Queen of the Ring tells the story of the trailblazing Mildred Burke, who had to grapple with the challenges of becoming a female wrestler during a difficult time for women in sports (and in general). However, the small-town single mother who became the first million-dollar female athlete in history couldn’t have risen to prominence in and out of the ring on her own. 

The WWE Hall of Famer and inaugural NWA Women’s Champion stood across the ring from a number of valiant opponents throughout her career, including Babs Wingo, Elvira Snodgrass, and June Byers. In Ash Avildsen’s excellent film, these legendary figures are played by Damaris Lewis, Marie Avgeropoulos, and Kamille (aka Kailey Latimer). And during the movie’s Los Angeles premiere, That Hashtag Show had the pleasure of speaking to each of them about the influential women that they portrayed.

Setting The Record Straight With Damaris Lewis

During the AEW Revolution pay-per-view this past weekend, filmmaker Avildsen was joined by Kelli Berglund and Damaris Lewis at ringside. The trio spoke to Tony Schiavone about the movie during the show, but Lewis’ comments came under fire from the wrestling fandom. She said, “One thing I learned about pro wrestlers: You all know you’re going to win before anybody else does. So thank you for teaching me that.” 

While many people accused the actor of breaking kayfabe and talking down about wrestling, she was actually talking about the mindset of wrestlers who view themselves as winners. While her co-stars came to her defense, this was also a sentiment that she shared with THS on the Queen of the Ring red carpet. 

When asked about her experience playing one of the first black women to rise to stardom in professional wrestling, Lewis said, “It is an honor to be cast, but a bigger honor to be trusted to play Babs [Wingo].” She found the stories of Burke, Wingo, and the rest of the wrestlers highlighted in the movie to be an inspiration. But it was their attitudes that really stuck with Lewis after cameras stopped rolling. “She is a woman who didn’t take no for an answer,” said the star. “Babs and all these women knew in their hearts that they were winners before other people did. You have to keep that in your heart.”

What Marie Avgeropoulos Learned In & Out Of The Ring

Lewis also shared that the cast underwent rigorous wrestling training to prepare for Queen of the Ring. She mentioned the great time they had learning under Doug Basham and Mickie James at OVW, the Louisville-based promotion that many may remember from the Netflix docu-series The Wrestlers. Her co-star Marie Avgeropoulos, who played Elvira Snodgrass in the film, reiterated how great the experience was for them. “We all took bumps. We all fell in the ring. [We were] covered in bruises, but it was worth every minute,” she recalled.

But as tough as her time in the ring was, Avgeropoulos shared some of the incredibly tough things that the real woman behind her character had to endure in her heyday: “Elvira Snodgrass was a renegade. I learned that she used to keep a man’s cap in the back of her car to make it look like she wasn’t traveling alone and to be safe. And she unfortunately had to sever her own arm off because she got in a car accident on the way to a match. There were no cell phones back then [to call] for medical attention. She was brave!”

Kamille Went From Brickhouse To Byers

Speaking of tough, you might be hard-pressed to find any Queen of the Ring cast member as tough as Kailey Latimer. Though the world at large may know her now as the phenomenal talent behind June Byers opposite Emily Bett Rickards’ Mildred Burke, she is best known to wrestling fans as NWA and AEW star Kamille. But as big and tough as she is in the ring, she was nothing but grateful for the opportunity to honor Burke, Byers, and their contemporaries with her performance in this film.

Kamille shared that this story is an important one because even huge fans may not fully know about this era of wrestling history. But rather than have it disappear into the ether, she is glad that they could put a spotlight on a time when it was illegal to be a female wrestler in some places around the country. Although, since she was a part of the National Wrestling Alliance and holding their Women’s Championship (which is affectionately known as The Burke) at the time of filming, did she feel any added pressure on her muscular shoulders as she brought June Byers to life?  

“Of course there was a sense of pressure there, but it was more of an honor,” she revealed. “That was the feeling that I was feeling the whole time. As I was playing June Byers, she was number five on the all-time wins list and I was number six. While we were filming, I became number five and [now] she’s six. It felt like, symbolically, she was passing the the torch to me.”

But if it ever came to be that Kamille finds herself across the squared circle from Byers, the honor and reverence may have to stay in the locker room: ”I think it would be one heck of a fight.”

Queen of the Ring is playing in theaters now.

For more on Wrestling, make sure to check back to That Hashtag Show.

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‘Queen Of The Ring’ – If You Didn’t Know Mildred Burke, Now You Do [Review]