AEW Superstar Malakai Black was recently interviewed on AEW Unrestricted as he spoke about his AEW ring entrance and creating that special live experience for the fans in attendance. You can check out some highlights from the podcast below:
Malakai Black on the idea behind his AEW entrance: “There’s a couple of things to that. Number one, right before I made my debut, I released this little movie on my social media platform that was a tie-in to a lot of stuff and gave some backstory as to the how, the what, and the when. There was a lot of light cuts in that particular clip until the manifestation. I wanted to see if I could have elements of that that translated towards the bigger screen. When I was in the other company, I had a very elaborate bells and whistles kind of entrance, very produced. Not that that’s a bad thing, but I consider myself a bit of a minimalist, and I wanted to see if I can create something similar by just using the bare minimum. When we talk about television wrestling, it’s obviously very different than live events. It’s very different than regular professional wrestling, basically. It needs to translate. So, I started thinking, how do I translate something on TV that gives a different impression and that translates well into theatrical aspects on television? So, I came up with the three light cuts and the three different positions. I asked myself, how could I create an entrance based off of light cuts and just using three simple lights, and the result is what you see on TV. And it literally is one of the easiest entrances that we have, but taking your word for it, it is one of the more unique ones that has been displayed in professional wrestling, especially current day.”
On wanting his entrance to be an experience for the crowd: “I wanted to switch away from the bells and whistles and just make something that is minimalistic in nature but still has a very memorable impression to people at home, to the people in the audience. I think it’s an incredible thing now that in the span of seven, eight weeks, the second that the lights cut, they know what time that is, and the people just come up and then as soon as the first note of the song plays, everybody quiets down because everybody wants to be involved and everybody wants to feel the entrance. And to me as a professional wrestler, as a performer, as someone that works in television and in wrestling, that’s what I want. I want the audience to be an inevitable part of my entrance, and I want them to connect and feel to what it is that I’m doing. I want it to be an experience. So, from the get-go, I wanted their attention, and this is how, in my head, I visualize that and I’m glad that it paid off. I also have to thank Tony [Khan] for allowing me to build this and give me the trust because the conversation literally went, ‘Well if I can’t get it done in three months, then maybe we should see if I’m a good fit.’ And we did it in less than four weeks. It was very rewarding, but that’s basically the thought process and the manifestation behind my entrance.”
(h/t – 411 Wrestling)
