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THIS.IS.PROGRESS: More Than Just A Wrestling Film, More Than Just A Wrestling Company

THIS.IS.PROGRESS: More Than Just A Wrestling Film, More Than Just A Wrestling Company

We had a sneak peak at the documentary about British wrestling's most famous promotion and spoke to some of the people connected to the film

Ryan Sidle

Ryan Sidle

They say you can't stop progress and Elixir Media's documentary THIS.IS.PROGRESS shows that statement's never been truer than when it comes to British wrestling promotion PROGRESS. But this is more than a film about just wrestling. We spoke to four of the most important people from the documentary.

Very few stories are actually about their subject matter on a base level, spoiler alert Animal Farm isn't really anything to do with a farm run by talking pigs.

In that regard THIS.IS.PROGRESS is about far more than wrestling, in fact you need no knowledge of the industry and no knowledge of British wrestling's most in demand company to understand and enjoy the film.

We got a sneak peak of the film and spoke to four of the main people involved in it; director Dale Beaumont-Brown, PROGRESS co-owner and stand up comedian Jim Smallman, wrestler Mark Haskins and fan Paul Lee.

I'd assumed that director Dale Beaumont-Brown had been a fan of the company before deciding to make his 15 minute short documentary but when I spoke to him I soon found out that wasn't the case:

"I didn't know anything about PROGRESS until about a month before I started filming them which was about the end of May 2016.

"I've been a fan of wrestling on and off, I wouldn't call myself a mega wrestling fan or an ultra, I was a casual fan in passing when I was a teenager. I did a fair bit of stupidity with some friends and did some backyard wrestling- got injured, a lot; got seven concussions, broke my ankle, had some internal bleeding, you know the usual kind of thing.

"And then I went to university and completely forgot about wrestling. And then I was getting towards the end of production on my first documentary, called 'Grassroots; The Cannabis Revolution,' and this was the start of 2016 and I was looking for a new project and I didn't know where to go or what to do and myself.

"And my long term cohort and executive producer on this project Ross Hagan, me and him went to college together and we used to watch wrestling together and we started watching wrestling again and our friend James said to us 'have you guys heard of PROGRESS?' and I said 'no, I've never heard of them' didn't even really conceive the British wrestling was as hot as it was. I saw their free show, Chapter 13 on YouTube, caught Jim Smallman's podcast with Scroobius Pip for the Distraction Pieces Network and I had a lightbulb moment and thought I'd really like to make a film about these guys."

Co-owner and announcer Jim Smallman in the ring at Brixton Academy.
Co-owner and announcer Jim Smallman in the ring at Brixton Academy.

Whilst it was an instant attraction for Dale it wasn't quite as simple for Smallman, who is one of the owners of the company, and his business partners Jon and Glenn, "We get asked a lot for people to make documentaries about us so initially when we got the first request it was like 'we'll have a word with him but it's probably the same thing' we get a lot of people asking to do documentaries because basically they want free tickets.

"And we went and had a chat with him and it was a bit like 'oh actually this guys the real deal' and he told us about what he'd been doing, and also the fact that he understood wrestling because he was a backyard wrestler for a long time. So he's a fan of wrestling and he gets it and when we started talking to him within 5 minutes of speaking to him we said 'okay we're willing to let him into our world in order for this to happen.'

"A big thing for a documentary is it needs to be independent otherwise it's just a sort of propaganda piece for something. The fact that he wanted to make it and remain independent and just follow us around was I think was they key for us, rather than us having loads and loads of involvement in how it was made."

The film was initially launched as a short of about 15 minutes and concentrated on the story of the company putting on then their biggest show at London's infamous Brixton Academy.

The release of the short was so well received, particularly by fans of the company that Dale decided to make it into a feature but he needed the help of a crowdfunding campaign, that went extremely well.

Now a feature length documentary the film focuses on a second big show. In September 2017 PROGRESS went even bigger, 'ditching' Brixton for Alexandra Palace for their biggest show ever.

But the film isn't just about the story of three businessmen who have built a small British indie wrestling promotion into one of the most recognisable names in the admittedly niche world of indie wrestling.

All three owners with Dale.
All three owners with Dale.

