With WWE shifting its shows to the Performance Center, it's not just the wrestlers who have had to make an adjustment, but producers as well.
One such producer is TJ Wilson, who wrestled for WWE as Tyson Kidd, and he noted that pro wrestling in an empty arena during the coronavirus pandemic is certainly different. In an interview with Spencer Love on the Conversations With Love podcast, Wilson noted how different wrestling feels with no live audience.
“It’s definitely changed a lot of things. Wrestling, at its core, is all about fan and audience participation and fan interaction live in that arena. Live in that bingo hall, live in that gymnasium, whatever it is, man, I’ve wrestled in all of them. It’s definitely an interesting thing to not have that audience out there, but in this moment, we’re not able to. So, the options are that we either just don’t have shows, or we do and there’s not a fan base present live in the stadium, the crowd. But, it’s definitely different, it’s definitely different," Wilson said.
In regards to how his role as a producer has changed in the past couple of weeks, Wilson said it hasn't changed a whole lot. He said he does have to remind talent sometimes that they just have to remain pros and not fall into the trap of having to do things in the ring quicker compared to when there's a crowd out there.
“In terms of changing my role, not really, because I think our talent, and I’m not just saying this, the talent that I work with is so good that I don’t have to - I just have to kind of remind them like, ‘Hey guys, obviously we don’t have a crowd here, so there’s a tendency to maybe to do things a little quicker, but you gotta just be the pros that you are.’ Our talent are just such pros across the board that it hasn’t been an issue in terms of that for me," Wilson said.
The full interview can be seen at this link. Credit to Spencer Love of the Conversations With Love podcast for the transcription.
