83 Weeks with Eric Bischoff - Strictly Business with Eric Bischoff #50: Adi Shankar

Episode Date: October 27, 2023

In this edition of Strictly Business, Eric Bischoff is joined by film producer and screenwriter Adi Shankar, who discusses the influences of the wrestling business in his art! Plus, Eric and Jon Alba talk NXT/AEW viewership, WWE's international PLE's, Endeavor, and more! Special thanks to this week's sponsors! Manscaped- Get 20% Off and Free Shipping with the code WRESTLEBIZ at Manscaped.com. BlueChew- Try BlueChew FREE when you use our promo code WRESTLEBIZ at checkout--just pay $5 shipping. FOLLOW ALL OF OUR SOCIAL MEDIA at https://83weekslinks.com/ Stop throwing your money on rent! Get into a house with NO MONEY DOWN and roughly the same monthly payment at SaveWithConrad.com On AdFreeShows.com, you get early, ad-free access to more than a dozen of your favorite wrestling podcasts, starting at just $9! And now, you can enjoy the first week...completely FREE! Sign up for a free trial - and get a taste of what Ad Free Shows is all about. Start your free trial today at AdFreeShows.com If your business targets 25-54 year old men, there's no better place to advertise than right here with us on Strictly Business. You've heard us do ads for some of the same companies for years...why? Because it works! And with our super targeted audience, there's very little waste. Go to AdvertiseWithEric.com now and find out more about advertising with Strictly Business. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

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Everyone, it's time for another edition of Strictly Business with Eric Bischoff, right here on the podcast Heat and AdPree Show's Network. I am John Alba, and yes, we're not here to listen to me. You're listening to the man with those beautiful, fantastic dimples, a lovely sweater in this late October afternoon. He's Mr. Eric Bischoff. What's going on, my brother? Man, it's a, it's a bit of fun week.

It's been a cold week. Last week, it was 70 degrees and sunny. These are turning, I'm out, you know, messing with my dog and a t-shirt and kicking back. And Wednesday morning, I woke up, and it was 11 degrees out and snowing. And it stopped snowing last night. So we've got a nice, and probably two, three inches of snow and typical winter weather here in Wyoming, loving it. Man, I remember when I lived in Bangor, Maine, there was one year where from December, 15th to January 15th the high never got above one degree and I was just saying to myself I don't know if I

could do this forever but it seems like that seasonal change and that deep winter weather you're good with that stuff yeah I mean the cool thing about where I live is they jokingly refer to this part of the Rocky Mountains as the banana belt and it's a small area again right around where I live that we get snow, but not a lot. It'll get down to zero, below zero for four or five days, and it'll go up to 50 degrees for three or four days. So it's not that straight, solid, not like Minnesota, being Minnesota gets cold in November and it doesn't warm up until June.

That's an exaggeration, probably until May. But it stays cold, it's gray, it's just winter throughout, you know, for four or five months straight. Here you get ice cold, you know, frigid temperatures, and then it feels like spring. And then it gets cold again. And it feels like spraying. All the snow melts. And so, you know, it's not a solid, intense cold.

It just comes and goes. Yeah. I dig it. You know, and I love the seasons. You know, it's hunting season here. I'm going to be doing some milk hunting next week. I, you know, I dig all that stuff. That was another thing that always cracked me up when I lived in Maine, you know, especially hunting season,

moose hunting specifically. you have to be part of a lottery in order to moose hunt and people would say you'd really hit the lottery if your car ended up hitting a moose and you were lucky enough to survive because the first question out of the cop's mouth would be do you want to keep it and uh the concept of eating roadkill was something i had to wrap my head around but it's apparently pretty common thing i don't know if it's like that by you but yeah we don't have any moose you know uh i would imagine i don't know what the laws are here i would imagine you could claim an elk or a deer you know you hit a deer where the car's not really much to work with you know because you know you do a lot of damage when

you hit a deer but a moose or an elk you know and a moose can weigh 1500 or 1,800 pounds so it just depends how hard you hit it and where you hit it but moose meat is fantastic it is one of my favorite wild game choices but it's hard to come by they used to tell me yeah you get one moose you're walking home with four to 500 pounds of meat for the winner And I was like, man, I kudos to those of you who are able to be lucky enough to step away with something like that. But I love it. I get to ask you about stuff like this, Eric Bischoff, because that is one of the true beauties of the ad-free shows network here. And if you sign up now at ad-freeshows.com, you'll get access to a ton of bonus content, including our Ask Conrad series.

And you'll get questions and answers, much like this. Dylan Leahy says there have been two wrestling booms in WWE's history, the golden era and the attitude era. And Conrad's opinion, or are we going to look back at this current period of wrestling as the third big boom and really wrestling as a whole? Yes, we're in it right now. We're in the biggest boom of all right now. And I know the people would argue that and say less people are watching. That doesn't matter. What matters is how much money's coming in and they're more profitable doing. bigger numbers than ever before right now.

We're in the boom right now. We've got series with Kevin Sullivan, with Mike Keota, Nick Patrick, and so many more over on ad-free shows.com. So make sure you head on over there and subscribe now for bonus content like that and early access to podcasts, much like Strictly Business with Eric Bischoff. Eric, we are going to talk about plenty of good current stuff going on. We're going to talk about this potential endeavor move to a private. company. We're going to talk about WWE announcing their big premium live event in Berlin. We'll

talk about Sting. But we have an interesting interview to kick things off on this particular episode of Strictly Business. What can people look forward to in just a couple seconds here, Eric? I was so impressed. I did the interview yesterday with Adi Shankar. And Diamond Dallas Page reached out to me a week or two weeks ago and said, hey, you're going to love this guy, Adi. You know, you really think you should have him on Strictly Business. He's an amazing guy. And he's got this new animated series. It's an adult animated series on Netflix. And I said, sure, man, anything to help a brother out, you know.

I didn't know what to anticipate, really. And then I did a little bit of research on Adi. You know, he's the youngest producer ever to have a North American box office hit. We're going to talk about that in the interview. Young guy, an extremely talented guy. And trust me when I tell you, you are going to be hearing a lot about Adi in the future. He is, I think, going to be one of the bigger names in entertainment and fascinating. And I got a chance to watch episode one of his series. And again, we're going to talk a lot about

that in the interview. And I want to give it away here. But really, really impressive wrestling fan. It's kind of one of the things that got him interested in entertainment, which I thought was really cool. But yeah, I think you're going to dig it. I love when we find good tie-ins like that. the people who are in the periphery of pro wrestling who utilize some of the elements they've learned over the years to harness that and use it effectively in their respective line of work. So without further ado, it's time now to queue up Eric Bischoff's interview with Adi Shankar. All right. Thanks, John. And joining me now, I've been looking forward to doing this interview for at least a week or so now. I heard from Diamond Dallas

page about this amazing producer, actor, writer, director, entrepreneur, and wrestling fan by the name of Adi Shankar, who is, Adi Shankar, I should say, who is, by the way, the youngest producer ever to have a number one box office film in North America. The title of the show or the movie is The Grey featuring our starring Liam Nisa. So that's kind of a big deal. Adi, thanks for joining us here on Strictly Business, man. Eric, you, thank you, man. This is such an honor to be honor with you.

So for me, this is insane. So I'm freaking out on the inside. Well, don't, don't freak out. It's really not that big a bigger deal. It's a bigger deal for me than it is for you. So thank you. And I hope you feel the same way when it's over, by the one. So, before we get the story about like meeting

your heroes that yeah like we don't ever meet your heroes so i'm kind of in in in meeting the hero mode right now so well i appreciate that brother yeah so i want we're here to talk about um your new series it was released on netflix october 19th captain laser hawk but before we get into that i want to learn a little bit more about you and let our audience learn a little bit more about you give us let's go back to day one man where you from and what's your interest in professional wrestling So I was born in India, in Calcutta, and then we moved to South India, Madras. Then we moved to Mumbai, then we moved to Hong Kong, and then it was like Singapore. My parents, my family's in the Middle East now.

And I immigrated to America by myself when I was 15. It was 15, like two days before 9-11 happened. So that was paradigm shift, moved to Rhode Island. So I had this kind of cross-cultural, multi-multin national background, so to speak. And yeah, so I guess my interest in professional wrestling, you know, I guess the best I can characterize it is I came from these pretty rigid societies that were, I think. I don't want to say they were homogenous because that sounds, that's wrong. That's too extreme of a word, right? But there were a lot of rules where I, where I've lived, you know, like, in, yeah.

So, but then wrestling was awesome for me because all of a sudden, now you're, you're, you're seeing like this counterculture, all's like rebellion happening, right? So, like, it was like, it was actually a paradigm, like a complete paradigm shift for me. So, my first exposure to this was Stone Cold. And I was like, whoa, this guy, this is crazy. And then obviously your work with the NWO, I was like, whoa, this is really cool. I haven't experienced me like this before.

