Alicia Atout has quickly made a name for herself in the wrestling biz as the engaging “Interview Queen” for Major League Wrestling. Excelling quickly when given opportunities is nothing new for the 26-year-old Toronto native. Prior to signing on with MLW, Atout did freelance work for All-Elite Wrestling, Impact Wrestling and FiteTV, among many others, and she’s interviewed quite literally thousands of wrestlers, musicians and entertainers for her AMBY (“A Music Blog Yea”) YouTube channel and AliciaAtout.com. She has also served as a host for Slipknot’s “Knotfest Roadshow,” and in total she’s conducted some 4,500 interviews since getting her start as bright-eyed, music-loving teenager. “Interview Queen,” indeed. “I’ll never say no to an opportunity,” Atout said. “I’ll be scared sh*tless sometimes! But I will never say no.”
Within four weeks of her start in the wrestling business, Atout was talking to WWE Hall of Famer Jake “The Snake” Roberts, and within six months she was rubbing elbows with the likes of Cody Rhodes, The Young Bucks and Kenny Omega. She worked at the groundbreaking “All In” show put on by Rhodes and the Bucks in 2018 and also at the first AEW pay-per-view, “Double or Nothing.”
On the music side of things, Atout has interviewed Metallica, Motörhead and Ace Frehley, to name a very few, and she shows no signs of slowing. “When it comes to my interviews, I just want to keep getting bigger and crazier interviews and travel a lot more once it becomes safer to do,” Atout said, “And down the line, whether it happens to be because of wrestling, music, being offered something by a TV or entertainment station, I just want to be that household name known for being charismatic and being able to bring out the best in people.”
The very talkative Atout — a great trait to have as “The Interview Queen” — was open and engaging in a lengthy conversation for this Web Is Jericho exclusive.
Who were some of the first wrestling promotions you worked for? “So there was one here in Toronto called Smash Wrestling, who I worked for a lot. I was very lucky, because when I first started working there, they were bringing in some very cool talent. One of my first interviews was Jake “The Snake” Roberts, and he was doing a signing for them. So within four weeks of starting wrestling interviews, I got an interview with an absolute legend, and that blew my mind. From there I started working for a company called BCW (Border City Wrestling), which is co-owned by (Executive Vice President of Impact Wrestling) Scott D’Amore, and so of course, there are ties to Impact there. So when he liked my work in BCW, he had me on for Impact within I think the first five months of me being in the wrestling business. So I worked for Impact a little bit. I didn’t work for Ring of Honor, but I got to interview their whole roster when they had Cody Rhodes, The Young Bucks, it was just like an insane time then. So within the first six months of wrestling, I was interviewing all over the place. About a year into it, I was able to contact Cody Rhodes, because I had his info from that ROH interview, and I said, ‘Hey, I hear there are some rumors about a show going on. If you need a host, I’ll be your woman.’ Next thing I know, I’m backstage at the first ‘All In’ and then ‘Double or Nothing.’ So everything has been kind of ‘right place, right time.’ I was always asking for things. Worst case you get a ‘no,’ but luckily there was a lot of ‘yes’ thrown my way.”
How did you end up hooking up with MLW? “MLW was crazy. They actually hit me up about two years ago around this time, and they said, ‘We really like what you’re doing, and we’re surprised no one has actually locked you down,’ because all of those things I mentioned was all freelance work, even though I was with some of these brands for quite some time. And so they said they would really like for me to come to one of their shows in New York, see how it goes, and then we’ll go from there. So I flew down thinking, ‘OK. Worst case, this is a one-off gig.’ Within my first hour of being there, I was pulled aside by who is now one of my bosses, and he said, ‘We want to lock you down. Let’s talk numbers. Whatever you need, we want you to be our person.’ So that blew my mind, too. Every promotion has a lot of wrestlers, but they usually only have one or two interviewers, so for them to want me, I was super hyped on that. The atmosphere has been great, and they’ve really let me have my freedom, and it’s only grown since then. I’ve been with them for two years now, and it’s been fantastic.”
Recently MLW has been a bit more cinematic with the addition of Cesar Duran. Do you find you’re able to stretch your chops, so to speak, under the new format? “Absolutely. Before, it was kind of, ‘Come in, and we’ll let you riff on the interviews,’ and I was having so much fun with that. But now they’re giving me five minute segments, where you’re literally having lines, you can riff, everything in between. I had to really dial into that actress role, which is something I really hadn’t done this heavily in the past. So that’s been absolutely incredible. It’s shown me I can do a bunch of things I didn’t even realize. It’s been so much fun working with everybody and having those more cinematic pieces and just being able to come in and display other sides of the ‘The Interview Queen.’”
