(All photos are used with the express permission of the photographer. All copyrights belong to the respective photographer. Photo credits included with each photo. Thanks to Zia Shoots Wrestling , Rich Wexler Photography, Neil Kohl, and Genna Joy.)
If you’ve checked out an independent wrestling show in the Northeast region recently then you might already be acquainted with our spotlight wrestler for the month of December: CPA!
I first got a chance to see CPA for myself this past October at LVAC's October Let's Hang Out event. On a show filled with colorful characters and top notch wrestling CPA still managed to stand out.
I had a chance to sit down with CPA recently. It was one of the most rewarding interviews that I have ever conducted and I hope you enjoy getting an insight into the mind of CPA the wrestler and the man.
Growing up, professional wrestling was inextricably linked to action movies and Saturday morning cartoons, I felt kinship with CPA as he explained how his love of wrestling began.
“I grew up watching Terminator 2, and weird crazy over the top action movies, …my first exposure to wrestling that I can remember . . .I saw a Papa Shango Vignette. I started watching it and I had family members who watched it. A few older male family members of mine loaned me tapes . . . I was very into Kamala, Undertaker, and Giant Gonzalez, all the weird creepy characters, and of course Bret Hart, Hulk Hogan and Ultimate Warrior.”
We discussed Summerslam 92 being a seminal event in both his fandom as well as his choice to pursue professional wrestling.
“The combination of Undertaker against Kamala and Bret Hart against British Bulldog made me want to be a wrestler one day. I didn’t know the process for becoming a wrestler, I thought I guess I could just show up to WWE headquarters and then I'll become a wrestler.”
CPA joked, playing on his naivety in underestimating what it entailed to train to become a professional wrestler. When we got serious though I asked him who he considered his biggest wrestling influences.
“In Wrestling, I have levels, obviously Undertaker and Hulk Hogan . . .then I started liking Bret Hart and Shawn Michaels, then later on it was Ahmed Johnson, Stone Cold Steve Austin and Goldberg. The Bruisers, [and] tough guys who just had a lot of personality around them. Later on, on the indies it was Larry Sweeney and Bryan Danielson”.
Professional wrestlers draw inspiration from different art forms, not just other professional wrestlers. I wanted to know what performers outside of wrestling CPA admired or followed.
“I’m very big into music. If I do anything weird while I'm in the ring its [because} i’m a big Faith No More [fan] and anything Mike Patton. I’ve always watched Mike Patton on stage and been like “I don't know what he’s doing or why he’s doing it but there’s a reason”."
"Also Brian Wilson from the Beach Boys, such an awkward, socially inept human being as far as being able to move on stage. If you watch any Brian Wilson performance from the early stages of Beach Boys from when they're playing in front of a hundred . . .few thousand girls who want to ravage all of them, and he looks like he would rather be anywhere else on earth than on that stage in front of thousands of people who fawn over him!"
"There are others, Rob Halford from Judas Priest, the way he can command an audience, Freddie Mercury as well. I like to think that In some form or fashion I am taking their influences into my performances”.
While doing my research I stumbled upon the fact that CPA's twitter account revealed a large "The Simpsons" fan, I couldn't miss out on the opportunity to ask him his favorite episode.
“My actual favorite one is “The Springfield Files” I genuinely believe I’ve watched that episode at least 50 times. It was one of the first episodes I remember watching . . .where I understood a little more humor than when I was watching it when I was younger. Destination viewing for me at the time was King of The Hill, anything wrestling related, Ripley’s Believe it or Not, but occasionally I would catch a Simpsons episode, and that one completely destroyed me . . .its become one of my favorite things of all time”.
One question I brought up was about white collar and suit wearing based characters in general. An area that's a bit of a bone of contention for CPA. Mostly owing to the sometimes constant comparisons by some fans to the wrestler Irwin R. Schyster or IRS (wrestling legend Mike Rotunda).
“When I started wrestling I was kind of doing (accounting) work on the side, and I dunno CPA is me. I don’t really view it as a character cause it is very much me. There’s not a lot of gray area in there . . .chances are anything you see me doing in a wrestling ring I have done or would do . . .It’s just the way I am.”
