Just two days before his fledgling wrestling promotion holds its first ever pay-per-view, All Elite Wrestling President Tony Khan sat down with his good friend Jack Whitehall to talk all-things “AEW”.
On Saturday night’s highly anticipated Double or Nothing pay-per-view in Las Vegas, Tony hopes to attract “lapsed fans” that have fallen away from the world of professional wrestling, for one reason or another.
“I believe there are millions of people around the world, particularly in the U.S., the U.K., Canada – markets that we’re focusing right out of the gate, but also in other countries where the love of wrestling has spread. Where people really, really cared about it – deep down they love wrestling, but they’re just not watching much of it. I believe that if we create a competitive environment and put the best wrestling product out there, and work really hard, I think we can rekindle a lot of wrestling internationally. It’ll be like it was 20 years ago, where everybody was watching wrestling!”
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“I would really like people that have been itching, that have been dying to see more wrestling, and want wrestling to succeed, and want to go back to a time where wrestling was cool. Where everybody was doing it, and you could talk to anybody. Whether it was friends at work or school, when you’re waiting in line for coffee and you see the t-shirt of a wrestler that you like, and you start up a conversation – it’s just fun. I want to get back to that. There’s so much great wrestling out there right now, and we just need to give it this platform.”
2019 kicked off with the massive announcement that Mr. Khan had teamed with three of the hottest free agents in the world – Cody Rhodes and the Young Bucks – to form a brand new professional wrestling company, to be called All Elite Wrestling.
Tony recalls being present at last September’s ALL IN pay-per-view at the Sears Center in Chicago, and being very impressed by the production, despite the relative inexperience of the young wrestlers in charge.
“…Cody Rhodes and the Young Bucks had never done a show on television, as a group, as a wrestling promotion, yet they were ale to draw over 11,000 people to a show they did in Suburban Chicago – just on viral promotion and word-of-mouth, and through the love of wrestling that they’ve spread. The kind of people that came to the show were some of the most rabid, passionate fans that you’ll ever see. It was a really exciting experience. I was there, and it was one of the best shows I’ve ever been to.”
“When they became available to work with somebody else, I was there with a business plan and ideas that we could produce a show. It was gonna be available weekly, and it would recreate when it was a better time to be a wrestling fan in many ways.”
WarnerMedia took the wrestling world by storm earlier this month, at the 2019 television upfronts in New York. Tony Khan and several of his AEW executives stormed Madison Square Garden to announce a partnership that would establish a live, weekly wrestling series to be broadcast on TNT – the historic home of the late World Championship Wrestling’s Monday Nitro, during the Monday Night Wars.
“Right now AEW has the best wrestlers in the world, the best in-ring performers, but until now we didn’t have a platform where anybody besides WWE – which has really great distribution in a lot of places – now we’re getting distribution in places all over the world. We’re getting as good, or better distribution in many of the biggest markets. For wrestling fan it’s been a long time since anybody else has been competitive in that aspect.”
“When you say ‘taking on [WWE]’ – I don’t see it like that. I just want more wrestling for everybody. I think the more wrestling people watch, the better. I don’t try to discourage people from watching wrestling, and we don’t discourage people from wearing other wrestling company’s shirts to our shows, for that matter. We’re pretty open and inclusive, and that’s what makes it fun.”
Along with bring wrestling to TNT for the first time in nearly two decades, All Elite Wrestling has also announced a deal to bring their product to ITV, the second biggest television network in the UK. On average, ITV makes up for 21.8% of the nation’s viewing share, nearly three times more than WWE’s home network, Sky UK.
“It’s been a great partnership. The people that work at ITV Sports are phenomenal people. What I think is cool is some of them are really, really big wrestling fans. It’s always a pleasure. I enjoy talking to them about it – it’s really fun! It’s not a chore for me. Am I mad to get into this business? I really do love it. I’m very fortunate that I get to work in things I like, and that I choose to do. I’m not doing this just because it’s a fun thing to do – we’ve invested millions, and millions of dollars, and we really believe this is going to be a huge, huge business.”
“I would love to bring AEW to the UK in the future. What we’ve got right now in the U.S. and the U.K. is phenomenal, because it’s been so long since anybody’s had the distribution – nobody’s had the distribution we have. Having partnerships with both TNT and ITV at the same time, it’s the best distribution any wrestling company, bar none, has ever had. That’s what we have on our side right now. Absolutely we are going to come to the U.K. and do some big shows. I’m really excited about what we’re going to do there.”
The AEW roster has been consistently expanding on a weekly basis since the start of the year, with some incredible talent signing on such as Joey Janela, Kylie Rae, the legendary Aja Kong, the Lucha Brothers Pentagon Jr. and Rey Fenix, Hangman Page, and dozens more. Unfortunately for Tony Khan, there’s a limit to how many people the promotion can take on in its current state.
“You can’t hire everybody in the world. It’s hard because there’s so many people that I’m a fan of, that are great performers, but we’re running a business. The people we have hired, I want to put every resource into. You don’t want to have a roster full of people that you don’t have any availability for. But what’s great is, we also have enough performers on the roster to give us flexibility, in terms of scheduling.”
“I’m not planning to do the hardest road schedule in the history of wrestling. In fact, it’s going to be, in my opinion, the most favorable quality of life plan anybody’s ever put together for a roster of wrestlers. If you look at what we’re offering in terms of salary, relative to number of dates people are performing, and the opportunity to gain full-time employment either here or elsewhere. You can work a full-time job. There are full-time jobs that people here in the studio are doing. There are people that work on the production side, that work on the talent side, and the creative side. Those are full-time jobs, outside of wrestling a couple times a week.”
Finally, Mr. Khan sheds a little light on his relationship with AEW Executive Vice Presidents Cody Rhodes, Kenny Omega, and the Young Bucks, Matt and Nick Jackson.
“I’m very hands-on with AEW. I don’t know any other way. That’s why I get involved in things I really care about. In the case of AEW it’s a really close partnership I have with the EVPs that work directly with me. Cody, the Young Bucks and Kenny Omega – the five of us talk every day. We’re in an active group chat and we talk on the phone on a daily basis. We work very closely together, and it’s been a really great creative and business partnership. We have a lot of talent that’s very involved also, in the daily business. Brandi, the Chief Branding Officer, she and I also talk on a daily basis on how to build the brand of AEW.”