Various: Tony Khan on AEW Creative Process, Full Card for PWG Nineteen, Indies

May 17, 2022

Tony Khan Comments on AEW’s Creative Process for Their Shows

Forbes held a recent interview with AEW CEO Tony Khan. One of the topics discussed included his thoughts on AEW’s creative process for their shows.

“When we started AEW Dynamite in October 2019, I had never officially written a wrestling TV show. All of my experience writing TV shows and wrestling had been exclusively imaginary and all the episodes of Dynamite and Rampage, for that matter, were shows that I had been creating at home for fun as a hobby. I did lean more on people around me and I would try to trust my instincts but it’s hard when you don’t have as much experience and I do take a lot of pride in the booking.
I work with a lot of really smart people. What I think I do a good job of is being organized dealing with a lot of different people. I have a lot of great creative minds that are in the company that I can have full time access to like Chris Jericho and Christian Cage, and Jon Moxley has great ideas. And now CM Punk and Bryan Danielson, Adam Cole have come in with great ideas.
I don’t understand the idea of having a lot of different people write the show and then a person would go in the day of and rip it to pieces and try to come up with new ideas. To be honest, when I hear about somebody going in and they have a TV show on Monday that they rip up, my first thought is, ‘What were you doing all weekend?’ Because I work my ass off on the weekends.
So, I don’t do everything myself but I do make the final decision on everything. I put the format together, I put an outline of what the show is going to be for Dynamite and Rampage. I write it by hand.
I really just want people to go out and make the points and keep the stories going but I’m not so autocratic that I want to control every word somebody says on television. And I think that’s also why some of our interviews, our storytelling, and promos are really strong, I believe.”

Transcript h/t: F4WOnline.com

PWG Announces Full Card for Their Nineteen Event This July

Pro Wrestling Guerilla recently announced the full card for their Nineteen event, which takes place on July 3rd at the Globe Theater in Los Angeles, California.

It was also announced that tickets for this upcoming event will officially go on sale starting on June 6th at PWG’s official website.

PWG World Championship – Konosuke Takeshita vs. Daniel Garcia (c)
PWG World Tag Team Championship – Aussie Open (Mark Davis & Kyle Fletcher) vs. Kings of the Black Throne (Malakai Black & Brody King) (c)
“Speedball” Mike Bailey vs. Buddy Matthews
Jonathan Gresham vs. Davey Richards
Yuka Sakazaki vs. Masha Slamovich
JONAH vs. Kevin Blackwood
Aramis vs. Shane Haste

Misc. Wrestling News & Notes

PROGRESS Wrestling held their Chapter 134: “No Mountain High Enough” event this past Sunday in London, England which featured Jonathan Gresham being stripped of his PROGRESS World Championship following his disqualification loss to Gene Munny at the event.

A new documentary film based on the late Bruno Sammartino, titled Bruno Sammartino, was released earlier today on Apple’s iTunes store.

As noted before, former MMA fighter and WWE wrestler Cain Velasquez was arrested following an attempted murder shooting incident this past February in San Jose, California. Velasquez is alleged to have attempted to murder a man named Harry Eugene Goularte, who had been charged with molesting a close relative of Velasquez. PWInsider’s Mike Johnson reported that a judge denied bail for Velasquez during a court hearing on Monday and Velasquez is currently expected to remain incarcerated until his trial date.

As noted before, Impact Wrestling talent PCO suffered a shoulder injury during Impact’s set of television tapings this past weekend in Kissimmee, Florida. PWInsider’s Mike Johnson reported that his sources stated that PCO’s injury was not serious and he has been medically cleared to resume in-ring work. PCO reportedly had informed others that he is currently fine and will not be missing any of his upcoming scheduled bookings.

NBC reportedly declined to order a second season of their America’s Got Talent: Extreme reality competition series, according to PWInsider. This series featured WWE Hall of Famer Nikki Bella as one of the judges.

The National Wrestling Alliance recently announced a new match for the card of their Alwayz Ready event on June 11th in Knoxville, Tennessee:

Triple Threat Tag Team match – AJ Cazana & mystery partner vs. The Fixers (Jay Bradley &Wrecking Ball Legursky) vs. The Mortons (Ricky & Kerry Morton)

Terminus recently announced a new match for the card of their Modern Age Grappling on May 22nd in Hampton, Georgia:

Adam Priest vs. Baron Brown