Directed by Ryan Bruce Levey
Starring Byron Anthos, Jordan Blade, Steve Blair
Unrated
Runtime: 1 hour, 44 minutes
Will play at Fantasia Film Festival July 14 until August 3

by Anthony Glassman, Contributor

Pride Month might be over, but much like a pro wrestler going for heavyweight championship, it’s not tapping out. That’s right, it’s taking over July to give you a body-slam of epic proportions with an intimate, heartfelt look at the history and current state of LGBTQ+ performers in an industry that made its name on hypermasculinity and incredibly mixed messages about femininity.

Ryan Bruce Levey’s Out in the Ring examines queers in wrestling from the heterosexuals playing crypto-gay characters like Gorgeous George through to today, when athletes like Effy and Dark Sheik are replacing the Red and Blue brands of the WWE with rainbow flags and self-expression.

There is a distinct axis flowing through the film, from the somewhat tragic need to hide that Susan Green and Pat Patterson felt in their careers, to the liberation that Sonny Kiss and Billy Dixon bring to the ring in the present. Green went through the Fabulous Moolah’s training and booking to become a wrestler, and despite having been around the block for years, Moolah was “not having it” when it came to lesbians in the ring. Green fought on, though.

On the other hand, Patterson was a regional champion for years before going to what was then the WWF and becoming the Intercontinental Champion, eventually taking a position as an executive with the company and steering aspects of it for decades. However, he only talked openly about his sexual orientation for a few years before his death, despite almost literally everyone around him knowing he was gay and that his “friend” was his husband.

Chris Kanyon’s and Chyna’s battles with mental health were exacerbated by the hyper-heterosexuality of the wrestling world, and are likely prominent factors in their untimely deaths. Thankfully, as Levey shows the audience, there are so very many people working to make wrestling an open, affirming and supportive community now, like Effy with his Big Gay Brunches, or Billy Dixon, or Papa Don, or Dark Sheik, who announced in the ring to a venue full of fans when she started hormone replacement therapy.

Levey also shows us that there is a panoply of different ways that queer wrestlers are expressing themselves as well. Sonny Kiss goes with the femme (and, on an unrelated note but it has to be said, has the cutest tushie in pro wrestling), Mike Parrow is a beast of a man. And speaking of beasts, Nyla Rose shows that women, whether cisgendered or trans, don’t need to be girly, while the mother of the exoticos in the Mexican wrestling scene, Cassandro, shows that you don’t need to be butch to beat the shit out of the guys around you.

On a side note, out wrestling journalist, Wade Keller from the Pro Wrestling Torch news website is also interviewed in the film, praising the current expanding state of the wrestling universe. Many years ago, I contacted Keller for help in trying to write an article on LGBTQ professional wrestlers, probably a decade before it was prudent to do so, but he was even then a staunch ally and connected me with the then-head of TNA Wrestling, Jerry Jarrett, who was also very helpful, kind and pleasant. So even in the days when things seem dark, there are those in the industry with good hearts and welcoming natures.

While currently playing the festival circuit, given the opening of the fests to curated streaming, Out in the Ring might be coming to a city or television near you. Keep an eye out and support this hard-working novitiate filmmaker and all the hard workers who give their all in the squared circle. And if you can, definitely keep an eye out for live wrestling shows in your area—it’s spreading like wildfire, and there is nothing like the energy of a live wrestling show.