Far more than that the film is about family, friends and devotion to a craft that is loved by the people who run it, perform within it and who follow it. Dale does that perfectly through the stories of three people. The owners, Jim, John and Glenn, PROGRESS star Mark Haskins, and his family, and 'Ultra' Paul Lee.

Haskins may well be the most intriguing part of the story. The filming of the initial short coincided with an extraordinary rollercoaster time in Haskins career. First we see him win the title at Brixton before he is soon told he may never wrestle again.

Juxtaposed with his career is his family. With two young children and a loving wife who is extremely supportive of his career it's impossible not to fall in love with the Haskins family, especially Jack- the real star of the show.

Mark told me what it was like hearing the news that he may never wrestle again, "That really sucked, I really wasn't happy doing that at that kind of time. But at the same time I had to face the facts, I'd spoken to a physio who said that he wouldn't recommend that I wrestled and that I'd have to take some time off if I wanted to have a chance of recovering."

Mark's wife Vicky.
Mark's wife Vicky.

We see in the film the moment Mark receives the news, then there's a quiet journey in the car before there's a magical moment with his daughter that changes everything. So what was that all like for Dale to be along for the ride? "He rang me about two days before his appointment with his physio and he was due to get a diagnosis from him about the state of his neck. Cut to a month previously, Mark had just won the PROGRESS title and he had about six or seven other titles from different companies as well, so he's literally riding a wave and he's right at the pinnacle of the indy wrestling scene globally and his star couldn't have shone brighter.

"So he rang me two days before his appointment and said 'I don't know what's going to happen in this meeting but I have a good idea. I think I'm about to have my heart ripped out and I think I'd like you there with your camera just in case my heart is about to be ripped out.' What do you say to that when someone says that to you?

"I'd become really close to Mark and his family so I took it personally as well so it's really difficult to try and hide those thoughts and feelings too but that's part and parcel of mine and Mark's relationship.

"I was the first person to actually find out that news and then obviously the drive home was tense, an hour long journey home and barely any words were said. And then we get back to Mark's home and little Lilly is there dressed like a bee, there's this moment where Mark goes from 'I'm about to lose everything' to 'oh my god there's my daughter she's dressed like a bee, isn't that amazing' and then they have this talk, Mark and Vicky, and they discuss everything that's going to happen and it's just heartbreaking stuff. So I feel privileged to have been there to document it.

"For the rest of the film it was going to be one of two things, I didn't know which way Mark's story was going to go it was either going to go down the lines of Mark is going to have to retire from professional wrestling and he's going to have to do something else and he's not done anything else in his life, he's been a wrestler for 13 years, so what else is he going to do. Or does he try and heal up and come back to wrestling so when filming it I really didn't know which way it was going to go."

Mark Haskins with daughter Lily. It's impossible to not fall in love with the Haskins' family.
Mark Haskins with daughter Lily. It's impossible to not fall in love with the Haskins' family.

Smallman and his partners had some big decisions to make but it wasn't the first thing on his mind, "There's two emotions, the first is that like everyone who works for me Mark is my friend and at the time we were told he didn't know if he'd ever wrestle again so I was gutted for my mate, especially gutted for him because I can empathise with him as I'm also a parent like he is and I remember thinking 'I don't know how he's going to earn money and he's got kids' and I remember being gutted for him from that point of view.

"The other side of it is we found out on the morning of the show that he'd abandon the title. So we had to make a decision of what to do and there were two options of what to do. One option was to have him lose to someone he was in the match with but we hadn't planned on that happening so we had to change plans, which often happens in the course of wrestling because people get injured, or get signed by WWE or whatever and we have to change our long term plans.

"We planned on Mark being our champion for a long time and those plans had to change, there was the stress of that but the stress of having to change our plans paled into insignificance to the sadness we felt for Mark at the time and the worry we had for him and his future."

Dale also wanted to get the story of the company through the eyes of the fans. PROGRESS has managed to cultivate the spirit of 'ultras' in football and no one encapsulates that better than Paul Lee, a huge Middlesbrough fan who used to travel from Boro to London and Manchester for the shows...now he travels from Glasgow every month.

Paul watches on from his usual balcony seat at the Electric Ballroom in Camden.
Paul watches on from his usual balcony seat at the Electric Ballroom in Camden.

