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Equity says pro wrestlers can be members


Victor Is God

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The US industry is worth billions and there is no reason why our own could not be too, as the FWA's recent mainstream attention has proven.

 

I won't judge Alex Shane too much as I only know very little of him, but he just comes across as being his own self-hyping biggest fan. I don't see how the FWA could have, in any way, shape or form proven that there's an untapped potential to make billions through British wrestling.

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The US industry is worth billions and there is no reason why our own could not be too, as the FWA's recent mainstream attention has proven.

 

I won't judge Alex Shane too much as I only know very little of him, but he just comes across as being his own self-hyping biggest fan. I don't see how the FWA could have, in any way, shape or form proven that there's an untapped potential to make billions through British wrestling.

 

The two most mainstream things the FWA has ever done is have that one show on ITV about ten years ago with Eddie Guerrero on it and have that boxer who beat an incredibly washed up Mike Tyson appear on their show. Lame.

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The US industry is worth billions and there is no reason why our own could not be too, as the FWA's recent mainstream attention has proven.

 

I won't judge Alex Shane too much as I only know very little of him, but he just comes across as being his own self-hyping biggest fan. I don't see how the FWA could have, in any way, shape or form proven that there's an untapped potential to make billions through British wrestling.

 

The two most mainstream things the FWA has ever done is have that one show on ITV about ten years ago with Eddie Guerrero on it and have that boxer who beat an incredibly washed up Mike Tyson appear on their show. Lame.

 

Shame the Eddie Guerrero show, Revival BTW, wasn't FWA and wasn't on ITV, it was on Bravo.

 

When you look back at FWA, at one point they were providing fantastic monthly shows with quality wrestling, produced some cracking little angles (Simmons double turn, The Family/Travell hardcore matches with Ulf/Alex, Storm Euro Champ challenge and more) brought over some fresh US talent yet never really went OTT on that element, and generally kickstarted a new impetus for UK wrestling.

 

It's just a shame their efforts never really fully achieved what they were actually after in the end.

 

Not lame in anyway to be fair, they made national radio, they made newspapers, they spurred on a new type of product, it just never drew the end result of weekly episodic television.

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Until a wrestling company in the UK is given the financial backing of somebody with a serious amount of cash, it'll never get to that stage unfortunately.

 

Its production levels would need to be on par with the likes of Dancing on Ice, the X Factor and Britain's Got Talent for it to become a mainstream hit again. IMO even a WWE-esque product would struggle to achieve the heights that British wrestling achieved back in the WOS era. You'd need a lorry load of crossover names, a Dermot O'Leary-level presenter and enough performers charismatic to get the in-ring product over to millions of fans. Even then, you'd have to catch lightning in a bottle for it to succeed.

 

No matter how many great angles are booked, MOTY candidates are wrestled or wrestling 'coalitions' are formed, a wrestling ring stuck in the middle of a hall or Coventry Sky Dome-type building is not going to become a nationwide phenomena. Which, to me at least, makes it look pointless the more and more times that people involved within the wrestling business or who write for magazines like FSM say that they've taken the next step in getting professional wrestling onto the television sets of ten million homes every Saturday night.

 

The WWF's global domination took years upon years, celebrity after celebrity, PR campaign after PR campaign and a whole lot of damn look to achieve the success that it did, so for Alex Shane to say that the FWA has proven that there's the potential for a billion dollar market here is ridiculous.

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Sorry, but what? lol

 

i have no clue about the equity stuff, i have asked a few people who are members of this. and they find this quite amusing, are the BWC/FWA going to pay for the talent to become members? i can hardly see workers who get paid

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^ Sorry, am I reading that correctly? The FWA expects its performers to be treat equally and given the same level of respect as actors, yet it doesn't pay the people performing for them any more than the cost of getting to and from its shows?

 

Am I missing something here?

