It's not about having a certain body type and looking picture perfect beautiful. It's about having the drive and some kind of wacky attraction you have to the physicality, the test of learning how to wrestle and being to do it believably.
Ivory
You just know that you're a performer and that's that.
I was very pleased to see that things have come far, far away from the Diva Search days where it was, 'Let's have a bunch of girls in bikinis flop around and look stupid so the public can vote them on or off the show.'
I got a call from someone at WWE and was flown out for an appearance, knowing I had to do Revlon training the next day. I was open to it as long as they got me to the airport so I could make it to my gig in San Francisco on time. When the company picked me up, I had all my Revlon stuff for the class the next day and took it with me to the arena.
I was fortunate enough to watch Bayley at NXT, when they had their matches. Those girls were on fire. It's all around us. Great ladies' wrestling is all around us. So it has not disappeared by any means.
I was waiting for something to sink my teeth into, so I was all-in to be Miss Ivory of The RTC. It was great fun too!
I did just about everything under the sun. I did some Revlon work, make-up artistry. I taught classes at community colleges for a make-up course, teaching tennis. I was doing everything I knew how to do. I think one year I had as many as 10 W-2's come in.
There is a power to sisterhood.
I get that it's packaging and it's neat to put a name on what the girls are. But it seems to me that they were making us Sports Illustrated swimsuit models instead of women who wrestle on a pro wrestling program.
I work with dogs and cats all day long. I work by myself, for myself. I'm around 15 or 20 dogs every day of my life. It's just like wrestling.
I did some rescue work for Hurricane Katrina victims with a group of rescue people called Best Friends Society, who have a show on Discovery now called 'Dogtown.'
Live life to make an honest difference.
Nobody wants to pay to see a real chick fight because it's ugly and it doesn't sell.
Women who decide to wrestle are a special type of women. We are tomboys, we are women that can hang in a locker room. I am just grateful that there are outlets for that.
When you go see a magic trick, the first thing you ask is, 'How do they do that.' That's what I hope the kids are saying when they leave the matches.
It's really hard to go put mascara on a lady in the mall, and people recognize you and ask you what you're doing there, and all you can think of saying is, 'I'm trying to make a living.'
Well, you have to get a job! That's the first thing you have to do as a young person. You're not in school anymore... It costs a lot of money to pay the rent these days.
People can get hurt just getting into a wrestling ring.
I didn't chat with Vince McMahon all the time, but he always gave me great opportunities.
In the mid-1980s, there wasn't a representation of gayness on television. Our glitter and our goofiness and our great costumes made in Vegas; the cheekiness and campiness of the show, it turns out little boys who were gay coveted our act.
There is a real power to what you represent when you go in front of people.
Looking back, it was really cool to be a person that helped catapult the women's division to become what it was.
I definitely stand by the phrase that I'm an entertainer and not a role model.
If I was going to wrestle, I wanted it to look good. If I was going to do skits, I was not an actress and so I was trying to memorize my lines.
Imagine having an idea of putting good-looking girls in the ring, and they figure, first, let's make them good-looking, then let's see if they can wrestle.
I am a perfect example of somebody who'd have benefited from much more training before I got to be on TV.
Womens' voices are very important.
I understand it now because I worked with the best of the best, but I didn't get at first that people have an extreme passion for wrestling and the wrestlers. The fans are really intimately connected with each wrestler.
I made $400.00 a week for my tenure at GLOW. I was there for about nine months.
Putting the boots to somebody, that's what I do best.
I am honored to be a part of that awesome talent, and to have experienced some of the pinnacle moments of the evolution of women's wrestling.