How did this love/hate relationship with Selena de la Renta come about? It was really like an old-school wrestling angle there for a while between the two of you on Twitter. Talk to me about how “The Worsties” came about. “She’s the worst. We’d be in the locker room together, and we’d have to film promos. She was always a little off-putting. I never had issues with a single person at MLW. All the guys, it’s like a brotherhood, and it’s fantastic. But she was just always so rude to me. I could say a lot of worse words, but she was horrible. Then it got to the point where she was starting to represent and manage Mil Muertes for a match, so I sent out a graphic (of them), but put the poop emoji on her face. Super juvenile, but I thought it was hilarious, and I said, ’Wow, Selena finally looks good for once.’ She clearly did not like it and wrote a rebuttal, and then for weeks we just went at it on Twitter and did not stop this fueled hatred and frustration towards one another. Then we decided, you know what? Let’s try to call it even. Let’s film (us confronting) and post it online, like there’s literal footage of what went down in case stuff does hit the fan. We had a talk, and it did not go well. So we’ve never seen eye to eye, and since then, we’ve turned it into ‘The Worsties.’ We’re both businesswomen, so we realized we can put our differences aside and people do like seeing us go at it and us together. Let’s try to make this work and make some coin off of it, and at the same time try to not kill one another. And it’s interesting, too, because I feel like deep down she wants to be my best friend. So that’s why when we were talking, ‘What do we call this? What is this?’ At first we called it ‘Frenemies,’ then we decided, ‘Nah. We’re not friends. You’re the worst person I’ve met. You’re my Worstie.’ So we decided to go with that. Now, we have matches, there’s pages for everybody to follow, we do photoshoots together. Once a month I stay with her for like a week to two weeks, and it’s turned into something crazy.”
Speaking of doing matches with Selena, is getting in the ring on a more full-time basis something you might entertain in the future? “When I am down there (with Selena), I have been training. Now, I did get injured when I was in the ring, because my body, even though I’m thicker, I’m just a wimp. I bruise like a peach and I’m a total baby. I see what my friends go through, and I just don’t want to put myself through that. But I can’t really say that I don’t want to wrestle. A year ago I said I would never set foot in a wrestling ring to wrestle, and I’ve done that for the pay-per-view matches we’ve put together. So, anything can happen. I’m not opposed to it anymore, but I know deep down it will probably end up ruining me, so we’ll have to see (laughs).”
Did you grow up a wrestling fan? Was becoming a wrestling interviewer always on your radar? “I have been a fan for a very long time. I started watching it when I was about 3-years-old, and like most wrestling fans, I went up and down in terms of my love for it, but I’ve always been a fan. When I got to a point where my website was getting fairly big on the music side — I just came off interviewing Metallica and Motörhead — it was my dad who was my manager as a teenager, and he said, ‘Why don’t you start interviewing wrestlers? Your site’s doing well. You love that whole idea. So why don’t you try it?’ I thought, ‘You know what? Let’s give this a shot.’ So next thing I know I was at an indie show here in Toronto doing my first wrestling interview, and I was so nervous. I thought it was gonna be so different from music, but it went so well, and that kind of inspired me to move forward. I never thought it would turn into what it did, in terms of becoming a host and part of storylines and traveling because of it, but you just kind of have to ride that wave when it feels good.”
Talk about how you got into journalism. You started your own music blog as a teenager, right? “That’s exactly it. Pretty much I would be in class just bored out of my mind. I finished assignments early. I would always throw my headphones in, because I had some pretty cool teachers that would allow that at the time. I would listen to tunes, and I would just start writing reviews of them in my notebook. I’d go to a concert the night before, and I started writing down concert reviews. Then when I started telling my parents at the time how much I was writing, they said, ‘Why don’t you start throwing this up on a blog?’ So I started a random WordPress, called it ‘A Music Blog Yea’ to be super cheeky, because everyone had a blog, and decided to put my writing online. Next thing I know, I was at a concert six months after that seeing a band I love called Bombay Bicycle Club, and we had this really crappy HD camera. I went with my dad and my sister, and afterwords we got to meet the band. My dad said, ‘Hey, why don’t you ask them two questions?’ So, as a nervous wreck that I was as a 17 years old, I asked one of my favorite bands two super short questions, threw it online and for some reason, people enjoyed it. Then I started doing more of these video interviews, and I loved it. I was getting free concert tickets, and I was getting to spend time with the bands that I loved without having to pay for a meet-and-greet. This was a teenager’s dream who loved music. From there it just grew into what it is today, which still blows my mind. But I’m still super grateful for that first two-question interview.”
Who have been some of your most notable and/or favorite interviews? “This is so difficult. I’m really lucky that within my years of doing this, I think I’ve done like 4,500 interviews, which is crazy. Metallica changed everything for me. I’ve never been so nervous or anxious for an interview in my entire life. Once I did that, and it went so well, and not only did the band like it, the publicist did, I thought, ‘OK, throw whatever my way now. We’re doing this.’ So that was incredible. Being backstage at RiotFest and interviewing Motörhead, I believe it was two weeks before Lemmy passed away. That was just for so many reasons emotional and touching. Then funny enough, Jericho. I was so excited for that first interview. He was my favorite growing up from on the mic to his attitude, I loved him and still do. And one of the more recent ones was having Ace Frehley of KISS. I adore KISS, so having an absolute icon like that on the channel blew my mind.”
So what’s the rest of your 2022 look like? “This year is already shaping up to be insane, and for me to say that only in January has me so excited. Not only will I be at all the upcoming MLW tapings, they have some huge plans for me that will be taking effect at our Dallas show (taping takes place Jan. 21). So I’m excited, I’m anxious, cause it’s going to be a massive change. But we’re going to shock everybody, so I’m very excited for that. When it comes to my interviews … I just want to be that household name known for being charismatic and being able to bring out the best in people. I love talking with people, which is weird, because I kind of am anti-social. But I love the research and investigating and just chilling with friends. I just want to continue to grow, which is so cheesy, but I just kind of want to take over in that sense and be known for being good at what I do.”
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