Interview: Dark Side of the Ring Producers on Series Direction and Montreal Screwjob

A recent episode of the Smark to Death podcast show had Evan Husney and Jason Eisener, producers of Viceland’s Dark Side of the Ring series, as guests and some of the topics discussed included their direction for the series and their approach towards the infamous Montreal Screwjob incident.

On the topic of their direction for the series, Husney stated that his main goal was to create a wrestling-based documentary series that would be accessible to people who are not wrestling fans.

Husney – “With the Montreal screwjob story, we’re huge fans of Wrestling With Shadows and the way we engineered the full series, obviously we’re hardcore wrestling fans, we’ve been fans our whole lives. We wanted to engineer this series to be accessible to people that aren’t fans of wrestling. What we wanted to do for a new generation to show just how dynamic and interesting and singular and bizarre the world of wrestling is. Almost like, this is the type of wrestling show a fan can show their friends or significant others to help them understand the thing that you love.”

Eisener – “Those are always some of our favorite compliments is when wrestling fans tell us they showed their loved ones and they become addicted to it. That’s one of the big reasons to do this show. We do the same thing, when you meet a non-wrestling fan you show them your favorite matches, some of the most emotional moments in wrestling.”

On the topic of their approach towards the infamous Montreal Screwjob incident, Eisener stated they wanted to approach it from a different angle and put the focus more towards the inner workings of WWE that led to the screwjob to be possible.

“With the Montreal Screwjob, there’s definitely fatigue around that story in terms of the hardcore wrestling fan, but for people like my dad or people that watch Viceland it is a super important story that kinda is the best entry point for a non-wrestling fan and how the backstage function, the backstage politics, how matches are orchestrated, what the stakes of that are ya know, it’s not just people going out and doing a bunch of ga-ga for the sake of it, and how important it is to be a champion. Really it’s to educate people on how that functions and it’s a perfect lead in to the other episodes.

We wanted to approach it at a different angle. One of them, which some people take an issue with, is the idea that here’s what happened, but also people still can’t agree on how this thing went down. It’s always interesting to me and it’s also fascinating to us that there are so many people that wanna take credit for this incidence, but they don’t wanna take credit at the same time.”