out there.
• 54:58
  Yeah, it's kind of shocking really came around, but yeah.
• 55:02
  You still get paraded naked bodies, sure, but like it was
• 55:06
  actually a very non sexual environment.
• 55:09
  It's like in terms of like walking around, even the picking
• 55:12
  and choosing and like the discussions and everything.
• 55:15
  It's all no, it's very non sexual.
• 55:17
  The whole the whole thing, you know, it wasn't like you
• 55:20
  wouldn't have got aroused or anything really just because
• 55:23
  it's it was all quite Yeah, I say it was, it was all non
• 55:27
  sexualized really. So is that when people talk
• 55:29
  about like, acting sex scenes in films and they're like, oh, was
• 55:34
  it hard, you know, not getting aroused?
• 55:36
  And it's like, bro, there's a fucking camera crew.
• 55:38
  And like there's there's like. There's like.
• 55:42
  Everyone's staring at you. Like if anything, it's it's
• 55:45
  horrible experience from that, from that sense.
• 55:48
  I was just. But one thing about I did like
• 55:53
  that I thought was psychologically interesting
• 55:56
  about it. I wondered in retrospect.
• 56:00
  So there's a there's a book called Black Box thinking by
• 56:05
  what's he called his table tennis champion used to write
• 56:08
  Matthew Syed. And it's very interesting book
• 56:13
  juxtaposes the reaction to disasters in aviation and the
• 56:17
  NHS. In aviation, they look at
• 56:19
  absolutely every part of it and then implement things that means
• 56:23
  it can never happen again. In healthcare, they go like, you
• 56:26
  know, things happen. He's not a bad guy.
• 56:29
  You know, sorry about that. And one of the chapters he's
• 56:34
  talking about how he observed university students before they
• 56:39
  were going to go have an exam the next day.
• 56:42
  They were out drinking right when they knew full well this is
• 56:45
  not best preparation to do before exam.
• 56:48
  But he he realized it was their sort of like pre building an
• 56:52
  excuse for not doing well into it.
• 56:57
  So they can they it's obviously completely self-destructive and
• 57:02
  fallacious thinking. But that was like the idea
• 57:04
  behind it was like, oh, well, you know, we're drinking.
• 57:06
  Of course I didn't do that well and after a few months, I
• 57:11
  thought so in terms of my ambitions as a performer and AI
• 57:19
  guess as a performer, yeah, which I would love to do full
• 57:22
  time and and and all of that instead of a day job was doing
• 57:27
  naked attraction in a sense, throwing in the towel for like
• 57:33
  mainstream success because how many potential jobs would I be
• 57:39
  no longer tenable for because I've been naked on TV And is the
• 57:45
  fun idea of like, yeah, I want to be naked on TV.
• 57:47
  To what extent was I going? Well, I can't do that job.
• 57:50
  I'll never get the, you know, GMTVTV just Christ, I'll never
• 57:57
  get the I'll never get the Granada reports job now.
• 58:01
  I'll never get the, you know, so I'm sorry the.
• 58:07
  GMT gig didn't work out brother. No, that's just obviously, you
• 58:12
  know, it's very interesting thing to do go on naked
• 58:16
  attraction. And that was part of our think
• 58:18
  thing That was that was maybe now, but maybe I've sort of like
• 58:20
  just to like screw, screw a mainstream attempt.
• 58:23
  I'm throwing in the towel and put my Dick on TV as a like a
• 58:26
  sort of like, you know, fuck you.
• 58:28
  I don't know, I'm just going to get rid of that.
• 58:31
  With the types of people we are, like, you know, we've both lived
• 58:35
  and done things in the quote UN quote normal world.
• 58:37
  And then we've both done things in the sort of creative space,
• 58:41
  which can be quite fucking out there, you know, and I don't
• 58:48
  know, I'm like yourself. I'm I'm kind of at home with the
• 58:50
  chaos, whereas I feel like the standard world to me is crazy.
• 58:57
  And like, you know, like the people talk about the 9:00 to
• 59:01
  5:00 and I'm like, that's my idea of hell on earth.
• 59:05
  And you know, it is just a fucking desk job.
• 59:07
  But to me that's like, I'd, I'd go crazy, right?
