2022 marked the official television debut of “The Glamour” Mariah May.
Premiering in March, ITV launched a brand-new sitcom titled Deep Heat. The show portrays ventures in British wrestling. The main character Holly pursues her dream of becoming a professional wrestler in her mother’s Boss Pro Wrestling promotion. However, the mother envisions her young daughter in more of a backstage role for the company. In addition, Holly’s brother Nick Nitro begins to form a rival company, which forces Holly into a precarious position — but she soon chooses to try and salvage the remnants of Boss Pro and keep it afloat.
The official show description reads: “Holly has led the gang to BOSS Pro Wrestling’s big show – but an act of brotherly spite threatens to end their dreams. Can the underdogs pull off the impossible?”
Real-life professional wrestler Mariah May portrayed the role of Roxy on the show, appearing in three episodes of the six-part season. In speaking with WrestleZone’s own Ella Jay, “The Glamour” detailed her experience on the set of Deep Heat and how she landed the role.
“So that was such a dream come true for me because, since I was a little kid, I loved wrestling,” she said. “Then when I went to school, I did a lot of theater. The closest I could get to wrestling was doing theater, so I loved acting. I was actually a drama scholar at my school, got a scholarship, which I’m very proud of. Then I worked really hard from that, and when I left school alongside my wrestling training, I was actually auditioning. And if anyone out there is an actor or knows anything about it, it’s a lot of just radio silence, like it’s hard to even get auditions. Then from there it’s hard to get the role. So it’s something I’ve wanted for a very long time and just wasn’t able to achieve just yet.”
“And it’s all about timing and just the right role,” she added. “Then I was very deep into wrestling. This was just after [pandemic] lockdown and I debuted at Rev Pro. I was doing a lot of wrestling there. I was hoping to go international. It’s weird. I was a bit of like a plateau with my career, though. I really wanted to get things off the ground. But it was hard to get international stuff because at that point with COVID, you’d have conversations [with promoters] and then it would be like, ‘Oh, but we can’t yet and things would get changed.’ There wasn’t too much happening in the UK at that point. So I was really just frustrated. I felt like I was doing as much as I could, but nothing was happening. Then I got an email and I thought it was a joke or….just some weird, spam email.”
“It was like, ‘Hey, we’re doing a sitcom. We’re really interested in bringing you in.’ And I [thought] like, ‘Surely not,” but then I was like, ‘I’m going to reply because I checked the email and the actual email was like @DP or something like that.’ So I’m going to reply, and then it was just all legitimate. It was so crazy how it just happened because it doesn’t happen like that. As someone who’s been trying for years, it never happens like that. So it was kind of just like a dream come true.”
May continued on to explain her emotions upon arriving on the set of the show, describing it as a “pinch me” moment when she got her call sheet.
“I was like, ‘This is insane.’ I got to set, and it was just incredible,” she said. “Everyone was so kind, so friendly. But it’s just like all these trailers and catering and costume and they’ve got you in there and oh, it’s just unreal. Like I said, the best part about it was the people that were just so giving and so friendly and polite. There were some other wrestlers on set as well.”
“Obviously none of them had acted before or knew anything about it and they were so giving with their time and making sure everyone felt comfortable. I just try to learn as much as possible. I was just like watching everything, like taking mental notes of it all. Yeah, that was just a crazy experience and it really inspired me to pursue acting more and kind of put more time into it because I want to do it again.”
Season 1 of Deep Heat is available now on ITV, but May is eager for a possible season two. “I think that needs to be season two about Roxy, or a Roxy spinoff [show] would be amazing, right?” she suggested. “I would love for there to be a season two [though]. The cast worked so hard and the show was such a good feel [show]. I feel like we need TV like that where you can just decompress and have a good laugh. So I really hope there is a season two. I will definitely be trying to be a part of it if there is. But if you guys want to season two, tweet ITV ‘we want season two.'”
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