This is awesome. And, yeah, so, you know, I was just a fan. And I wanted to get into entertainment. I didn't really know how, because there really wasn't, you know, pre-social media, you know, in the, in that era, there wasn't a lot of information on how media worked and whatnot. But actually, thanks to you, Eric, there was a lot of information on how wrestling worked. So, or kind of the behind-scenes mechanations of the,

the wrestling ecosystem and how that worked. So I was just soaking in information. And also, the other thing that was really cool was the audience feedback aspect. I felt like I really understood America watching wrestling, where a performer would come out. And then you're getting, you're seeing like, oh, wow, okay. So I was able to, like, spot trends, I guess, before they became mainstream because you're like, oh, this person is, you know, this character's coming out and they're behaving this way. And so I got this kind of preview of the forks in the road of culture.

That's really interesting. And we're going to, we'll get into the reasons why. Because I did have a chance this morning, actually, early this morning, which was really interesting. for me because I'm not a morning person. I mean, I get up early and I have this process that I go through. It starts about 5 a.m. And it starts out mainly with a cup of coffee. And I thought, man, I better sit down and watch episode one of this new series before this interview.

Of course, it was pretty early in the morning. And it was like, bam. I mean, it was a, it was a lot cool. It was a shocker at 5.30 this morning. And, and there was a lot of kind of previews of, of culture going on, at least in that first episode. but I don't know what the next four or five look like, but I was kind of overwhelmed. But I want to go back to what you said a few moments ago.

You know, you wanted to break into the entertainment business. You didn't really know how. You came from another series of countries and cultures and backgrounds. And you decided I'm going to break in to the entertainment business, which was no easy feat for people that have gone to film school and have interned at, you know, entertainment agencies and companies.

what was your first breakthrough how did you first plant your flag in in entertainment i mean it was it wasn't like one breakthrough so to speak right it was it was more um a series of of random back doors that i found um again i won't point out and i'm not just saying this because you know it's a podcast with you you're a pivotal figure in the lineage of wrestling but actually i i figured out that i had to use backdoors because of wrestling right uh how does like i don't know jericho get over with the with uh the audience okay so he's not being pushed okay so find a back door right get in front of people so it was really a series of backdoors i would say maybe the first the first one is uh and this sounds ridiculous now um i met daniel stern um

so if you recall home alone the sure there was like two bandits there was the joe pashy bandit and there was daniel stern who's the taller bandit um i met him through a friend of a friend and he agreed to have lunch with me and sent me a script and I literally thought I'd made it. At this point, I'm like, whoa, crazy. Dude, you know, so I'd say that was maybe my first. And that wasn't even a break, right? But to me, at least, that was like, oh, this is possible.

Like, there are people who actually do this and want to them talk to me. How old were you at that time? 22. What I love about that part of your story is, you know, I do conventions. I do meet and greets. And oftentimes I do Q&A's even here on this podcast or others. And one question that I get almost every time I'm out in public and doing something in public is how do you break in to professional wrestling?

And the answer is there's no one answer. There's a million answers. There's no template. There's no formula. There's no book. There's nothing you can. study, it's just going out there and being in the right place at the right time and having the passion and the desire. And I think this should be inspirational to a lot of people that are

listening to this that may have an interest in professional wrestling and want to get into it or any other form of entertainment. There is no single simple answer. It's just being in the right place at the right time and being willing to kind of put yourself out there and having lunch with a friend of a friend of a friend's contact and reading a script. Yes. Yes. Step one. And honestly, and I bombed in that entire situation, right? Because he gave me the script to read, and I went ahead and rewrote it, and I sent it back to him, and he was like super pissed off.

So it wasn't, so it's not like I went very well, right? Like, I love it. And he's like, you wrote my script? I'm like, yeah, I know. I just made it better, dude. Oh, sorry, that's not how this works. I'm sorry. And at the time, I was working at, do you know the Discover credit card?

Sure. So I was working, you know, I graduated from college. I went to Northwestern University. And I had an idea when I was at Northwestern. And again, this sounds ridiculous now in the world of social media, right? But this is pre-social media. So if you're Coke, Nike, or GE, you know, you go to one of the big, Ad agencies, foot cone building, Sachi and Sachi, draft Depsie, you know, one of the big guys.

But if you were a mom and pop shop, you had literally no one to go to, like, who was going to design your logo, who was going to give you a marketing strategy, right? So Northwestern is housed in a suburb outside of Chicago called Evanston. And I'm like, oh, all these businesses actually want to market. They want to like market to Northwestern students. And I've access to the mailboxes and I can flyer the campus. But I didn't want to just be a guy that was firing. Flyer, you know, hang out flyers. So I went to a bunch of businesses in Evanston.

And I was like, hey, let me run your marketing campaign. Let me basically be your ad agency. Can I, can I do that? And then, you know, basically make ads for you. And just turn to like a full mini, not even mini, it turned into an ad agency. And obviously small scale, right? We were only dealing with mom and pop shops.

So then I got hired by the Discover credit card. Actually, in between then, the Northwestern had me teach a class on advertising and brand management when I was a senior. And I taught that for a whole year again after I graduated. So I was like teaching at the university that I was a student at, which was super, super weird. That's just so weird. It was just so weird.

But again, it was like I found this kind of hole in the market because you have, and it wasn't just me in the ad agency, right? because like Northwestern had so many kids who were working in advertising, even a year or two out of college, right? They were like, we're working with the big agencies. In order to land those jobs, they were making spec ads, right? So they'd make a fake Eminem's ad, a fake Volkswagen ad. And I'm like, dude, instead of making like a fake Eminem's ad, let's go actually make a real marketing, you know, make a real advertisement for this coffee shop down the the street. And so, so then I end up teaching at the, you know, I have teaching this, which

was weird. Then I end up working at a credit card company, you know, because my parents were very, very strict and they were like, hey, you have to work in like finance and, you know, you have to work for a proper company or else you have to come back home. So I was actually fighting And I was like trying to stay in America because it felt like there was just endless possibilities here. It felt not quite like the Wild Wall West. That's an extreme. That's an exaggeration. But it felt like an ecosystem celebrated risk-taking.

And I was at the time, you know, we were living in Singapore. And there, the ecosystem felt like it was driven by a fear of failure. And I'm like, whoa, like, I can't go back there. That's going to be, that's basically going to, you know, be a fate worse than death. Which sounds extreme right now. And actually, as I said that out of my mouth, I'm just like, dude, that's insane. But I actually believe that at the, you know, the core of my being. I was like, oh, my God, this is fate worse than death.

And so, you know, but I was working at the credit card company and I hated it there. I literally, dude, I hated it there. I was like, you know, this may be TMI, but I would, you know, drive to, to work and I'd be like thinking of like jumping off the garage. It was so awful. I was just there was something about corporate life that was like soul-sucking. Now, this was all a gift at the end of the day. It was all a gift because it put me in a spot where I had to make any creative endeavor work. Um, because I'm like, failure means I go back to Southeast Asia, uh, how I dress,

how I dress gets picked for me, who I marry gets picked for me. Like, it's going to be like, um, this is your future. And it's like, you will follow this. The pressure of, of the whole thing, um, kind of forced me to rise to the occasion and make something happen now in your new series mm-hmm you feature Cody Rhodes and Kenny Omega yes how did you how and why Kenny Omega and Cody Rhodes created characters for them in and Cody Rhodes character is Cody Rhodes yeah it's and you did a great job by the way for you know I'm sure you're trying to reach a broad audience but I

I'm guessing. I don't know a lot about your world and your business, but I'm guessing that the comic book audience and the wrestling audience, there's a great overlap there. I say that because I've been to a number of comic cons, the big ones. And, you know, when I'm surrounded by a bunch of cosplay, you know, comic book, animation, you know, fans, I'd walk through to go grab a Pepsi or hot dog or whatever. And, you know, I was shocked at how many people recognize me. I wouldn't have anticipated that. So I would have, I would have. I would have. imagine the crossover is pretty significant huge huge but you did such a great job because right in the you know in the opening couple moments of episode one we see cody roads you know we identified cody rhodes as a character i think he's got a match coming up later or something like that and uh you hooked that wrestling audience and then we see cody as a character later on of course at the end of the first episode i'm not going to give it away but hell of a finish brother hell of a finish at the end of episode one man i love yeah but again why why why cody why did you pick cody and kenny i just liked personally so so the the the uh maybe i'll address

kenny first but before i jump into that uh i a hundred thousand percent agree with you that there's massive massive massive crossover between the uh wrestling audience the comic book audience and the video game audience um now uh and the anime audience so i i feel like there's a cross pollination that has been happening that is that is the that is the norm i think especially for my generation and and younger um yeah if you i mean if you like wrestling then you know play the video games and then you know at the end of the day like the undertaker is kind of a character like like He's a Marvel comic book character, right? So he's a Marvel character.