• 59:12
  So I can completely understand where you're coming from, but I
• 59:16
  also, I don't know, I look at these things like, does me doing
• 59:20
  this thing prevent me from from actually doing these things?
• 59:25
  Or is it just all based on reputation and you're worried
• 59:29
  this will affect your reputation?
• 59:30
  It's like, so fucking what? I mean, Like, it's, I think it
• 59:35
  says more about society than it does about you, really.
• 59:37
  Yeah, so I suppose to the old Groucho Marx thing, you know, I
• 59:40
  wouldn't want to join any club that would have me as I remember
• 59:42
  anybody who would reject me on the basis of being on naked
• 59:46
  Attraction. You know what?
• 59:49
  What kind of operation are you running here?
• 59:50
  Yes, just go back. To what you're saying before,
• 59:54
  like I think generally the presentation of the show was,
• 59:58
  was positive. You know, I, I never, if you
• 1:00:01
  look at like some of the stuff that's on TV now, like things
• 1:00:04
  like Love Island, I'd say that is more of a a negative show to
• 1:00:09
  go on because the whole premise is people are getting together
• 1:00:13
  to have sex and drama and all that.
• 1:00:15
  And it's like, yeah. Whereas Naked Attraction was
• 1:00:19
  kind of hit and miss. You've had people that were
• 1:00:22
  going on the show who you know is very well known.
• 1:00:26
  Plenty of people go on TV just to be on TV to build something
• 1:00:30
  else. And I don't think there's
• 1:00:30
  anything wrong with that. It does bring the question when
• 1:00:34
  it comes to reality TV though, of like this isn't real and it's
• 1:00:38
  like it never has been. But then there's there's like
• 1:00:42
  real instances where people get together and and sometimes they
• 1:00:45
  end up being together forever, which is is awesome.
• 1:00:48
  So there's like a reason to watch it.
• 1:00:50
  Do you know what I mean? And then there's the whole, just
• 1:00:55
  as you said, like looking at the human body and how people
• 1:00:57
  actually look and. Better love it.
• 1:01:00
  And I'm sure it's, yeah, a lot more realistic in that respect.
• 1:01:03
  Yeah. Well, I can talk with that with
• 1:01:06
  you all there about this, but I think we should move on.
• 1:01:09
  Thanks for sharing there. I really appreciate it.
• 1:01:10
  So we've both been on television, we've both done
• 1:01:14
  film, We both share a love of red professional wrestling and
• 1:01:17
  also we both have been in Bollywood movies.
• 1:01:23
  I've been in five. Five.
• 1:01:25
  Oh my God, who's who's your agent?
• 1:01:27
  Give me a go. No, it was a nightmare.
• 1:01:32
  It was an experience. It was, it was an experience.
• 1:01:36
  But yeah, I'd never do it again. Well, how did you get?
• 1:01:39
  At what point did you decide never do again after the fifth
• 1:01:42
  one? Or you know.
• 1:01:44
  OK, so I decided after 4, the fifth one was like, I got it
• 1:01:49
  through the OK. The reason why and it's not,
• 1:01:52
  this is not against Bollywood films in general.
• 1:01:54
  It's just the particular production company that was
• 1:01:57
  producing all of these films with the exception of one.
• 1:02:01
  One of them was fine. Actually, no two of them were
• 1:02:05
  fine. Three of them were bad and the
• 1:02:08
  two that were fine different, different production companies.
• 1:02:12
  It was interesting how they do their, their film work totally
• 1:02:15
  different to anything I've ever seen.
• 1:02:16
  It was interesting. But one thing they're all, and
• 1:02:21
  this was the decided factor for me they're all guilty of is not
• 1:02:25
  paying on time. The the law says you got to pay
• 1:02:28
  within 90 days. And they went over that time and
• 1:02:32
  time again. And so when it came to the final
• 1:02:34
  time, I was messaging like an intermediary talent agency.
• 1:02:41
  So they won't represent me. But like you can apply for these
• 1:02:43
  ones where it's like talent talks.
• 1:02:45
  You heard the talent talks, right?
• 1:02:48
  Yeah. So if anybody doesn't know,
• 1:02:50
  there's there's ones that you can sign up with where you're
• 1:02:52
  not actually signed to them. But if you do get something
• 1:02:56
  through them, it works the same as a standard contract would
• 1:02:59
  work. So they get their car and
• 1:03:00
  everything and, and talent talks is great.
