In an exclusive interview with Last Word on Pro Wrestling, we had the chance to talk with one of the fastest rising stars on the independent wrestling scene, Billie Starkz.
Starkz is well-known for her time in Game Changer Wrestling (GCW) as of late, as well as being a major part of the Mid-Western independent scene in the United States. Most recently, Starkz competed at WrestleMania weekend, competing in both GCW’s The Collective and IWTV’s Showcase of the Independents. Here are some highlights from the interview as Starkz discusses balancing school with wrestling, the Big Starkz Brand, stories of Nick Gage, and so much more.
Q: What was your favorite match from this past WrestleMania weekend? Whether it be yours or overall!
“I feel like that’s hard,” Starkz said. “There were so many great matches that entire weekend. If I had to choose my favorite match of that entire weekend it’d probably be me and Allie’s (Kat) match at Hot Girl or my Gary match, Gary Jay, at Family Reunion. Both were so much fun but I feel like they were great in other aspects but I feel they’d be a good watch for anybody. But that weekend there were so many matches going on that you can’t really be like, ‘oh, this one was the best.’ I remember that I was really, really excited to watch Low Ki and Lio Rush at VxS so that was a fun watch and I felt like they showed out. There’s so much!”
Q: How has it been balancing school and pro wrestling?
“School has always been super, like I am very, not to brag. I don’t like being this person but school comes easy to me. For some reason book smarts, I don’t understand it but I’ve always done really, really well in school and my family and my teachers all work with me. Most of the time I’m like, ‘hey, I don’t time for this I’m on this weekend’ or ‘hey I am going to try and type this paper in the car but please work with me. If I need to redo this, please give me a chance.’ And my freshman year of high school, my gym teacher gave me the opportunity… her rule was that if you miss my class, send me videos of you working out.
“So I was like, ‘okay.’ And the funny thing was, I started sending her my wrestling matches and that would count as my credit for missing because most of the time I would miss on Fridays because I had to leave early for a show and her class was like my sixth period. And I would send it to her and she would be like ‘oh, that was really awesome. It was really entertaining. Here’s your credit.'”
Q: What are among the top pro wrestling seminars you have attended in terms of learning from them?
“I feel like one of my favorite ones that I took was Jonathan Gresham‘s. He just broke things down and we were able to talk things through. I also did an ACH seminar and he conditioned us so well and I was like ‘I need to get into better shape.’ That was a lot of what I was thinking. You could see him (ACH) pushing people’s limits and my dad talked to him while taking him back to the airport. Of him being like ‘yeah. By the way, we were going to do more. I just ran out of time.’ He was trying to stay as long as possible and he was trying to get everybody ready and take care of stuff and he was still like ‘I wanted to do more.’ And I was sitting there just dying.”
Q: In light of the recent Dark Side of the Ring episode, people have been sharing their Nick Gage stories to the world. Do you have any stories with the “King” that you’ll remember forever?
“I’ve been around him quite a few times but this was before I was wrestling on GCW,” Starkz said. “He came to a St. Louis Anarchy show and he had a seminar and he’s going around asking people ‘what’s your gimmick? Who are you?’ He’s giving advice to a bunch of people and he gets to me and is like ‘what are you?’ and I’m like ‘I’m Space Jesus’ and he goes ‘Oh, that’s perfect and then keep moving. Like I didn’t have to explain anything to this man. He was like ‘nope, I get it.’
“And it gets even better because he gets to my friend Cole Radrick. And Cole Radrick at the time was trying to be this tough guy wrestler and he was like ‘oh I am trying to be this tough guy wrestler’ and Nick goes, ‘shut up p*ssy.’ And everyone goes ‘what!’ and you see Cole just *shocked*. It was hilarious and it’s still that thing we make fun of him for.”
Q: Who is your dream opponent in all of wrestling?
“I would love to wrestle Millie McKenzie,” Starkz said. “Millie McKenzie got signed and she was on my hit list forever. I want to wrestle her so bad because I just fell in love with her matches within the past year, year, and a half. Oh my god, I love her. And I would watch a lot of her stuff and she was just so entertaining.”
We want to give a huge thank you to Billie Starkz for giving us the chance to sit down and talk about her career. You can follow Billie Starkz on Twitter — @BillieStarkz — and check out the Big Starkz Brand website for Billie Starkz merchandise and essentials.
You can also listen to the interview in its entirety here.
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