So tons of overlap, not just an audience, but I would also say like thematically and creatively. Yeah, I mean, I knew Kenny and Cody personally. I actually met Cody through DDP, same way Diamond Dallas page, same way you and I met. Dallas actually introduced me to Cody right after All In had blown up. And he was like, he set up a, a dinner for us.

And, you know, Cody was in a spot where he was trying to figure out next steps. You know, he'd had a, he'd had an offer from Tony Kahn to create effectively what ended up becoming AW. You know, there was a conversation with world wrestling entertainment. And, you know, you know how Dallas is, right? He's like, he's a connector. He's just a sweet guy. He's a connector.

And he could kind of, and he was like, Addy, you've got this, you know, great relationship with Netflix, you've delivered them a freaking hit show. And you clearly like wrestling and know something about wrestling. Why don't you take them these guys and say, hey, let's do a wrestling show. And it was kind of through that process that, I didn't end up doing, by the way. I didn't end up doing that. But I got to know Cody through that, you know, just through that. And I had a lot of respect for him.

just as a just just the way he shows up in the world you know um he's a classy guy and he's a classy guy yeah great representation of the industry for sure one thousand percent you know he then he then he was in l a he um he came over to uh to to to see me uh you know he was just asking some some questions about some stuff so he came over to meet me and my mom happened to be here and my mom was like you should be friends with guys like that. He's a great, great guy. And I met Kenny in a different context that was through mutual love of gaming. His man, his agent Barry Bloom introduced us. So I wanted wrestling. It's more than wanted. I needed wrestling to have representation in the world of Captain Laserog, right? Because at the

end of the day, the show is an ode and homage, a love letter to everything that I love as a child and as a young adult and really still love. So I was like, okay, wrestling have to have some sort of representation, right? And in episode three, that's the episode that's the episode Kenny Omega appears in. There is, have you ever seen the movie They Live? Sure.

So, you know, obviously star Roddy Piper, John Carpenter directed the film. Would you be able to explain the, just like the two-sentence plot synopsis of they live? Oh, God, I'd probably butcher myself, but basically it's a kind of an apocalyptic environment that Roddy finds himself in and has to find his way out of, I guess. I was in a two-story building in an elevator, that would be my pitch. Conceptually, totally, but it's an apocalyptic world where people didn't really realize it's an apocalyptic world.

And he finds a pair of sunglasses. And when he puts on the sunglasses and he looks at the world, all. all of a sudden like a billboard for, I don't know, so like a commercial for beer, all of a sudden it's no longer there and it says obey. And he starts, you know, he looks at the TV and the news anchors are not actual humans. They look like aliens. He'll walk down the street some more and you'll see like a bus ad. And again, he puts on the glasses, the bus ad is not there and it says consume any and so effectively what these sunglasses are doing is they are removing the programming that the aliens have created let me let's let's segue because

that's a good segue into the premise of captain laser hawk because when i when i saw it this morning well let's just go before i get to that because i don't want i don't want to jump it but what is the premise of captain laser hawk what's what is that world and yeah just explaining that to us it's it's an alternate timeline so in this universe uh automation happened in the 1950s. And this wasn't the automation as we know it today. It was if there's a there's a animated movie called Iron Giant. So it's Iron Giant style automation. And then because of it immediately there's mass unemployment, right? There's just mass unemployment everywhere. So the biggest tech company of the time period steps in and says, okay, well, you know what? We'll

will provide universal basic income. So by that we mean that anybody who is a citizen of America gets money every month. Everyone's happy. They're like, cool. This company, this corporation, like, solved our big financial problem, which is great. Kind of like meta, kind of like meta, right? Yeah, exactly. I mean, kind of like meta, kind of like Amazon and all these.

Yeah. And then we cut to a few years later. And then they go, okay, look, everyone gets credits, free money, but if you spend it at our stores, they're worth double. Kind of like Klux Schwab and the World Economic Forum. I don't know. And then, you know, then they start exerting social controls. Like, okay, look, we have one child policy. But, you know, look, you just get.

extra credits for agreeing to not have extra kids so on and so forth and then we cut to the 90s and it is a complete fascist dystopian hellscape and by the way america is no longer america it has now been called eden eden is the tech company so that so the tech company now has rebranded america as just the tech company honestly adi and i'm glad you made those comparisons because I was a little hesitant to because I don't like to get political or too social. You know, this is all about the wrestling business after all. But I was like, whoa, this is,

out is like the George Orwell of animation. I mean, we're so many things that I saw inside of that first episode, just as you pointed out, you know, universal basic income, big social media company kind of taking over the world and creating a new country called Eden and social credit scores. and all i mean it's like holy crap it was it was very you know because when i first when dallas first called me said oh how did you know told me all the great things you've done and you know you had this new animated series coming and i'm thinking animated series it's an adult

and it's a very adult animated series by the way so this is not scooby-doo by any especially imagination but i was like man i'm going to have a hard time relating to that but you know two minutes in and i'm going whoa this is like a little not nod to not only what's going on now, but what could go on in the future if things don't kind of get under control. A hundred percent. Really scary. Yeah.

Oh, yeah. Yeah. No, it's, you know, I'm dissecting the dangers of mass surveillance, the monopolization of the American dream by large tech corporations, and really just how our relentless pursuit fucking comfort will lead us into an apocalyptic nightmare. Attention, all sporting enthusiasts and ballgame officiados. It's that magical time of the year when football is in football. swing basketball is back. The baseball postseason has us on the edge of our seats.

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grooming tools like the lawnmower 5.0 ultra, you can tackle any hairy situation and come out looking like an MVP. Also inside the bundle made for balls features the new weed wacker 2.0 ear and nose hair trimmer, the crop preserver ball deodorant, crop, suitor, and two free gifts. So get 20% off in free shipping with the code wrestlebiz at manscape.com. That's 20% off with free shipping at manscape.com. Use code wrestle biz. We got balls and beard trimmers, but mostly balls. Man, that's a great way of saying. I feel much better. I was going to tiptoe around that because I didn't want to offend you. You know, I mean, I, people react to things different ways. That is such a clean, clear-cut way of summarizing the premise of this series. And the other thing

I'm not like, you know, I wanted this series to exist in a world of, within shades of gray, right? Because I didn't want this thing to be a propaganda piece against anyone group or anyone social. So, you know, I wanted to create a narrative that mirrors one's biases. Like, so, you know, it'll mirror your own biases when you're watching it while warning you of the perils of radicalization, right? So as an example of this, universal basic income. I'm literally not saying, oh, my God, universal basic income is bad. It's bad.

Like, we got to watch out for it. Again, it just, it's a thing. It's a thing. It's not good. It's not evil. But there is danger it's applied without proper guardrails. Because when you even look at this financial model of universal basic income, I'm not critiquing universal basic income as much as I'm critiquing how this financial apparatus

can be used to further enslave humanity. And that's one of the things that I think is going to make. this thing ahead like i said i don't think i'm i'm overstating it when i say you you could be the george horwell of of animation but let's go back i mean the action is great the animation is really really impressive now i'm not a connoisseur i have to admit that but i was taking aback at number one the uh the dialogue your your actors the people that did the voiceovers which include you by the way which character did you voice over by the way the red the evil red Power Ranger. Oh, dude, you were evil.

Yeah. Dude. Good job. But the actors, the voiceover work was really, really well done as well as the editing. I was amazed at the amount of editing that went into this. It was almost done like a feature film.

For sure. For sure. It was, you know, the animation studio that I worked with to execute the screenplays they're this awesome awesome and I call them a tribe of renegade pirates they are their friend it's a French animation studio called Bobby Pills Bobby Pills and Eric they are you know they it felt like yes and it just felt like yes and right they anything I was throwing at them they found a way to make it even better

even more crazy. So the animation feels super fluid, but I feel like also what you're responding to is you can feel the passion that we reported every hand-drawn drawing. And that's the part that's so impressive to me because I just saw, I went to, my wife and I and my daughter

went to see Killers of the Flower Moon last night, which is really amazing, amazing story. And it's a true story. You know, and Leonardo, Caprio did, if he doesn't get an Academy Award for that performance, I don't know who will. But so much of the emotion that is created in a feature film is created here in facial expressions, and they're subtle, and they create emotion, they moat and it connects to the audience, which is a lot harder to do, I would guess, in animation.

but in your series I and it's one of the things that hooked me right away is I'm feeling the same way about these characters I noticed it consciously but I'm sure in the beginning of a subconscious the same way I would feel if I was watching a feature film a non-animated feature film in that it it creates an emotional connection and it draws you in even though you're watching animation and we talk about you know professional wrestling it's always about Suspension of Disbelief. Yes, we all know it's scripted entertainment. Yes, we all know what's going to happen

or that everybody else knows what's going to happen in the ring. Blah, blah, blah, blah. But it's the ability of the performers in the ring to give you permission to forget that you're watching professional wrestling and whatever biases you may have about it. For sure. Get sucked into the story and the drama, but that's done based on the talent's ability to create that emotion.

and connect to the audience. You and your studio did an amazing job of doing that in an animated format. Hats off to you and the entire team. Thank you, Eric. Thank you so much. You know, the idea was to find a way to showcase real authentic chemistry between characters, even though they're cartoons. Has it been received so far by Netflix?

