Effy recently spoke with Wrestlezone’s Kevin Kellam about his character and the ‘secret’ to what Effy is. He talked about being a character that doesn’t have a direct appeal to what most would call “the standard wrestling fan” and says he isn’t exactly what he appears to be.
“When you see Effy out there and I’m in the fishnets, the ‘Predator’ armor—if you go watch the Predator movies they have the same fishnets on—and I’ve got sparkles on, and I’ve got this spiky purple leather jacket, and it all looks like fun and exciting, but I’m really a very old school southern wrestler. And I’ll do some things that are a little out of the blue for me, but if you really watch my working style,” Effy said, “I’m like a queer Tully Blanchard. We’re in there really working, so I think once real wrestling fans start actually watching me and watching me go, they’re going, ‘Hold on, there might be more than just the flash and dance and the flamboyance, there might be somebody in here whose actually working some old school wrestling. And that’s what I strive to be—both ends of that spectrum—the showman but also, we can get down and grapple when it’s time to.”
Expanding on his comments about queer representation in professional wrestling today, Effy says wrestling has always had a gay audience, but they haven’t really ever felt safe at shows. He says there’s been many improvements to make people feel welcome and comfortable at events, and talent and promoters are working to make events more inclusive.
“Yeah, I don’t want to sound too heady about it, but to me, gay wrestling fans have always been there. It’s just that recently, with changes to the world,” Effy said, “we’ve been able to be out and be a little safer and more ourselves. So when I look at wrestling shows where queer people are starting to come out, it’s not even that they just found out about wrestling, some have and that’s great, but there’s a lot of people who are wrestling fans who, up until this point, have not felt safe being at shows.
Even going back a few years, I have people hurling slurs at me at wrestling shows that I’m performing at. And even since then, the times have changed a lot better, and there’s a lot of shows that kind of preach that safety there. So, when these queer people, when these LGBT identifying people can see that they’re allowed to go out to the show, to pay their ticket, to enjoy the show, and not have to worry about harassment, or not having to worry about having to hide who they are, or feeling unsafe. We’ve now opened the door to a whole new group of people who have been wanting to come to shows,” Effy said, “but we haven’t been paying them enough attention in the industry because we didn’t think it was a viable model. But now we’re saying, ‘No it is a very viable model, these are great fans who just want to watch wrestling if we give them the place where they can do it safely.’”
Related: Effy On The Mystery Of Nick Gage, ‘Party Promotions’ And Attracting A Potential Audience