• 1:03:03
  Nothing bad to say about those guys.
• 1:03:05
  They're every time I've worked with them, they're great.
• 1:03:08
  But I was messaging a contact from there and I was like, OK,
• 1:03:12
  listen, the last time I worked with these people, I didn't get
• 1:03:16
  paid for like 4 months. Can you guarantee I'll get paid
• 1:03:21
  and that you'll facilitate that? And they were like, yes.
• 1:03:24
  And then it became just endless emails.
• 1:03:28
  And I knew they couldn't do anything about it because they
• 1:03:30
  were just the intermediary. And they were saying, hey, yeah,
• 1:03:33
  we keep emailing and we just keep getting pushed away.
• 1:03:36
  And eventually I got paid like 6 months later.
• 1:03:39
  I was just like, this is a joke. Like this is this is stupid.
• 1:03:43
  So we're all filming in the UK or did they need a, did they
• 1:03:47
  need AU and they flew out to India?
• 1:03:48
  Well. That'll be amazing.
• 1:03:50
  No, it was. It was all in the UK.
• 1:03:53
  I, I, I think it's an experience like, like I like all
• 1:03:56
  experiences. I think it's an experience to
• 1:03:57
  have. I was pretty impressed with how
• 1:04:01
  they're very loose with, with filming and, and like they don't
• 1:04:06
  do more than one take, which I was like is that's risky.
• 1:04:09
  But they, they, they're very like, they do not waste time.
• 1:04:13
  They're just like boom, in done next shot.
• 1:04:15
  And I'm like, wow, never seen that before.
• 1:04:18
  So you were on a Bollywood movie called Shanda.
• 1:04:23
  Please tell me about your experience.
• 1:04:24
  Well, it was very brief walk on roll, but it turned out to be
• 1:04:30
  absolutely pivotal to the plot. Oh, they couldn't cut me out.
• 1:04:34
  Nice, I had a. Friend of mine who was working
• 1:04:37
  on locations for the movie. It was Bollywood's first
• 1:04:41
  destination wedding film and they were on the beach in Red
• 1:04:45
  car and without no, I just yeah, which when they needed mostly
• 1:04:51
  people. So my friend who went in the
• 1:04:53
  film said, oh, I know two guys. Me and my friend Russ went along
• 1:04:57
  and we got cast of stud boys one and two and we had to like walk
• 1:05:01
  down the beach hit the mark a couple lines to these actors,
• 1:05:07
  but they left us around rain all day.
• 1:05:09
  We sat around we had two lunches because we were waiting so long.
• 1:05:11
  I didn't under it this time, I can say that much.
• 1:05:14
  And then my friend hadn't acted before and I was, I was pretty,
• 1:05:19
  you know, just wrestling, which is quite different really.
• 1:05:23
  And we kept like, not doing the line right or like missing the
• 1:05:26
  mark a little bit. And I didn't.
• 1:05:28
  Meanwhile, the tide's coming in, the lights going.
• 1:05:31
  They took my line off just to sort of simplify things.
• 1:05:36
  And what I realized afterwards, the line as written was a bit
• 1:05:43
  unnatural. It was like, would you like 1
• 1:05:47
  Right. That was that was that these
• 1:05:49
  girls were sitting on the beach and we had the some mystery
• 1:05:54
  brownies and mystery mushrooms that we were like walking down
• 1:05:56
  the beach with. And then we would give them some
• 1:05:59
  whole family has a hallucinary trip sang up the second back to
• 1:06:03
  the film, whatever. But the line is written was
• 1:06:05
  like, would you like one or something like that?
• 1:06:09
  And what I didn't have the confidence to do because this
• 1:06:13
  was one of my first proper film sets that I'd been on because it
• 1:06:18
  was all the whole Bollywood world.
• 1:06:22
  If we'd use something more natural rather than reading the
• 1:06:25
  line just straightforward, would you like one?
• 1:06:29
  If we'd said something more, how would actually say it?
• 1:06:32
  Like, do you want one or you fancy one of these?
• 1:06:36
  Something that actually like fit a normal vernacular to us.
• 1:06:41
  That would have been much better.
• 1:06:43
  And like, we were just walking along the beach to our mark.
