In a recent interview with the Going Broadway podcast, independent wrestling talent Kylie Rae discussed several topics, including her recent WWE tryout experience.
Highlights of the interview are below:
On the opportunity to take part in the WWE tryout: “I don’t know how far in the woods, or how early we want to get into this and I apologize, sometimes I don’t know what I’m allowed to say, and what I’m not allowed to say, but I’m kind of an open book, so it’s a blessing and a curse, but as far as when WWE goes to towns, I’m sure you all are familiar, they’ll use local talent to come in and do extra work, so they were coming to Chicago and from my understanding, again Freelance Wrestling is like my home, it’s where I started and it’s where I continue to train, and they were asking people from our school to reach out to WWE. I don’t know how many people know about this, but it’s Gabe Sapolsky and he’s just such a sweet, I just want to say he’s one of the best people I’ve ever had the pleasure of knowing, I can’t even express enough of how much he’s helped me just throughout this entire process, and that’s genuine, honest to God, that’s who were reaching out to for extra work and whatnot. You all know wrestling, the ratio, men to women it’s gotten better, but there’s still a heck of a lot more men than there are women, so at this point, I was not contracted with NWA anymore, I was able to throw my name in the hat for people for extra work, so I just kind of said hey, if y’all need any women, I’m more than happy to be considered for this opportunity, please let me know, if not I completely understand.”
On her conversation with Gabe Sapolsky to take part in the tryout: “So, I talked to Gabe and he was, from what I understood, he was surprised that I was even reaching out for extra work, because he’s like, I think we could try to get you a tryout if you’re able to, and one thing that I really appreciated is that we had a conversation of where my mental health is, the sobriety came up, we were able to talk about that, he wasn’t focusing on the past, he was more so like, what do you have in place right now that’s going to keep you on the route that you’re currently on, of like God forbid, if I do start going off course, what will keep me on this good road, so yeah, it was a good conversation, and again, you all know when people say, oh yeah, this is going to happen for you, unintentionally take it with a grain of salt, and in a sense of like, oh yeah, I’ll believe it when I see it kind of thing, but I appreciate you even considering me for this opportunity, so yeah, he was like, we’ll get you this tryout, I think I’m going to kind of have to pull some strings type of thing, I just want to make sure you’re in a good place, because please be honest with me, if you’re not ready for this, I don’t even want to go down this road yet until you are ready, and I was like, I can’t predict the future, but I feel as good as I have ever felt.”
On who she faced in her practice matches: “Promos, they are a struggle, but it was wonderful. I got to talk about my ADHD, which is genuine clearly if you haven’t already noticed, so yeah, it was awesome, it felt real and authentic, and then I got to have two practice matches, one was with Thea Hail and she’s just such a sweetheart, she knew how nervous I was ans she just helped me so much, and the other one was with Fallon Henley, who I knew her as Tesha Price, and I met her years ago at RISE that they used to have before the SHIMMER shows, she was a dream match of mine years ago, and then, to have a match, the first match we ever had is in a WWE ring, in front of Shawn Michaels, there’s no words to describe that, so yeah, that’s awesome.”
On her WWE Main Event appearance under the name of Briana Ray: “So, I will start off by saying Dana Brooke is amazing, just such a sweet human being. You know hoe there’s just some people, you meet them and instantly, you’re just like, you can tell they’re just a wonderful person, that’s what it was like and the name, I genuinely don’t know the reason, but I just assumed that you’re not allowed to keep your name. Oh, I would’ve picked Kylie Rae if I could, but then again, I don’t have another name that I got by aside from my real name, so it was one of those. Earlier, they had asked, hey do you know what name you’re going to go by, because it just says Kylie Rae on the board, and I was like, oh I don’t know, I was like, I only wrestle under the name Kylie Rae, so they’re like, either we’ll get back to you, or get back to us kind of thing and 10 minutes before we were going out there, so you can’t use the name Kylie Rae and I was like, totally understand, not a big deal, I didn’t even ask why, because again, that’s their business and they’re like, do you have another name that you go by, and I’m like no, do you have any recommendations.”
The full interview is available at this link.