"What you are seeing is me for the most part its not too much smoke and mirrors there, it's very accurate to the person that you are seeing in front of you who just happens to be wearing a pink shirt and a tie."
CPA gets a passionate as he explains how there are nothing but surface level comparisons between his character and IRS.
"That being said I’ve had people say “oh you’re like IRS” and I'm like ABSOLUTELY NOT! There’s nothing wrestling style related between me and IRS except we both wear ties basically. I had a woman come up to me at a show a few weeks ago and go “oh you like IRS!” Nope nothing like him. The “you wrestle like IRS'' thing is like the second or third most triggering to me.”
As someone who has seen more MIke Rotunda matches than even the average wrestling fan I can say CPA’s in-ring style is not in any way reminiscent of IRS. Mike Rotunda’s greco roman and collegiate wrestling style is not in any way similar to CPA’s more modern and technically expressive style, and high flying style.
“There’s literally people who are like “you’re just like IRS” and I’m like “you’re just about to lose me I gotta go”.
One area where CPA has beaten IRS to the punch is in the realm of barbed-wire death match wrestling. CPA competed in his first one recently against Shawn Donovan for WrestlePro.
“I had a few hardcore matches, but that was the most aesthetically violent match I’ve had so far. I don’t know what came over me . . . it was weird, it was wildly out of my comfort zone. I do alot of wildly crazy stuff in my matches, a lot of stuff that I do is not on brand for most wrestlers of my ilk (if there are any)"
" I think I did okay, I had to climb up a ladder that was 100 percent broken and not meant to carry human weight. I walked up to it and [thought] “you know what I’m either gonna die or make this happen” I am seeing this to the end. This ladder is my ride or die right now, I’m either gonna ride it or die. I was determined to make that work and I guess to some extent I did."
I really enjoyed sharing my love of classic WCW with CPA by discussing the 3 on 1 handicap matches that are the specialty of Paul Wight, a match-style that CPA experienced first hand, in his hometown of Queens, NY alongside partners RSP, and VSK.
“It was such a surreal, out of body experience. I’m from Queens originally too. Out of everyone who I grew up with that were wrestling fans, I’d say about 85 percent of them were there in attendance. I only know that because my phone nearly exploded after the match with people I haven’t spoken to in years messaging me “Oh my God I just saw you wrestle [Paul Wight]!"
"I can’t really quantify what it was like. The only way I could summarize it was when I finally posted the perfect picture of [Paul Wight] standing there with a befuddled look on his face holding a clip on tie, and the caption I chose was “I’ve done a lot of weird things in Queens over the years, but there’s usually not 20,000 people there’’.
The last stop on my discussion with CPA was focused on what would make a “successful” career upon retiring. His honest and thoughtful answer evoked the spirit of my latest essay.
“I mean obviously I want to wrestle around the world and be a big television star, but as long as I can [wrestle] for a long time and create memories for people; to be an all-time wrestler. I’m aware that I'm not a Zach Sabre Jr, or a Lee Moriarty or someone who’s like “oh my god this is the best wrestler I’ve seen in my life” stature.”
“I just want to create memories and bring people back to what wrestling is supposed to be; and that’s a thing to take you away from real life. If I can do that for hundreds of thousands if not millions of people that would be superb”.“
I feel like people [who watch] wrestling are very angry, grumpy and frustrated and I want to bring them out of that. I want to make them happy, and make them realize that wrestling is supposed to be fun to watch. It’s supposed to bring different emotions out of you, but none of them are supposed to be “I’m angry because this guy only wrestles once a year, or I’m angry that this guy allegedly isn’t allowed to win this match or that match”. Wrestling is real guys come on, lets just have fun, let’s just watch it, and lets just enjoy it for what it is, and I’m trying to bring people back to that.”
"Of course I want to go out there and have a cool match and get people on twitter freaking out about it. But ultimately what I want people to say is “I really don’t like wrestling but I think I'm going to watch it now because of this CPA cat”. If I can do that for many, many people for many, many years to come I will be very happy.”
I really enjoyed the time I had talking with CPA and I have a feeling his future in wrestling is going to be very bright indeed. If you would like to see CPA wrestle live in action you can follow him on Twitter @CPAWrestles or on Instagram to see where he will be next!
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