Congrats goes out to our girl Shantelle, whose interview was able to be named “Featured Article” in Canadian magazine, “Movie Entertainment”! Unfortunately, I don’t have the magazine, but I got the next best thing – a transcript of the interview! It’s a really great read, and I suggest everybody take some time out to read it!
Jim Slotek
September 2009
Movie Entertainment
Professional wrestling had a tighter hold on Taylor Wilde than she knew.
When, at 22, she became the youngest title holder in Total Non-Stop Action’s Knockouts Division, the compact, blond spark plug had already “retired” from a wrestling career that had started at age 18 and taken her to Mexico and South Africa. She says she was serious about her decision at 20 to quit World Wrestling Entertainment and concentrate on her psychology degree at York University.
“I was retired for good as far as I was concerned,” says the Toronto girl born Shantelle Malawski. “It was a lot of things, but I remember meeting a veteran who I won’t name, who was in my opinion completely burnt out. And I’ll never forget that moment of meeting a celebrity, and them going (in a gravelly voice), ‘Meh, nice to meet you, kid,’ and kind of disregarding me. I just didn’t want to become that person.”
But Wilde found wrestling wouldn’t leave her head. “It’s like the most abusive and passionate relationship I’ve ever been hooked on,” she says. And she found a way to reinvent herself when TNA offered $20,000 to anyone who could beat the then champion Awesome Kong. TNA audiences soon began seeing a blond “fan” identified only as “Taylor,” attending events and demanding to be let in the ring.
“That time off basically gave me a new perspective on what I wanted out of life. I realized I’m a performer and an athlete, and wrestling basically covers all those desires and drives and small goals I have. So when I saw that $20,000 fan challenge posted, I realized it was do or die, now or never.”
The “fan” storyline played inevitably as a female wrestling version of David and Goliath. Malawski, who’d wrestled under the name Shantelle Taylor, was reborn in TNA as Taylor Wilde.
“The ‘Wilde’ part was brought to you by TNA,” she says. “I wasn’t sure how I felt about it at first, but now I feel it fits.” “I mean, ‘Taylor Wilde’ is pretty much me. What you see is what you get. I’m, like, not the greatest actress in the world, but I’ve got a lot of personality, and I may be a little loud and overbearing in real life for some people. So it’s just an extension of who I am.”
Wilde’s greatest rivalry is with the other most famous Canadian in TNA Knockouts, erstwhile champ Angelina Love. They were tag-team opponents (Love’s “Beautiful People” tandem with Velvet Sky against Wilde and Roxxi) and, most memorably, opponents in last year’s TNA title match in Oshawa, Ont. (Wilde prevailed.)
Wouldn’t they be more suited as Team Canada partners?
Wilde sniffs, “If it wasn’t her, if it was any other Canadian, yes. She’s not that good guy I want on my side. She’s conniving and she’s very full of herself. I’ve known Angel a long time. We started at the same training facility in Toronto, and we’ve gone all around the world fighting each other. And now that we’re on TV, we’ve got a lot of old animosity and grudges to draw from.
“I think it’s better we’re competitors. We’re both from the same home town, we both have blond hair and we’re tanned. There’s so much competition on that level that I think we’re trying to wear each other out.”
She not only beat her in the ring that night in Oshawa, but came out on top against Love in a pre-fight “beauty pageant.” How is this different from, say, the Miss California contest?
“I don’t think Miss California and her competitors actually punched each other out during the competition. I think it would be great if the men did pageants, too. Y’know, wrestling is campy and fun and this was something new in the Knockouts Division – something to do apart from just wrestle or yell into a camera about how much we hate each other.”
Name: Shantelle Malawski
Loading ...