Of course Paul was in the Electric Ballroom in Camden, PROGRESS' spiritual home and venue for their shows in London every month, when Mark had to hand over the title at the end of a show where he'd just defended the title before climbing back in the ring and leaving the belt there, "Everyone absolutely lost their shit when he won the title. That was one of THE moments of PROGRESS, it was cool as hell.

Then you fast forward. Me and my mate are sat at the balcony looking down when at the end of the match he just put the belt down and walked off and we were like 'what?'. We thought something was going on, some storyline thing.

"Then the next day it went up on social media, all about it. I just remember going back to the bus the next day when the news broke and I had to sit down for five minutes to take it all in. It's one thing if your favourite wrestler to drop a title in a story but it's another when out of nowhere they might not be able to do this thing you love again, it was crushing."

Travelling for Paul usually means leaving his house the night before the show and arriving in Camden in time to start the queue, often about five hours before doors even open, "On a show day, I set off from my house about half 9 on a Saturday night, go down, jump on the bus. 10-12 hour coach journey ahead, try and get some kip as best you can. When you get down there wait for the Tubes to start running on the Northern line because the lazy buggers don't start running till half 7 sometimes."

You won't speak to a nicer and more humble guy than Paul, who wasn't quite sure why Dale wanted to tell his story when he believes there's so many fans with similar to his own.

No better view than that of Jim Smallman and no better sight than watching the co-owner react to what's going on in the ring.
No better view than that of Jim Smallman and no better sight than watching the co-owner react to what's going on in the ring.

Paul's story resonates to the owners because it means so much to them seeing people travel so far for their shows and be so loyal, "At every show at least one person will come up to me and tell me how much the company means to them and I will explain to them how much it means to me that they've told me that. I'm very proud of our little company and I'm very proud they support it in the way they do and they love it the way do. And for someone like Paul to go through all the travel he has to go through to be at our shows and at the front of the queue every time and then be as enthusiastically into the shows as he is, it will never stop being cool.

"The stuff I say in the ring about it being a family, and how everyone's welcome and things like that, it's the truth and I, as a sports fan, that's how I want to watch football, that's how I'd want to watch any sport whatsoever and it's how I want wrestling to be. I want wrestling fans to feel welcome and feel comfortable and be able to come whether it's on their own or in a big group. I want them to know, as soon as they walk through the door, that they are part of something."

Jon might be the hardest working man in wrestling but he's not actually the robot we all thought he was.
Jon might be the hardest working man in wrestling but he's not actually the robot we all thought he was.

For all the people who might have meant to be the characters in the film they're all outshone by Haskin's son Jack. The initial short showed a shot of Jack and his dad on a walk near their home. Mark asked his son what he liked to do on their walk and he answered, "I like to chill out here and shoot some dinosaurs."

It's the most wonderful line anyone could have said and it instantly became an internet sensation. Fans took to Twitter to ask PROGRESS to name one of their chapters after it and at their fifth anniversary show, chapter 46, that's exactly what did happen.

Jim told me how it came about, "I think we must have watched the short and between the three of us said 'that's a good name for a chapter,' and then the fans started going 'that's a good name for a chapter isn't it.' Some chapters are really easy to name like between the three of us we tend to take turns naming them, unless something absolutely amazing comes up.

The dinosaurs one it was just like 'that's a cool phrase isn't it' so that's got to happen and we started discussing it and then the fans started wanting it and it's like 'well this is going to be the easiest show to name ever'- job done, dead easy.

For Dale the chapter name was the mark out moment of the whole process for him, "Oh I went mental when I found out.

"They didn't tell me. By making this I've obviously got to see a hell of a lot of stuff behind the curtain and sometimes before it even happens. But this time they didn't even tell me and it went out online and I thought 'hold on, I recognise that title' and I sent a screen grab to Mark and said 'the fans have spoken.'

"Once the short went out a load of fans were talking about the moment Mark turns to his son and a load of the fans screen grabbed it and were putting it on the fans page on Facebook and on Twitter. Then they named the fifth anniversary show after it and I cried. It was really special to me because they've all become I admire and respect through making the film. I was properly chuffed."

Director, Dale Beaumont-Brown.
Director, Dale Beaumont-Brown.

It went beyond a title though and Jack ended up accompanying Mark to the ring and not only that there was a special entrance. Mark wasn't so impressed that his requests have always been ignored but here was his son outshining him, "So I think like a week or two before the show I was saying if I ever got to do my 'Wrestlemania entrance' It would be with Jack shooting a dinosaur, the shows named after it, perfect, so let's do it.