• 1:06:48
  Whereas again, if I thought about it, like there's
• 1:06:50
  definitely room for improvisation there.
• 1:06:52
  Looking back on the film, it's very staid.
• 1:06:54
  But because we were essential to the plot, had to use it.
• 1:06:58
  Whereas if we'd been natural and like, if we'd taken a moment to
• 1:07:02
  be like, OK, how can we lift this and make what we're doing
• 1:07:07
  interesting and like ring true and sound a lot better.
• 1:07:12
  It would have been the power performance at least would have
• 1:07:15
  been would have been so much better.
• 1:07:16
  The net result would have been the same because we were given
• 1:07:19
  the brownies and they had a hallucinary experience.
• 1:07:21
  But yeah, that's something if I, I wish I could do that again
• 1:07:25
  because I would have done a lot more with it, not blowing up my
• 1:07:28
  role, so to speak, but just sort of making what I had.
• 1:07:31
  I did have the confidence to say to the director, like, can I say
• 1:07:34
  it like this? And I'm sure it would have been
• 1:07:35
  like, yes, fine, you know, good, that's better.
• 1:07:39
  Do you want join one of these as opposed to?
• 1:07:41
  Would you like one too? You know what I mean?
• 1:07:44
  That just because this line was so.
• 1:07:46
  Do you want? One, do you want one?
• 1:07:47
  Yeah. Yeah.
• 1:07:49
  So that's that's something I learned from that experience.
• 1:07:51
  But I wish I'd had this presence of mind to to to make it better
• 1:07:59
  as I went. But then, like I said, they
• 1:08:01
  couldn't. They had to use it because it
• 1:08:02
  was integral to the film. And there I am, about an hour
• 1:08:06
  and a half into Chanda. Stood by #2 I think.
• 1:08:12
  Would you say you've learned to do that now in life, like to to
• 1:08:15
  speak, you speak your mind and kind of in situations like that?
• 1:08:19
  Yeah, I think people are more open to collaboration than you
• 1:08:23
  might fear when you're starting out, you know, and if you don't
• 1:08:26
  ask, you don't get it. You can always be told no.
• 1:08:29
  And that's not, that's not bad. So I've not had a lot of many
• 1:08:35
  more lines in in films or whatever.
• 1:08:37
  But yeah, I would definitely know to like, I think that's
• 1:08:41
  part of being older. You just you're just more
• 1:08:43
  comfortable suggesting things. You were on a film that had
• 1:08:51
  David Tennant on? Yeah.
• 1:08:53
  The lead, me and him, I think it's called Not to be confused
• 1:08:55
  with you, Me and her, the TV show that came out at the same
• 1:08:58
  time. Again, that was another learning
• 1:09:01
  experience, you know, and another another bit role.
• 1:09:04
  I was a baby Butler for a party or something, or a baby shower.
• 1:09:12
  Oh yeah. And I was sort of like, my job
• 1:09:15
  was to sort of stand there, exchange a look with with Sam
• 1:09:17
  and Bird, which is fun because I'd seen him on TV and then he
• 1:09:22
  then stroke of a conversation with somebody else.
• 1:09:25
  And I was still in shock, stood there and I was supposed to be
• 1:09:32
  still, but like felt that I didn't want to be too still.
• 1:09:35
  I didn't want to be like Rock still, so I was sort of trying
• 1:09:39
  to give like little reactions, small scale reactions to what he
• 1:09:43
  was saying because they did refer to me sort of at some
• 1:09:46
  point because yeah, they allude to me.
• 1:09:51
  I had to react a little bit. My something I learned when I
• 1:09:57
  actually watched the film, you can really see my wrestling
• 1:10:00
  training because I'm doing eye acting for the back row.
• 1:10:04
  I'm doing the Rose Z eye acting, whereas the cameras like massive
• 1:10:08
  lens, the, you know, 4 foot away from my face.
• 1:10:13
  It's like for me, I ruined the scene because you can see my
• 1:10:17
  eyes go like moving like that. So that's another lesson,
• 1:10:22
  another lesson learned, you know, wrestling, acting and
• 1:10:25
  having the camera right in front of you is is is very different.
• 1:10:29
  What was this? What was Simon Byrd like?
• 1:10:32
  He's very nice. Yeah.