Oh, great. I mean, this is the, I mean, these are the best reviews I've ever gotten just of my career. Yeah, everyone's digging, digging it. You know, I became kind of a crackhead on Twitter. Like, you know, I stay, like, because you don't want to, like, read any of this stuff and everything, but, like, someone sent me a link. The next thing I know, I'm on, like, Twitter reading the awesome things people have to say about the show on Twitter. and then your dopamine receptors get completely fried. So there's a come down from that.

But yeah, it's been, it's been, dude, I'm just so grateful, man. Like, I'm still grateful that I got to do this. What's next for you, man? And the other thing, Eric, I just should point out is, you know, this is effectively an original world, right? It's an original universe, original, but it's actually populated with some of the biggest characters in video games, you know, characters from Assassin's Creed, Far Cry, Splinter Cell, even the chief propaganda officer of the fascist dystopian hellscape is a cartoon character.

It's this dude Rayman, who was the mascot for, I is the mascot for, you know, Ubisoft, which is like the fifth largest gaming conglomerate in the world. They, like, literally let me use their mascot in a R-rated way. So, again, super great. That had to be a challenge, right? I mean, you want to take that? No. No.

No. It was nuts because I just, you know, I used to be, I used to draw these fan films on YouTube, like, back in the day. So I would, you know, do a hard take on the Mighty Morphan Power Rangers or a hard take on, you know, where the Power Rangers are effectively child soldiers being weaponized by aliens to fight an interglactic war that they have mistaken. Or, you know, a hard art take on Pokemon where you're like, hey, this is effectively illegal animal fighting. Like, what are we doing? So I had this kind of track record of doing subversive takes on popular IP, but those were all unauthorized and unofficial. So Ubisoft just let me do that with all their brands.

And you're like, yeah, that should have been very difficult and they like literally wasn't. one of the one of the heads of Ubisoft sat down with me and he's like, okay, we're going to let you do this and we're going to clear the runway for you to do it. I'm like, man, that's

a lottery ticket. Right there. That's a lottery ticket, brother. Yeah, yeah, yeah. It was pretty crazy, dude. So, and again, all gratitude, man. All just super grateful that this even exists.

And it's weird to be living in a reality now where it's out there and people have seen it and they're reacting to it and they're loving it. And Ubisoft is, I don't want to say a character, but it's a integral part of the story plot. Yes. They not only lets you take their characters and have some creative fun with them,

but you use their brand inside of the show as a part of the plot, which is, yeah, I mean, that's corporately, that doesn't, that shit doesn't happen, man. No, no, that's like, that's like, that's like Disney saying, hey, why don't you give Mickey Mouse a Tommy gun? Yeah. That's crazy. It's literally the exact same thing. Yeah, it was crazy, dude. Listen, brother, we're going to wrap this up here, but before I do, first of all, thank you again.

But secondly, and most importantly for this interview, what's, what's next? There is my next show that will come out is something called Devil May Cry. So based on a popular video game that I loved during, you know, I just love this game. And I'm making a series out of Devil McRye. Awesome. For Netflix with Netflix. Yeah. Awesome.

Well, Adi, man, it's like continuing success. Like being a kid in the candy store with the stuff, right? Because it's like the things that I loved are now cutting and I get to like. So I and I got to ask, I mean, this interview could go on forever. But I got to ask you so how's, how's mom and dad feeling now? They try to get you back? Are they good with it? You don't work for a bank.

You don't work for a big company. They feel them pretty good about things. When I get good reviews, they feel very good. and that lasts for a little bit and then all of a sudden the panic it's like but but America's so crazy come back home well it's

it is a little crazy but we're glad to have you brother and continued success and I'm sure we're going to be talking again in the future Adi thank you so much for joining us if you're listening to this podcast check it out you've got to check that out you're going to have it's on Netflix

and it's a six episode series correct six yeah season one is six episodes yeah captain laser hot check it out you're you're going to love it you're going to love it adi thank you so much brother thank you so much eric it is such an honor man you're like you're like you're literally one of my heroes and uh the not lip service like i kind of had an understanding of how media works just because you were so gracious with the amount of information you put out there and and you know just how like the corporate ecosystem that govern corporate ecosystem and the corporate apparatus that governs what

gets made and how it gets made when you transitioned into reality television just kind of how you talked about that process and put it out there you were just so open about even even things that didn't work out so well and then you know just being so introspective about what you would have done differently man like for people coming up like that is a freaking goldmine dude uh just just knowledge you know just just to be able to dissect and and here's someone who'd been at the top of the mountain for for so long just be so open and transparent without ego dude it's a gift man so thank you brother very much and by the way if you ever need like an elderly evil fucker and one of your animated things i'm your guy dude i i'm

Bro. It done. Done. All right. I love it. Thank you, Addy. Thank you. I'll take a pause here real quick. Eric, just to remind everyone that this episode of Strictly Business is presented to you by Bluechew. Let's talk about sex, gents. Remember the days when you're always ready to go. Now you can increase your performance, get that extra confidence in bed. And here's how you're going to do it. You're going to go to bluechew.com. What is Bluechew? That's a unique online service that delivers the same active ingredients as Viagra, Cialis, and Lovitra, but in chewable tablets and at a fractalibate. And at a fractalibate. of the cost. You can take them any time, day or night, so you can plan ahead or be ready whenever an opportunity arises. And you never know when it's going to strike. The process is simple. Sign up now, Bluetooth.com, consult with one of their licensed medical providers. And once you're approved, you're going to receive your prescription within days. The best part, it's all done online. So no visits to the doctor's office, no awkward conversations, and no waiting in line at the pharmacy. Blue Chew's tablets are made in the United States and prepared and shipped directly to your door in a

discreet package this stuff works so quickly you chew it you do it it's going to take a matter of minutes you can be missing out on the best sex of your life and you wouldn't even know you pop a blue chew it's going to change your life i got no doubt about that i've seen it happen firsthand with blue chew men everywhere excited to see the postman because when your package has arrived your package has arrived as well blue chew wants to help you have better sex discover your options at bluechew dot com chew it and do it we have a special deal for our listeners as well try blue chew when you use our promo code wrestle biz at checkout. Just pay $5 shipping.

That's Bluetooth.com promo code wrestle biz, W-R-E-S-T-L-E-B-I-Z to receive your first month absolutely free. Visit bluechoo.com for more details and important safety information. And we thank Blue Choo for sponsoring Strictly Business. Wow, what an awesome interview that was, Eric. Totally out of the spectrum of the traditional pro wrestling podcast discourse you'd hear. I really, really thought he was insightful, and I like that he's very forward-thinking, too. Any thoughts about the interview now that you kind of had a couple days to say in it here?

Yeah, I just, I can't overstate how just thoroughly I impressed I am with Adi. You know, his series, Captain Laser Hawk, I watched the first episode. I'll be honest, you know, I was thought going into it, I was just doing a favor for a friend in helping him promote a TV series, which I'm happy to do. you know um but yeah about halfway through the interview i'm thinking oh my gosh this is awesome captain laser hawk check it out and i never thought i'd hear myself say this but after sitting down and watching the first episode i'm kind of hooked now adi opened up a whole new genre of entertainment because i would have never ever you know sampled you know animation and adult animation project

i never would have sampled it and i'm so glad i did there's a lot of great animated programming out there, especially in the adult sphere. It really is amazing, Eric. I know this is kind of offbeat, but to think that a show like The Simpsons, which I feel like kind of laid the groundwork for everything that we know is like adult animated programming, that it still exists today in its essential form, as we've known it, since 1989. You know, maybe it's not as attractive to viewers as it once was, but the fact that

that it was so far ahead of counterculture that it still exists and helped spur an entire movement and an entire genre. I think that's amazing, isn't it? That even as TV habits change, there still is a desire for something like that. Yeah, and I think what's interesting, and again, you know, I learned from Adi, you know, Adi, you know, he got his start, as you heard, you know, basically coming up with a series where he essentially ripped off a bunch of, you know, video game characters and then kind of R-rated them and integrated them into an animated series. And now he's working with, you know, Ubisoft, which is one of the largest video game companies in the world. And they're allowing him to take their video game characters and kind of use them in these animated series.

