Review: William Regal live in Liverpool

Image: William Regal (credit Eros Comedy)

We'd previously got excited about the prospect of the homecoming of the North West's finest Sports Entertainment superstar William Regal, perfectly coinciding with the showcase of WWE's flagship weekly event Monday Night Raw hitting these shores, and thus couldn't wait to see if the show in itself lived up to it.

Before attending we had been present at Raw, held in the nearby Liverpool Echo Arena. We’re never anything but amazed at the diversity of the audience professional wrestling attracts, with a mixture of School Day Trip meeting a Bigg Market New Year's Eve. Lot's of clever chants, ironic signs and what is becoming the new British obsession... Fancy Dress.

Before we get into the business of the review we've an admission to make - sitting two rows away from our seats was British Actor/Director Noel Clarke, a man who has made no bones of admitting he is something of an WWE obsessive.

When 'The Ravishing Russian' Lana ordered the entire arena to stand in respect of her national anthem we did, only midway to turn directly to Clarke, trying to look incognito via a New Era Yankees Baseball Cap, and demand he show defiance to Obama's NSA Facebook Spying and support for Snowden. It resulted in a look of utter awkwardness - worth the attendance alone.

Alongside that we saw Mark Henry do another classic botch, 13 Time WWE Champion Triple H pay homage to his hero Freddie Mercury by singing and Alicia Fox deliver the best tilt-a-whirl backbreaker we've seen, even surpassing the late Eddie Guerrero.

We left the arena happy, and then made the short walk to a basement very similar in appearance to that most infamous of Liverpool venues - The Cavern Club, ready to see if Regal and his support act were capable of delivering the thrills we'd just witnessed at Raw.

Normally warm-up's for Stand-Up Comedy gig's are mediocre to good yet this wasn't the case for this event as Billy Kirkwood, the Colour Commentator for Glasgow's Insane Championship Wrestling alongside with professional comedian Chris Brooker delivered what many people would have been happy with being The Main Event.

The duo where that good that the Bar Staff, who seemed to know nothing about Pro Wrestling, were laughing hysterically as the routine focused on the illogical nature of being an adult fan. It was so good we began to get rather worried if William Regal could equal or surpass what was on offer - we're glad to report this didn't happen.

Regal’s style isn't exactly stand-up, but more a combination of after-dinner speaking meeting good old-fashioned dirty joke telling for over 90 minutes. We don't want to give an exact breakdown of the show to avoid ruining it for future audiences, instead here’s a run down of some of the varied topics raised... 

Regal regaled us with details about a highly awkward encounter with Phil Collins, an extreme phobia of a former tag-team partner, the exact moment he discovered that Professional Wrestling was pre-arranged, going on an epic Las Vegas drinking session with UFC legend Don 'The Predator' Frye and, most tellingly, his views on what makes a successful Professional Wrestler.

To have the opportunity to be in an venue that seated less than a hundred people and then getting an insight from a bona fide WWE Legend from the same region of the UK, is more rare than winning the lottery. We can only applaud promoters Eros Comedy for finding a venue in terms of location and size.

If, you're aficionado of both Professional Wrestling especially from Uncle Sam Land & like a laugh then Eros are your type of event organisers. If, The Miz can be in two WWE Films why couldn't Clarke direct Regal in a 21st Century 'Carry On' style production... we'll write the script of course.

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