“I feel like I’m living the dream,” says professional wrestler Zak Bevis at the start of new BBC documentary ‘Step into the Ring’ “…by helping people live their dream.” Sure enough, this four-part series which uses the world of British wrestling as a backdrop is really about the journey that a collection of young people go on – all of whom have their own challenges to overcome – as they try to achieve their goals. It just so happens that the people we meet watching ‘Step into the Ring’ all dream about the same thing: making it in pro wrestling.
It’s perhaps no surprise then that Bevis, who both wrestles for Norwich-based World Association of Wrestling and acts as a mentor in the developmental WAW Academy, ended up in this role. He’s the son of British wrestling legends Ricky and Saraya Knight, who both founded WAW back in 1994. He’s one half of the UK Hooligans tag team with his brother Roy, while sister Saraya-Jade (better known as Paige) is a multi-time champion in the WWE. It’s a family affair. The family are no strangers to cameras, either. Mum Saraya was the subject of an ITV documentary called Muscles & Mascara, while the Paige and Zak story… well, that’s got a fair bit of coverage of it’s own.
Indeed, the story of Zak and Paige, their quest to get signed by a major international promotion and the moments that their lives started to follow very different paths has been told twice over: first in the 2012 documentary ‘The Wrestlers: Fighting with My Family’, and then dramatized seven years later in the ‘Fighting with My Family’ movie.
In the first, the real Zak and family are shown dealing with the fallout of Paige being offered a contract – the mixed emotions of being proud of their new home-grown WWE superstar, whilst also handling the obvious disappointment of it not being a double celebration.
In the feature length dramatization, we cover similar ground, but this time get to see Zak finding his calling acting as a mentor and trainer for young people in his home town – even training a blind student to take bumps and wrestle in the ring. It’s a great story, but way too Hollywood an ending to be true, right? Well…
‘Step into the Ring’ is really the third chapter in the Zak Bevis trilogy: a chapter which shows a man who has dealt with bitter disappointment, overcome challenges of his own and carved out his niche by (to steal his own words) helping others to live out their dreams. In fact, Zak will point out that while he appears in all of the episodes, it’s really the young people that he’s training who take the spotlight.
Yes, there really is a wrestler who is legally blind. Yes, there’s two wrestlers who overcome anxiety to perform – one of whom has dealt with post traumatic stress on top of that. Yes, there’s a wrestler who has autism, and perhaps most movingly, there’s a wrestler who has Down’s syndrome. All of them are under Zak’s tutelage and, whilst all very different, can find a shared touchpoint in their love of pro-wrestling. “Wrestling is very accepting. There’s a home here for everyone,” observes Zak. It’s a home that, whether he’s too humble to accept or not, Zak has played a massive part in building.
In the 2012 documentary, Zak’s older brother Roy worried that the rejection by the WWE would send his younger sibling down a risky road – one that, by his own admission, saw both father Ricky and brother Roy wind up on the wrong side of the law.
While Zak acknowledges he truly did struggle in those early days after Paige was signed and he wasn’t (his admission of barely remembering the first six months of his son’s life because of depression is heart-breaking), we now get to see that no, he didn’t go down that path, that yes, he found a better direction and has lifted up countless people around him as a result – and not just in a superplex kind of way.
“Being around positive people, doing positive stuff. I started finding my way again. I’m helping people,” he observes. I’ll say he is.
Through this four part series we meet Marcus – AKA Marvel Marcus, whom Zak is mentoring not just in-the ring, but outside of it too. We watch as Bevis helps Marcus practice life skills that will help him as readily in the real world as under the lights of a wrestling show. We meet James – inspiration for the blind wrestler found in ‘Fighting With My Family’ – training to take literal leaps of faith off the top rope. Landing a top turnbuckle splash must be nerve wracking at the best of times, but not being able to see where you’re landing? That’s next level.
We meet Pocket, AKA the sub-5ft tall Violet O’Hara, taking the first steps back into the ring after a series of events knocked her confidence as hard as any wrestling bump. Then there’s Imogen, who morphs into the heelish Bella Van Der Velt (complete with valet / butler who accompanies her to the ring), who showcases how a good character can provide a veritable suit of armour for a performer still finding their identity.
Then there’s Sam – that’s Slick Sam to you – a lifelong wrestling fan with Down’s syndrome who works for a year to put on an exhibition match and live out his dream of being a wrestling superstar. I hope Sam knows that the pop he gets from the live crowd at his solo debut is going to be echoed many times over once his episode airs.
And yes Sam, I’ll admit it: you made me cry.
And that’s the really lovely thing about ‘Step into the Ring’: you won’t need to be a wrestling fan to enjoy it. The themes it explores – resilience, ambition, hope, vindication, passion – they’re not exclusive to within a wrestling ring: that just happens to be where we watch them play out.
It’s funny, too. Mid-way through prepping for an event at the Pub on the Shrubs in Norfolk (and yes, I’m going for a cheap Mick Foley-eque ‘name a place, get a pop’, there), we watch the guys getting ready for their matches… in the pub kitchen. “We’re actually in a five star dressing room,” the referee comments to legally blind wrestler James. He fires back: “Makes no difference to me. I can’t fucking see it, can I?”
Brilliant.
Ultimately, ‘Step into the Ring’ is life-affirming stuff. If I had any criticism, though, it’s that I’d have loved to have had more time with the people we meet – the pretty tight duration of each episode (around 20 minutes) means that when big revelations come about the wrestlers or would-be wrestlers on the show, we move on from them just a little too quickly – we never quite get to dig as deep as I’d like. These are real people with complex lives, and when these often life-changing events are referenced, it’s almost as if the director moves away before things get too personal or, dare I say it, too real. In the grand scheme of things, though, wanting more is no bad thing. If this is chapter three of the Zak story, surely it’s just a question of time until part four?
If anything, critics are perhaps more likely to take a passing look at this series and argue that it’s exploitative, or that the physical and mental health barriers faced by these would-be stars are played for comic relief. After all, loving wrestling isn’t exactly widely embraced or respected out in the real world, never mind dreaming of making it AS a wrestler. A blind kid trying to wrestle? Irresponsible, they’d say. Wrestlers dealing with anxiety? Why? None of it is real anyway, they might answer.
Yet they’d be totally missing the point. This isn’t the story of a collection of people who have been rejected from somewhere else and wound up in wrestling because no one else would take them – far from it. This is a story of people who have made it to exactly where they want to be. They have their Wrestlemania moments – even if they’re not actually at Wrestlemania, and it’s a privilege to see them achieve it.
‘Step Into The Ring’ is available now on BBC iPlayer in the UK.
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