But in that kind of adult themed, more serious, you know, as Adi said, it's kind of like Disney going, okay, Adi, here's our Mickey Mouse IP. Go ahead and put a machine gun into sand. Let's see what, let's see what you come up with. You know, what Adi did was so incredibly outside the box. I hate to use that term, but he shattered every paradigm when it comes to how to engage, you know, characters and license those characters into a project. And as a result, he's got another big project, you know, coming up next. And he's just a fascinating cat, man. He broke the mold, for sure.

Let me ask you this. When WCW was at the height of its personality, I've. feel like, and I'm going to go back to this term here, counterculture was super, super relevant at that time. It's why the Monday Night Wars were fueled by the no-limits element of the DX and NWO, et cetera. You're pushing everything that you had. South Park was enormous at that time. Celebrity Death Match. Were you guys ever approached about any integration or collaboration with any of those adult animated centric programs? Not in terms of animation. of course, you know, we were approached and participated in, you know, did the Jeff Fox really show.

I did an episode on HBO. I can't remember the name of it. Oh, my gosh. It's been almost a hit show on HBO for a while. Sports agent was the central character. It escapes me. I haven't had enough coffee. It's early in the morning.

But, yeah, we were approached for more traditional types of entertainment opportunities to bring some of our characters over. but nothing in the world of animation. I asked that because, if you recall, I mean, WWE had the affiliation with Celebrity Death Match at the time. It was huge. And it seems like that could have been an area where maybe there could have been some more crossover from either of the major companies or anything like that.

So, yeah, just very interesting. Was it Arliss? Was that the... Arlis was the show. Arles was the show. Did an episode of Arlis. Have fun. Got residual checks for several years. from that show. I go out to the mailbox and I see that check and I go, oh my gosh, I can't wait

to open it up, ran into the house, grabbed Mrs. B, jumped in a car, went into town, and had a dairy queen. I was going to say, it was my $2 residual check. Okay, $2.00. Okay. All right. And they got progressively smaller from there. Okay. You know, it's something, I guess. All right. Let's get into the business of the business here. Last week, we spent a lot of time talking about nxte and a w ratings we talk about that here again out of the gate 787,000 viewers for nxte overall once again beating a w dynamite here 774,000 viewers for dynamite so pretty close all things considered on different nights Tuesday and Wednesday the NBA the big headliner this week kicking off its season on Tuesday and then Wednesday was the main slate of the first set of games

across the league. NBA did a massive numbers across the board, Eric, as you would expect with the season kicking off plus Major League Baseball postseason. They had a couple of game sevens this week. So lots of big sporting events. And those were the numbers we saw at wrestling. Do you have any impressions on that? Yeah. Well, you know, I think it's really interesting. I think NXT was up against tougher sports competition than Dynamite was. Tuesday was a tougher night than Wednesday was. the card wasn't stacked you know it was you know a developmental show the c show against the a show from aew and again nxte was against tougher competition more of it and still nxte came out on top and i i think that's look in a big scheme of things there wasn't enough separation in those numbers

to be really significant, but it is a trend. This is like the third time now we've seen it. And I think you're going to see more and more of it. You know, the simple fact is NXT is getting better and better and its audiences growing in AEWs, as I've said here for the last two years, is simply not. So it's going to be interesting to see. And I think part of me is only interested in it in the ratings insofar as so much social

media nonsense and people making excuse you know last week was yeah but wwe stacked the deck and they did you know they had reasons to do it and they did it and it obviously worked well and now it's what excuse do we have what what what what what's the excuse du jour given that nxte had tougher competition a typical card typical roster well it wasn't a I'm not made to pushback. It wasn't a typical show. It was one of their, like, premium shows. It was the Halloween Havoc show that they did.

Okay. It was themed, but it was still. They had, like, pay-per-view caliber matchups on it. I'm not, I have no issue with that. I think that's great. You should have pay-per-view caliber matchups on your TV if you can afford them. But, yeah, it was not your typical, just here's a random episode of NXT, if that makes any sense.

Well, yeah, because there should not be a random episode. I agree. I agree, totally. They should be story-driven. thematically, if possible, driven, it should be, you know, highly promotable stuff. That's what a television show should be. It shouldn't be just a random show that we throw together and throw some names out there. And I think that what we're seeing, unfortunately, too often.

You know, Rick Flair made his appearance. Now, it wasn't advertised. It wasn't promoted. And I don't think anybody should, should, you know, suggest or interpret the fact that Rick didn't have a big impact because it was a surprise. And I think it was well done. Well, I love surprises. I think not promoting Rick was the right thing to do.

We'll see next week now that Rick has been established. Everybody knows that he's there. Next week, I think we're going to get an indication as to how much, you know, value, added value that Rick Flair brings, you know, to dynamite. But, yeah, I'm just going to be, it's just fun to watch. I love the competition. And I think more than anything, I'm just interested in the psychology of the, you know, wackadoos that are on social media. staking out their positions i think that's why entertaining the shows actually yeah the demos were down across both shows i would guess due to them going against heavy sports competition there being a

good amount of crossover with those audiences nx t did slightly edge out nx t or a dw rather did edge out nxt in the demo but not by much point two four to point two one there is an interesting point you bring up there you know nx t really the the main match they had that did have crossover from the main roster was of course becky lynch where she did lose was the NXT Women's Championship. I thought Becky Lynch did such a fantastic job in this NXT championship run she had. I think she added a lot of equity to the NXT brand. And that's exactly what you should be looking for with these crossovers from the main roster.

But I do want to bring up something that caught my eye about this. I feel like NXT is really, really, really, really building, building, building future, future, right now. That's huge. They're really trying to invest a lot of stock into these younger talents to make them people that the audience, wants to tune in and watch every single week. Whereas I look at AEW right now, you mentioned Rick Flair. They just brought in Adam Copeland. Christian Cage is one of the featured guys.

Chris Jericho is one of the featured guys in their top storylines right now. Two very different approaches, Eric, in showcasing talent on your shows. We're much older talent on one and much younger on the other. And that's a pretty interesting shift I feel like we've seen in the last three, four months or so. Yeah, and, you know, I've read some of the garbage on social media, especially from shit stains like Dave Meltzer, who was complaining a lot about, you know, the fact that E.W has too many older talents. It's not that the older talents aren't valuable. It's how you use older talent. And I think if there's a criticism to be made or point to be made, it's not whether Sting and not.

now Rick Flair or Christian or Chris Jericho or Adam Copeland are too old. You know, I don't even like to call them older. They are older than a lot of the younger talent, obviously, in the roster. But they also have a lot more value if they're used correctly. Now, I didn't watch the Rick Flair segment in its entirety. I watched a little bit of it. I'll probably have some time to check into it today. But from what I've heard from people who did watch it is Christian came out

and basically just ran them into the dirt. Yeah. And I'm not sure that's the smartest way to introduce someone like Rick Flair, a legitimate legend and somebody that is as well known. Rick is probably more well-known nationwide now than he was at the peak of his career. Certainly Rick was very, very popular with the wrestling audience, but Rick has transcended now the wrestling audience and is a legitimate. celebrity outside of the world of wrestling and to bring someone like that in with the legacy

that Rick has and just shit on him and and degrade him basically now if there's a story there if there's going to be if Rick's going to get his comeback and it gets interesting and I leave the door open for that possibility then then I may not agree with that strategy but at least I can understand it if it doesn't go anywhere and Rick doesn't get get an opportunity to shine and have his moment at the end of the story, I'll be really disappointed for Rick. But again, it's how do you use a guy like Rick Flair? How do you, how are you setting up Sting's retirement? I think you asked me last week, I think it'll have an impact on the ratings. My answer was, I think it could, but we have to wait and see how it's done. And if it's not done

well, if it's not done correctly, if the psychology isn't right, if it's not nuanced carefully, then it's just going to be another match. And it won't really reach the potential that it has. So we'll see. We just have to sit back and wait and see and hope that they come up with something creatively really good that really showcases some of this established talent that has the equity that a lot of that younger talent doesn't have.

You talked about Becky Lynch and how Becky's been utilized in NXT. Great story showcases Beck. It didn't take anything away from Becky. But it allowed Becky to share some of her value in equity and raise the level of the talent that she was working with. That's how you use talent correctly, established talent, when you're working with younger talent. Just throwing them out there for the sake of throwing them out there is not going to get you to where you want to be. It's a waste of great talent.