• 1:10:33
  You know, we didn't have, we didn't chat too much, but he
• 1:10:36
  was, you know, easy to play off. Yeah.
• 1:10:40
  Everybody, again, everybody on that set was really, really
• 1:10:42
  friendly. Most people in most sets are
• 1:10:44
  all, you know, very friendly. I've very rarely none come to
• 1:10:48
  mind anybody like that's been a decade or anything did.
• 1:10:53
  You meet David Tennant I. Don't think I was introduced,
• 1:10:57
  but he was, he was there, he was in the room.
• 1:10:59
  And how? How was he on set?
• 1:11:01
  Like, anything? Did you pick up anything with
• 1:11:03
  him? No, no, he sort of came in and
• 1:11:05
  and did his scene. Really.
• 1:11:06
  It was his, I think his wife was the director.
• 1:11:09
  Cool. So it was a little bit of a, you
• 1:11:11
  know. It was all quite casual and
• 1:11:12
  solid man. What would you say in addition
• 1:11:16
  to these, what was what were some of the best extras
• 1:11:19
  experiences or acting experiences you've had?
• 1:11:21
  Well, buying Bollywood movie tops them just because I've got
• 1:11:25
  it, you know, I've got it on DVD and it was a big, it was a big
• 1:11:29
  movie. It was like the directors follow
• 1:11:31
  up to a massive success. So it got a wide release over in
• 1:11:35
  India, so. To your mega star in India.
• 1:11:37
  The answer about it, but I imagine millions and millions
• 1:11:40
  and millions of people saw it. I mean, that's kind of crazy.
• 1:11:44
  So that would be that would be tough for me.
• 1:11:47
  Some of your worst experiences. In the sport, a recall is is
• 1:11:51
  terrible. Also think of being arrested,
• 1:11:53
  Bad recalls. Remembering what we agreed to do
• 1:11:56
  is not my strong point. But talk about your life, yeah.
• 1:12:03
  I can just about pull that around.
• 1:12:04
  It's I don't mind waiting around to be honest, as long as I'm, as
• 1:12:08
  long as they're paying me, I've got no problem with sitting
• 1:12:10
  around doing nothing. So.
• 1:12:11
  It's one of their minute. It's it's like I'm doing a film
• 1:12:16
  tomorrow and there's going to be some waiting around.
• 1:12:20
  It's just part of acting. It is what it is.
• 1:12:22
  Yeah, for sure. But it, it can be frustrating
• 1:12:24
  sometimes when it's been a long time.
• 1:12:28
  And then because the, the reality of acting as well is, is
• 1:12:31
  it's like you're waiting for ages and then suddenly when
• 1:12:33
  you're not expecting it, boom, you have to be ready.
• 1:12:36
  And you're just almost never ready.
• 1:12:38
  And then, and then you, you kind of feel bad because you look bad
• 1:12:41
  because you're not ready. So it seems like you've you're
• 1:12:44
  not paying attention or you're not invested, but it's like, no,
• 1:12:47
  no, I am. But I was ready like five hours
• 1:12:50
  ago, you know what I mean? So.
• 1:12:55
  The acting is not it's one thing to pretend to be doing
• 1:13:00
  something, but to like be able to suspend disbelief and make it
• 1:13:07
  seem like it's it's real. It's it's incredibly I've got,
• 1:13:11
  you know, especially you have to do it out of out of actual
• 1:13:16
  reality. You then have to clip and then,
• 1:13:18
  like you said, you have to you have to be on in this other
• 1:13:22
  headspace without giving any impression that you're in fact,
• 1:13:28
  you know, been waiting around for five hours and reading lines
• 1:13:32
  incredibly difficult. Once you've once you've seen
• 1:13:34
  yourself back trying to act, that's when you realize, oh,
• 1:13:39
  it's not just about hitting the mark and saying the line.
• 1:13:42
  There is a whole like tingling energy you need to you need to
• 1:13:47
  lock into. I found that when I was doing
• 1:13:49
  wrestling promos, you know, on the mic, in the ring or on
• 1:13:53
  camera, the best stuff would always come.