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What benefits do wrestlers get from this though? I know in the US the equivalent union to Equity has all sorts of requirements like health insurance and pay rates etc, what does Equity have?

 

Also...what's the incentive for British promotions to use these union wrestlers? Seems that in an industry made up of people who hate spending money and shitty wrestlers willing to work for free, they aren't going to be willing to spend more money on "Equity" wrestlers. The only way this works is if the big names sign up and that gets everyone else joining.

 

EDIT: should have read that link above on the benefits...the royalties is an interesting one, I wonder how many wrestlers get a cut of DVD sales right now?

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^ Sorry, am I reading that correctly? The FWA expects its performers to be treat equally and given the same level of respect as actors, yet it doesn't pay the people performing for them any more than the cost of getting to and from its shows?

 

Am I missing something here?

 

Unless things have changed.. Yes. when said wrestlers joins FWA/BWC a clause in there contract is they will work one show per month for free and expenses get paid within 2 weeks of said show

 

 

What benefits do wrestlers get from this though? I know in the US the equivalent union to Equity has all sorts of requirements like health insurance and pay rates etc, what does Equity have?

 

Also...what's the incentive for British promotions to use these union wrestlers? Seems that in an industry made up of people who hate spending money and shitty wrestlers willing to work for free, they aren't going to be willing to spend more money on "Equity" wrestlers. The only way this works is if the big names sign up and that gets everyone else joining.

 

EDIT: should have read that link above on the benefits...the royalties is an interesting one, I wonder how many wrestlers get a cut of DVD sales right now?

 

In Regards to DVDs etc.. well when we have our contracts for the big names stars. in it is they relinquish there rights to claim royalties on any DVD production as there wages cover them for a fee. IE RVD cannot claim royalties for the 1PW 4AS DVD. as that is part of his contract. as no UK wrestlers are contracted its always email/text/phone call.

 

but on the other hand, IF a wrestlers chooses to become apart of this.. and then asked to work a show.. do you really think the person who is booking them will get them a wage and apart of the DVD sales?? i personally don't see that happening i think it would cause a promoter to just cancel the performer and save themselves the hassle

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^ Absolutely crazy; fair enough that the FWA are a business and they need to make as much money as possible and so perhaps keeping its performers' wages to as little as possible may be a necessity, but to do this and then campaign for them to be given equity rights is crackers.

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Agree with that DVD bit. I bet lots of feds barely make their cash back on DVD sales, if they had to pay royalties too, they'd either cut out the match of the equity member, form a contract to get out of paying a royalty or just not bother with DVDs anymore

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The way I currently see this is it hurting the British Wrestling scene more than helping it.

 

If wrestlers suddenly start signing up to this and demanding higher wages, more money for this and more money for that, the companies that are already legitimate and have insurance, pay decent wages for decent talent, always have correct licenses and so on are going to begin to suffer. Any company putting money back into itself to continue its own improvement is going to be hit hard and may look to start using the non-union guys that are worse or simply fold as the money taken is not enough to pay these new higher costs.

 

In a time when its not only harder to get people to part with their cash but also everything is costing more its only going to put a tight pinch on already over stretched budgets for legitimate companies.

 

The shitarse companies using plebs and their friends for nothing are still going to exist.

 

Of course this doesn't affect the FWA too much is it has various other ways to look after its talents fees.

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but on the other hand, IF a wrestlers chooses to become apart of this.. and then asked to work a show.. do you really think the person who is booking them will get them a wage and apart of the DVD sales?? i personally don't see that happening i think it would cause a promoter to just cancel the performer and save themselves the hassle

 

Well that's the thing though. If someone, take the usual example, like Doug Williams was to join Equity and go to them and say "I'm in 100's of DVDs that are being sold by companies and I don't get a penny from it" then what's going to happen?

 

Could Equity come at you, fire off a legal suit, and reclaim the royalties for Dougie?

 

I'm not sure how it works...anyone got any actual knowledge of royalty claims?

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