And historically, I think AW has done a good job with their legends. I think that was one of the biggest things that Tony Con was emphasizing at first because there were a lot of WWE legends who left the company because they felt like they weren't being treated well. Mark Henry, Paul White, those types. And how have that, John, not to push back, still your phrase. Sure. How have they used Mark Henry in AEW?

Oh, I'm not talking about those two specifically because I don't think those two have, but I will give other examples. I think Sting to this point has been used fantastically and has aided a ton to Darby Allen. I think Matt Hardy has been utilized well and with private party and Isaiah Cassie. Isaiah Cassidy has improved 10fold as a character as a wrestler. I think Chris Jericho has given a rub to a lot of different towns, Sammy Rivera, Daniel Garcia. There have been a lot of people who have learned from. I agree on Chris Jericho. Absolutely. So there are a lot of examples. That's not to say every example is perfect, but I think there have been some good ones. So when I bring

this up about what they're doing right now, I am surprised by it because it feels like it's a shift away from focusing on utilizing those legends, those established stars to enhance younger guys, and instead we're putting the emphasis on them to drive the stories. And that's not to say they're not capable of it. We know Adam Cole is a top-tier performer. Christian Cage, you could argue, is doing the best work of his career right now. I find it fascinating because historically speaking, AW's focus has been on talent in different arenas. And now, as maybe we've seen some viewership dips and we've seen some live attendance dips, we're relying on some more established prominent Hall of Fame caliber names to see if that's going to make a difference.

Does that make sense what I'm trying to say? Sure. That's what I'm, I find very fascinating. And if we're juxtaposing it to NXT, where now more than ever, there's an emphasis on truly building and building and building the stars of tomorrow, it's just an interesting dichotomy as far as I see it. Yeah. And again, you know, NXT is developmental talent.

This is not their A show. There are very few main roster stars that spend time on NXT. And when they do, it's to build the talent and get some interest in the show, obviously. But people have to keep in mind when they're battling over these issues on social media between NXT and Dynamite. You have to remind yourself, it's the junior varsity competing against a college team. And the fact that the JV team is outperforming your college team is pretty interesting to me. Yeah. A.W. did, by the way, announce a pay-per-view this week as well.

It's going to be in December. It's going to be called World's End, and it's going to be on Saturday, December 30th from the Nassau Coliseum. It's going to be AW's eighth pay-per-view of the year. And it's going to follow the previous day's Ring of Honor pay-per-view, which is going to be final that we're actually sorry not pretty two weeks prior uh final battle which will be at um the hammerstein ballroom so returning to that the report as of now indicates that that pay-per-view is going to be exclusively on honor club whereas this a w pay-per-view will be a traditional pay-per-view as things currently stand a december 30th eric unique time to run a paper view

event especially with all the college football bowl games you know we're talking the new year's six bowl games there some pretty stiff competition you have any thoughts on that it's a tough time you know it's going to be interesting to see how that how that unfolds first well you know a w's success in terms of ticket sales for big venues aside from wembley um but here domestically in the united states has not been a pretty picture so nassau coliseum is a big building i'll be really interested to see how well they do with tickets in that building i was an interesting choice but as far as the time of year goes it's tough man there's so much going on you're coming right off of christmas the economy is not good people spend a lot of money over the holidays between travel and obviously you know

purchasing gifts and all the things that go along with the holidays and then you've got new year's eve right there coming up and it's just it's it's it's and all a competition that's available so it's going to be an interesting experiment and you know this is now their eighth pay-per-view i believe Yes, eighth paper. That's, and I'm really fascinated with what impact that's going to have on the AEW television product because adding, and look, I was the first one to do it. I went from four to six to eight to ten to twelve at a very short period of time. And I did it because that was the only real revenue stream that I had 100% control of. And I needed to make the money for WCW.

My goal, not my goal, my mandate from above was to turn this thing around and make it profitable or we're going to pull the plug. And the only thing I could do is increase a number of pay-per-views. And subsequently, WWE followed in that path that started doing the same thing I was doing. But that also puts more pressure on your television. Because a pay-per-view, when you only have four of them a year, they're in an event all by its in and itself. The fact that you're doing a pay-per-view makes it an event and you don't have quite as much pressure on your storylines and your arcs and your character evolutions within those arcs. You're simply putting on a big event and people get excited about the prospect to a degree.

But as you add more paper views, it becomes increasingly difficult when you don't have disciplined, structured story and build an arcs leading to those paper views. If your stories are random and inconsistent and they're not structured properly and they're not building to a crescendo right around that time of that paper view and you're adding more and more paper views, you're going to see, you're going to see an impact on the television show. The question is whether or not it's going to be a positive evolution of the creative for television or if it's going to be the same kind of random kind of storytelling that we've seen over the last couple of years

yeah see maybe maybe this pressure will maybe this pressure will will force them to start thinking differently about how they approach story and creative i'm interested in what attendance figures we see as they add more pay-per-views we know live attendance has generally been down for AEW. Historically, when they were running just the four pay-per-views a year, they really always did very well with the live dates and the attendance because people would travel to them. They were destination events. If you're an AEW fan and you know AEW's only running four paper views a year, you want to be part of them. They felt like big premium events. Now, as you add more, is there going to be that demand from the fan base to be willing to travel to as many of these?

WWE, when they're running all these extra premium live events, the backlashes, the judgment days, you know, those periphery, the B pay-per-views, if you will, a lot of those are centered in on attracting the local market to come out. They're not getting the international travel or even the national travel that you would get with a WrestleMania or a Royal Rumble, whereas with those B shows, you're looking at the local markets. And AW hasn't had a lot of success lately with the local markets. So I am curious if you see less travel from fans and how that impact the past. Look, the new car smell has worn off, right? When AEW first hit, and again, I've talked about this before. I, the premier episode of Dynamite, I watched in the writer's room in WWE headquarters in Stanford, Connecticut, along with several other writers and a couple producers.

And I was excited because I know, I knew that competition. makes everything better. So I was very optimistic like a lot of fans were. When AW announced Arthur Ash, I went online and just, you know, jumped in with both feet supporting it because, again, it felt like there was momentum. It felt like there was going to be this, this competition and excitement surrounding it that would put pressure on WWE, which I knew would be a great thing, ultimately for everybody. But over the last couple of years, I think that new car smell has worn off.

I think the fans' willingness to kind of forgive some of the things that consciously or subconsciously, they know were flaws because they're growing and it's a new company and we're still so excited about competition and an alternative. All that is worn off. And now I think by adding paper views, you're definitely going to see less of their that segment of the audience that is compelled to attend that event because it's an event. AEW is doing a big show and you're part of this emerging new wrestling company and wanting to support it. I think that's, that's, oh my gosh, I just lost my life.

I think we've lost a lot of that momentum and goodwill. And you're hearing and seeing a lot more critique of the AEW. and you're also seeing a significant loss of live gate, consistent. Now, in most markets, you know, you look at AEW's TV shows and they're, you know, they're promoting, they're producing their shows and they may be 10,000 of scene arenas, but they're scaled for 4,000 seats. It's not a good sign. That doesn't tell me that the live audience are really enjoying the product to the extent that they

were two years ago when it was the new kid in town. we will see as they head over to the new york market for that pay-per-view that should be a good market for them new york is a great market i mean there's so many wrestling fans in that market just generationally there were a fan i mean i did a signing in in queens i think it was in queen's last weekend i was there and just the people that came out were you know fathers and sons and nephews and and you know it's just so many wrestling fans So they should do well. I think if they don't, it probably has as much to do with the time of year as it does with some of the other challenges that.

Nassau Coliseum is a pain in the ass to get to as well. Oh, it is all the way out. Yeah, I'm not familiar enough with the area. My goodness, it's all the way out on the island, Long Island traffic, some of the worst in the country. So it is a pain and they has to get there. But there's not really a ton of active events going on there because the islanders don't play there anymore. and there's no one really actively using it as its occupants. So they'll get a chance to break that in for their first AW event there, I'm pretty sure.

And historically, that has been WWE territory. That's where SummerSlam 2002 happened, where Brock Lesnar beat the Rock for the undisputed championship. So I will see that there's definitely a market there for wrestling fans. It's just a matter of will they come out at that time of the year. I totally agree with you, especially with all those bowl games and stuff. I mean, that is a hot time of the year for TV, viewing simultaneously speaking of live events eric wwee announced this week that bash in berlin the first ever major wwee premium live event will be held in germany emanating from the mercedes

bens arena in berlin on saturday august 31st 24 so not all that long after summer slam next year the arena holds about 17 000 i'm sure will be scaled down just a tiny bit for all the sets and everything but wwee continuing the emphasis on international expansion that we've been seeing ever since nick con really came into the fold what do you think about that and i think i heard yesterday that they've already sold 10 000 tickets in advance and this is a live event this is not a pay per view no it's a it's a premium oh it is the paper view okay i i i stand corrected yep um but they've already sold from what I've read. I don't know this is a fact. I haven't verified it. 10,000 tickets. If that's true, this will be a sellout. And it speaks to a pent-up demand, right?