• 1:13:56
  When you get that sense that you're on the edge and you're
• 1:13:59
  like, start like butterflying a little bit and you're you're,
• 1:14:03
  that's when the best stuff would come out because you were
• 1:14:07
  inhabiting the, the tightrope, you know, of, of, of that
• 1:14:11
  moment. Well, it's improv really, isn't
• 1:14:13
  it? I think that's the key is you're
• 1:14:16
  feeling it, like you said, and obviously in professional
• 1:14:18
  wrestling, that's that's what it's all about.
• 1:14:20
  You know, you, you always hear wrestlers talk about feeling the
• 1:14:23
  crowd, feeling the room, the energy and, and right jumping
• 1:14:27
  into that. And I suppose this it doesn't
• 1:14:30
  really apply with acting. However, if you get enough into
• 1:14:36
  your head and you get into the character enough, you you can
• 1:14:38
  draw that out. Or sometimes you can play off
• 1:14:40
  the other person in the scene and and then you get to the good
• 1:14:44
  stuff. But.
• 1:14:45
  Yeah, inhabit the the scene. You know, you need to actually,
• 1:14:50
  you're not just pretending like you've been there.
• 1:14:51
  You're feeling like you've been there, like you've walked in
• 1:14:54
  from another room. But you've, you've been, what's
• 1:14:59
  your character been doing for the last half an hour?
• 1:15:01
  Not just what you, the actor, has been been doing, but yeah,
• 1:15:05
  I'm always wanting to try more, you know, And I do give anything
• 1:15:11
  to go, to be honest. You got a great attitude, man.
• 1:15:13
  I dig it, Right? A couple of final questions to
• 1:15:17
  round off today's show. OK, go ahead.
• 1:15:19
  Ready. Yes, let's go.
• 1:15:21
  What work would you never do again?
• 1:15:25
  I've been lucky to be honest, I don't think it's been I'm pretty
• 1:15:29
  high level of tolerance for corporate life.
• 1:15:34
  I never do again. It's again you're really hitting
• 1:15:36
  my bad recall sensors here. I'm sorry, I forgot nothing for
• 1:15:41
  you. It's OK, so good.
• 1:15:43
  It's all good. No regrets, obviously, you know,
• 1:15:46
  let's get there's no one I know one a minute.
• 1:15:48
  It's, it's good to hear that, you know, I mean, that's the
• 1:15:50
  thing with, with the questions I ask as well.
• 1:15:52
  It's like they don't, you don't have to respond.
• 1:15:55
  Like if it's just like, hey, yeah, I enjoyed the work.
• 1:15:58
  There wasn't any bad experiences.
• 1:16:00
  Like that's great. That's a good thing, you know.
• 1:16:03
  Good, but. I'm going to carry on with some
• 1:16:08
  negativity here, so what's the worst advice you've ever
• 1:16:10
  received? Well, you asked me this when I
• 1:16:15
  was on with the band and I I didn't have anything I should
• 1:16:17
  have thought I had. Should have planned it
• 1:16:19
  meticulously. I'm just deeply betrayed right
• 1:16:22
  now. What comes to mind?
• 1:16:24
  Criticism or an opinion, or I'm sure you've had many people over
• 1:16:29
  the years turn around and tell you things like, well, you
• 1:16:32
  should be doing this or have you thought about?
• 1:16:34
  This. Sorry man, this whole segment's
• 1:16:36
  a bust. I apologize.
• 1:16:38
  Now you don't have to apologize, man.
• 1:16:39
  Let's flip it. Let's go positive.
• 1:16:40
  What's the best advice you've ever received?
• 1:16:44
  I gave you a sex tip last time, didn't I?
• 1:16:46
  I'll try and think this one a bit better.
• 1:16:49
  It was a good one. Saying yes is quite a good one.
• 1:16:57
  I have sort of reached the logical conclusion of that sort
• 1:17:01
  of 38 where I'm now like just so busy doing things that I don't
• 1:17:05
  have any time for myself. But along the way I've got so
• 1:17:10
  much. I'm just like saying yes to
• 1:17:12
  offers, you know, it's easy to find reasons not to do things.
• 1:17:17
  Say yes. You'll more like to do it for
• 1:17:20
  sure. And calendars, like when the guy
• 1:17:23
  who taught me taught me wrestling, I noticed he used his
• 1:17:29
  calendar a lot. And ever since, that's what I
• 1:17:30
  do. And if you find yourself on
• 1:17:32
  conversations all the time when people like, oh, we should do
• 1:17:35
  this. Oh, we should do that.