And it might my experience, and again, things have probably changed a lot. But UK fans, you know, you could always count on the UK. German fans were, fans in Germany were a little bit different. They were a little harder to do as well in Germany as we could do in the UK, even for WWE. But times have changed. And one of the challenges with German TV, in my experience back then, was that each region of Germany, maybe they call them states, I can't remember anymore, but each region in Germany has its own rules and regulations regarding violence on television. And that was always one of the big issues for WCW when we just, even when we had our show on a pretty substantial network, I think it was called DS1, perhaps.

it we had to edit the hell out of it because things you could get away with here in the United States in terms of you know chair shots and things like that which are not an issue as much anymore but by way of an example you know we had to be we had to be really careful with how we edited in fact we didn't edit it was edited in Germany and sometimes they edited it so heavily that you lost any semblance of continuity in the show and each state was a little bit different. So it was tougher. You didn't have one product that was out there driving story and driving the audience. You had one product that was edited several different ways depending on what part of Germany it was being televised in. And it really took

and it was also late at night because Germany at the time, again, when I acknowledge things may have changed. But back then, wrestling was pretty much a late night property because of the violence issue. You could have full frontal nudity. And, And sex was fine. You know, Germans looked at things a lot differently in terms of what was suitable for a television audience and a viewing audience. Whereas, you know, full frontal nudity in primetime, no issues. But violence, that had to be late night program. Just almost the opposite of what it is here in the United States or what it was in the United States.

That was another big issue. So we'll see, you know, now that, you know, people have access to... the internet streaming platforms and they can now watch things that don't have to be chopped up and edited perhaps it's going to create a better opportunity in Germany than up until this point or at least when I was producing and distributing we had back then it's going to be faster it's always fun I like I love to watch the business of the wrestling business far more than I like watching what's going on inside of the ring and it's I find it to be really interesting to see how things change we got a lot of exciting things to look forward to

here coming up in the next few months including at wrestle k this is one of my favorite events that goes down every single year in winston salem north carolina three days a family friendly wrestling fun with generations of pro wrestlers and sports entertainers abound you're going to find more than 125 of your favorite wrestling stars from all errors including eric bischoff i'll be there as well November 24th through the 26th at the Benton Convention Center in Winston-Salem, North Carolina. The ad-free shows team is going to be represented in full there, including a live show, The Extreme Life of Matt Hardy, the other podcast I hope that I host, rather, Eric, will be in attendance signing autographs.

I'll be there on stage with Matt Hardy. Jeff Hardy's going to be doing a concert after the Hardy Boys wrestle. Arne Anderson's going to be there. Jake the Snake Roberts is going to be there. Lex Lugar is going to be there. it is going to be a fantastic time. WrestleMania.com is where you want to get your tickets now. Do not miss out on RussellK.

I don't think there's any better indicator of how hot WWEs right now is a property as seeing the international success they have had with Gates overseas. I think that is such a massive reflection of how the brand has improved across the globe and the access that the company has across the globe with money in the bank. We saw a clash at the castle. Now you get a show like this. We know they're going down to Australia.

They have the two Saudi Arabia shows every year. When is the next Saudi Arabia show, do you know? It's coming up. It's like imminent. Let's see, it is. I want to get you the exact date because it apparently will be Roman rains. This is November 4th, so it's next week.

it is apparently his last defense of the championship until the Royal Rumble, should he retain there against L.A. Knight. It's going to be interesting. That's another fascinating story that I'm going to really keep an eye on because with everything going on in the Middle East, I mean, literally, last night,

we're all eating dinner and I, you know, hit my phone next to me and I'm watching the news because I think what's going on right now in the Middle East is this is as close to a World War III scenario as we've seen since, the Cuban Missile Crisis. And I remember the Cuban Missile Crisis as a kid. You know, I remember having, you know, air raid drills and having to hide under our desk and stay away from windows

and all the things that we're doing as kids on a regular basis, by the way, because of just the tension in the Cold War. I think what we're seeing now, and as recently as last night, I was while everybody's talking and having fun and drinking wine, I'm looking at the news and I'm going, oh, okay, we've got 900 ground troops now, boots on the ground. getting to Israel and woke up this morning and, you know, we're dropping bombs in Syria. And all of a sudden, we're far more involved than I think anybody wanted us to be. And it's only going to escalate over time. It's going to be interesting to see if there's any impact on that, on that Saudi Arabia show as a result of what's going.

Because a lot can happen between now and November. Yeah, you're not wrong about that. John Cena is going to be wrestling on that show. That was just announced today as we record this, him in Solis, Soa, John Cena, Eric. has not won a singles match in WWD since 2018. How crazy is that? And he's probably having more fun now than he had before 2018. Yeah.

I get the sense just from the little bit that I've watched John recently, that he's just having a blast. And it just makes me so happy to see that. You know, that's what you hope for when you see a guy like John Sina or any or Rick Flair or anybody. You want to see them go out there and just enjoy. it and have fun doing it well you know with the sag after strike eric i don't think he expected to have a run like this i think this is all bonus and gravy for him and he's having fun doing it

it gets him back to the beginning it brings him back to where it all started and i just think it's cool as hell yeah and that strike doesn't look like it's ending anytime soon so uh who knows how much longer they'll have him for you know speaking of sena as we take this fightful just drop this report I think you'll find this interesting. Fifele, Sean Rossapp, reporting Cody Rhodes continues to be a standout on WW programming and is over at the merchandise table as well. In a rarity, Fiple select learned and subsequently confirmed within WWE that Cody Rhodes was able to outsell generic WWE merchandise at some of the recent live events.

This doesn't occur often as generic merchandise generally includes basic WW logo shirts, event merchandise, and title belts. Cody Rhodes does great sales with weight belts, which are a high ticket item as well, but has had great success with merchandise since his return in 2022. We're told that as of late, John Sina has been in Cody a couple of times, but generally it's Rhodes Sina or generic WW merchandise top in the list. Is he not the guy?

He's the guy. He's the guy. It's awesome. Should have won, man. Should have won at WrestleMania. I'm sorry. I'm not coming off. WrestleMania is going to be here in about 20 minutes.

And if Cody comes out on top and, and completes the journey and moves on to his next journey, there's plenty of time to sell a lot. All that is is an indication that the audience wants it. The audience wants it as bad for Cody as Cody wants it. And that's the perfect scenario. Making the audience want to see Cody become champion and complete his journey is that's the magic.

That's the nuanced art of, creative and you know i hate to call it booking because it's not really booking anymore but that's the art in creating creating that emotion creating that desire and and making a character so compelling that the audience is just gnashing their teeth wanting to see him complete that journey or her that's the magic and like i said russomania would be here in about 20 minutes so we got plenty of time brother when you're in town for that i'll take you some good spots in philly we'll make sure we have a good time there it'll be great i ain't going near philly i'm not going near philly good i won't even take a i won't even take a

booking or an appearance if i'm asked to do it not even doing it's too it's too much for me man i just maybe i've been living in wyoming too long but i i i don't mind dipping my toe in the water and you know i had fun in new york you know because it was in and out we went on a friday night got in around midnight worked all day saturday into the saturday evening and i was out seven o'clock sunday morning i don't mind that but man it is so busy and jammed and russomania is such a massive event i feel the same way about super bowls if somebody gave me you know two tickets for for laurie and i and a free flight to go to a super bowl i would say thank you and maybe give it to somebody that really cares because i just soon sit home and watch it on television i'm not

big around i don't like big crowds and congested areas so i appreciate the offer to show me around Philly, but I'm going to take a hard bath. I was going to take you to a good sushi spot where you were going to buy me dinner because you still owe me that, by the way. And I still will you dinner. But it's not going to happen in Philadelphia. Okay, got you. We do have a couple more quick things.

I want to ask you about this. And we'll finish on a WWE topic, but TNA's back, baby. The TNA brand name is returning. They announced Impact Wrestling announced at Bound for Glory this past weekend that the company would be rebranding once again as TNA wrestling in the beginning of 2024. And it was an interesting response from the peanut gallery. I think a lot of people got caught up in the nostalgia and thought, hey, that's cool. You know, they associated with 05-06 TNA was that cool hip alternative product.