• 1:17:36
  Like you're out with somebody and they're like, oh, we should
• 1:17:37
  do this. Oh, let's do that.
• 1:17:39
  My response is, OK, what you doing?
• 1:17:42
  July 23rd? You know, even if you book it
• 1:17:44
  six weeks in advance, that comes around soon enough and it makes
• 1:17:50
  party bullshit that much more bearable because you've you've
• 1:17:54
  actually made a plan to do it. And more often than not, it
• 1:17:58
  happens when you do it. So say yes.
• 1:18:01
  And when you do say yes, get your get your calendar out and
• 1:18:05
  stick a date in it. I live my life by Google
• 1:18:08
  Calendar. Honestly, it's how I get
• 1:18:11
  everything done. Even just basic stuff.
• 1:18:13
  I just pop it in there now. There's no excuse to miss.
• 1:18:16
  What's the biggest life lesson you've learned so far?
• 1:18:19
  Stay hydrated, drink a lot of water, take things that I take a
• 1:18:24
  lot of face value. I think that's good, especially
• 1:18:26
  when it comes to texting and especially if you're like dating
• 1:18:31
  apps and stuff and you're like getting to know people by text.
• 1:18:36
  It's a lot easier to take things at face value, especially words,
• 1:18:44
  because if you start getting into like second guessing,
• 1:18:48
  people are like imagining what their motivations were, What do
• 1:18:51
  they mean by this? You'll drive yourself insane.
• 1:18:54
  So take it at face value. I mean, I think I'm at risk of
• 1:18:58
  being conned at some point by somebody.
• 1:19:00
  But for the most part, I like, yeah, whatever people say to
• 1:19:04
  you, I'm like, yeah, I believe you.
• 1:19:07
  I believe you're saying what you want to communicate and life's
• 1:19:12
  easier. And final question, do you have
• 1:19:14
  any upcoming projects or final thoughts that you'd like to
• 1:19:17
  share of our listeners? Yes wall castrati my band if you
• 1:19:22
  saw the previous episode me and Carl were on, we got 3 gigs in
• 1:19:26
  July, 1 in Liverpool, one in Stockport and one in Manchester.
• 1:19:33
  Consults the Instagram or websites.
• 1:19:37
  Wall castrati dot world let me check that domain still works
• 1:19:42
  for all the information you need you can listen to our demo.
• 1:19:45
  You can watch our video the year 1 video all the stuff we've done
• 1:19:49
  all the stuff I've done as a creative person wrestling or
• 1:19:53
  music or anything. Most of the time I'm like, I
• 1:19:56
  couldn't do that better. I wish I could do that again.
• 1:19:59
  Yeah, I could do that and improve that with this year one
• 1:20:02
  video that I spent ages editing and hewing with the guys to get
• 1:20:07
  like. 20 minutes of funny stuff I watched that I enjoy it and
• 1:20:12
  I'm like, yeah, that's I'm happy with it.
• 1:20:14
  So it must be great. So if you look at Swar Castrati
• 1:20:18
  year one on YouTube, that's that's says all about us.
• 1:20:24
  And if you like that, you'll like us.
• 1:20:26
  So come and see us, life. It's been a pleasure having you
• 1:20:30
  back on the show Ian. Thank you so much for appearing
• 1:20:33
  and best of luck with the band and everything.
• 1:20:35
  Hope to see you soon. All right.
• 1:20:39
  Thanks very much for having me. Thank you and to the listeners
• 1:20:42
  of the Christian Reed podcast, make sure you check out
• 1:20:44
  Swargastrati and everything that Ian has to offer.
• 1:20:47
  Links will be in the bio wherever you're listening to the
• 1:20:51
  show on YouTube, Spotify, Apple Podcasts.
• 1:20:54
  I say listen as well. I keep forgetting this is a
• 1:20:56
  podcast sometimes even though it's been 6 years.
• 1:20:59
  This is just like just natural to say that like they get the
• 1:21:02
  bio link in the bio link in the bio, but I'll make sure
• 1:21:05
  everything is there. Thank you so much for watching
• 1:21:07
  and listening and as always, be safe, be well, and I'll see you
• 1:21:12
  all in the next.