But Eric, there are also a lot of people who associate TNA with quite a bit of stink. And to see the brand return here after the impact brand was put in place in the first place to get away from the TNA name. Man, it just seems like there's a lot of moving pieces here. Do you have any thoughts on this? Not really. You know, I understand. I can't understand why they did it.

I certainly haven't talked to anybody about it. You know, there is an argument to be made. I'm not sure I buy into it 100% in this particular case, but there is an argument to be made that tapping into Nestle, is a good thing. But let's be honest here, not wanting to offend anybody or hurt anybody's feelings, but T&A was always a pimple on a pig's ass. It had a very small, loyal, but small, relatively speaking, market share in terms of television. It was never a big property. It was an emerging property, and it was exciting for a while because it was new, and there was a new car

smell and all the same things that we're seeing in the dynamite but or a ewe i should say but i just don't think that t and a brand had enough value ever so that bringing it back is going to have any kind of no pun intended impact i i think it's interesting and it gets people excited there'll be some chatter on social media there'll be which is a buzz it's another way of saying buzz there'll be some buzz. But unless the product changes and there's a significant change in presentation to coincide with a rebranding, it's just changing the name of the show. And I don't think that that's really going to matter one bit. Again, there wasn't enough value in the T&A brand to begin with. And it's still T&A. And you can, oh, yeah, but it means total and outside of that. It meant tits and

ass. It was a Vince Rousseau idea. And as time went on, it was like, well, we got to tone down the, you know, can't have, you know, girls dancing in cages and stupid shit. We got to tone it down. And it was like, oh, it's not, it's total nonstop action. Well, okay, I guess. But like I said, there was just never enough value to begin with to, to expect that bringing it back is going to have any kind of significant impact on the property. Funny the thing is there. I hope I'm wrong. I think I know impact wrestling right now is not really on your radar, but I think if it was, you'd find it to be probably the most compelling wrestling program on TV.

You know what, John, it may be, but if no one's watching it, no, I totally agree. I get it. How many people are watching it? 300,000 people on an episode consistently?

That's, you know, I could do a YouTube show, me cooking a fucking steak and do that many views. It's just not, nobody's watching. It'd be fantastic, property. That's what I mean about presentation. You know, presentation also includes

where, where do you see it? Otherwise, it's a tree that falls in a forest and nobody hears it or sees it. And that's what impact is. Regardless of the talent, the roster, how good the show is put together creatively, it's got to look and feel significant in order to expect to see any kind of uptick in audience reaction. Yeah. Now, I was just saying, I think it's interesting that what is generally considered to be a very good show just doesn't have the reach. It doesn't have the access that some other promotions do have. I mean, we just saw NWA of all promotions just allegedly inked the deal with CW affiliates. So that's where NWA, which it just cracked me up because you and I spent so much time analyzing the live golf stuff with the CW.

And I'm curious to see we don't know the time slot yet or the day. what kind of interest is there with NWA and if it's going to be a sort of syndicated program where there's a different time slot in each market or if it's going to be a universal time slot. Let's see what the appetite is for that because I don't know if it's full discussion worthy at this moment in time, but it could be interesting to follow. The last thing, Eric, that I want to talk about here with you was a pretty significant story that emerged this week.

We know the TKO stock hasn't been electric since the merger went down, but the report from the Hollywood reporter this week indicates, and I'm going to read it verbatim here, Endeavor, the owner of WMEIMG and a majority stake in TKO group is going to test the market and is considering going private. The company said Wednesday that it is initiating, quote, a formal review to evaluate strategic alternatives for the company, end quote. Endeavor adds that it is not considering a sale. of its stake in TKO, which owns and operates the UFC and WWE. Private equity firm Silver Lake, a major shareholder in the company with 71% of Endeavors, voting power added, quote, Silver Lake is committed to strategies that deliver value for all shareholders to endeavor. To that end, Silver Lake is currently working towards making a proposal to take Endeavor private.

And they also, Eric, reiterated, they do not plan on selling off assets here. So let me ask you, Joe, because I don't know. If TKO, which controls UFC and WWE, is not a part of this, what does Endeavor own? What assets within Endeavor, excluding WWE and UFC, are a part of the Endeavor group? Because I don't know. Well, so you have the WME agency, which is, you know, that's the William Morris agency. and Endeavor, they merged, and that became part of the Endeavor Holdings Company. I mean, WME is a massive, massive, massive.

They used to represent me. I'm pretty familiar with them. Right, right. No, I'm saying for, not to you, I'm saying to our listeners there, who may not be familiar. So that, to my knowledge, that is their primary business stake that they have. And then you have the different subsidiaries that they hold, which is UFC. I'm looking right now, 16 over 90, which is a global. creative agency as well.

So this is an agency play. This is similar to what CAA did. Very, very similar to CAA. Yes, absolutely. They have Learfield, which is another streaming service that I used to do some work for, actually, that they promote broadcasts on like ESPN and Fox Sports. They have the NCSA College Recruiting Company, Miss Universe, they own. So they have their feed in a.

a bunch of different ponds. So I wonder, and again, this is just me not knowing this world and spending time researching it, but I wonder this isn't a significant move as it relates to WWE and UFC. It's a non-issue. It really isn't even interesting. To me or to us, if we're talking about the wrestling business or the business of the wrestling business, it's kind of an insignificant news item in that sense, isn't it? if it's not going to affect they're not a part of this public private play who cares so long as

so long as they're true to their word on that i mean them saying that we don't have interest at this time in selling them that's not a guarantee that it wouldn't happen but i would be very surprised if it did and i'd also be surprised with the legality of that i'm not going to sit here and pretend that i know it, but being able to pawn off an asset that you had just merged and acquired, there's got to be some sort of legality with that, I'd have to imagine. I don't know. Yeah. That's, I don't know.

I just, I just found it interesting. There's going to be a lot of moving pieces. I mean, there was even a report this week, Eric, that Warner Brothers Discovery might be up for sale very soon, and NBC Universal and Comcasts are very interesting. interested in a potential acquisition there. Yeah, there's a, there's a, I had a conversation with, uh, Bill Shaw, Bill Shaw, uh, was the guy that promoted me to executive producer and I think senior vice president at one point, um, Bill is still, is still in touch with the Ted Turner family.

Ted doesn't really communicate a lot anymore. He's a type of dementia. So there's not a lot of direct communication with with ted although bill is going to ted's 85th birthday party in november which i found really cool that's awesome um yeah it's pretty awesome but i was talking to bill about everything that's been going on and his bill's still very much in touch with a lot of the you know top what were top executives in internal broadcasting but cnn you know is moving out of atlanta and bill's comment while he's moving to new york and bills bills of the opinion based on the conversations he's had with people that know that CNN's going to be for sale. I don't know if it's true or not, but it seems like the Warner Discovery thing was all about crushing costs,

expenses, making it easier to spin off assets. It may not even be around two years from now or three years from now. You just don't know because television is such a volatile environment. business-wise, it's, anything can happen right now. I mean, it's day-to-day. Can you imagine after all that time we spent talking about Warner Brothers Discovery and then all the WWW rights conversations and the sale and the merge of the acquisition, if Comcasts, which at this current time has licensing agreements with WWE,

we're to swallow up Warner Brothers Discovery, which has licensing. with AEW and potentially even more what a weird wild turn of events that would be in such a short period of time yeah nothing's nothing surprises me anymore than when it comes to media what was once a pretty stable business and exciting business is now really the wild wild west of garage sales it's crazy for sure for sure good stuff here eric bischoff we covered a lot of ground on this episode great interview as well anything you want to throw out there as we wrap up here no man It's fun to get back in his saddle again. Looking forward to doing next week's show.

There's a rumor that Justin Barrasso from Sports Illustrated may be with us. We don't know. We haven't entered the deal yet. We'll have a contract signing soon and we'll keep you informed on social media. But yeah, looking forward to getting settled in and cranking out some great shit. No doubt. Trying to lock that down with Justin. If you're listening, Justin, text me back so we can lock that shit down.

But I want to lock down to some advertisers here on Strictly Business as well. And you can do that by head on over to advertiser with Eric.com. Get your business out in front of thousands of listeners and viewers every single week here on Strictly Business. This is one of the biggest podcast feeds in the world for professional wrestling. And we want to get your product out in front of it. Should be a lot of fun coming up here over the course of the next few weeks. We've got Resselcade coming up. I know you guys over on the ad-free show side, have some plans for Tampa for the Royal Rumble,

so there's going to be a lot of good things going down here. Anything else you would like to say to our Strictly Business faithful, Eric? Now, have a great week. How's that? Enjoy your weekend. It's Friday. The show will probably be posting late Friday. So dig in and have a great weekend and a great week next week.

We'll see you there. Eric Bischoff. This has been Strictly Business Week. We'll see you next time. Thank you.