"I spoke to John about it, John was super cool. I then had to gear Jack up into the mindset of going out and shooting a dinosaur. I was showing him some Progress and I was like 'so you'll walk out on stage with me in front of everyone we shoot some dinosaurs' and he was like 'yeah!' and then he starts humming the Jurassic Park theme song. And I was like 'well you'll be coming out to daddy's theme song' and he's like 'No! Jurassic Park theme song.'

"So I just jokingly told John, 'Jack's demanding his own theme music, lol' and then we get there on the day of the show and John tells me, 'Okay I've got the Jurassic Park music ready to go,' and I was thinking 'What?! how many ideas have I given you over the years that have been shot down and now my son has got his own show named after him and his own theme music as well.'

"It comes to the actual entrance and I've told Jack we're going to shoot the dinosaur and then we're going to walk to the ring and he was like 'who am I fighting' and I said 'no one' and he goes 'awww' so I say you're going with mum and he says 'okay..' We go out, he comes out with me, we shoot the dinosaur, he does my taunt and then he goes out with Vic.

"Then as we're leaving the show that night I get him to say goodbye to John as we're on our way out so he says thank you and John says "did you have fun?" and Jack answers 'yeah' then looks him straight in the face and says "next time I'll do Star Wars.'"

Jack Haskins is always the star of the show. The biggest babyface in wrestling since 1980's Hulk Hogan.
Jack Haskins is always the star of the show. The biggest babyface in wrestling since 1980's Hulk Hogan.

The fact that Jack is already getting his return booking in is good news for the PROGRESS fans, Jack could be a draw for years to come.

The future is bright for the company all round with Jack's sister Lilly, Dale's daughter Daisy and Jim's son, who already has his wrestler name 'Claudio,' all being talked up by their parents for future feuds. As Jim jokes nepotism in wrestling is good, so expect Claudio to have the title soon.

In the slightly nearer future Jim told me what's next on this bonkers journey that's already seen them in New Orleans and Australia this year, on top of their usual London, Manchester, Sheffield and Birmingham shows:

"World domination. I think we're going to do a show on the moon.

"The busiest year in the history of the world. I don't think we can do any more than we've already got planned this year. Wembley Arena is the big thing, Super Strong Style at Alexandra Palace is the other big thing. Victoria Warehouse is the other big thing. Plus loads of other shows, plus other loads of other cool stuff. It's a busy year.

"All the shows in the world, hopefully all the cool stories because we've got loads of cool stuff planned for this year we're starting to set up now and Wembley which is kind of badass.

"...The world's crazy, as long as things are going well. The goal for JJG, and it's been the same goal since day one, is let's send everyone home happy and feeling like they can't wait to see the next show. As long as we're still doing that then we're doing okay. I want people to go home thinking 'I enjoyed that,' and as long as we keep doing that we're doing well. And it doesn't matter what size venues we're doing or how often we're doing shows. That's the goal for the year, make sure people still want to come and see us, so fingers crossed."

PROGRESS' one rule is 'don't be a dick' and their other tagline is 'everyone is welcome' and it truly feels like that. Cameo appearances from PW GrrrlGang's Suzy and wrestler Jack Sexsmith reinforce that belief and both do wonderful things in different ways for those who wouldn't traditionally be represented at wrestling shows.

Women wrestlers Dahlia Black and Jinny have a wonderful exchange and no story about PROGRESS would be complete without an appearance from Jimmy Havoc, his and the company's story is one worth checking out on their on demand service.

There's also a wonderful embrace between John and Glenn at the end of last year's Alexandra Palace show that could easily be missed but is absolutely beautiful.

Jinny and Dahlia might not be in the film for long but their wonderful friendship still comes through.
Jinny and Dahlia might not be in the film for long but their wonderful friendship still comes through.

But it is of course the fans and the family aspect of this company, and the film about it, that make it so worthwhile so it seems only fair to give it to Paul for the last word on what exactly the company means to him.

"It's the biggest cliche where 'this fandom is like a family,' but it really is. PROGRESS is a whole family. I've got my routine, I get there early, go and have my breakfast, comeback and start the queue. There's 10 or 15 people I can set my watch by, I know when they're going to get there. Go and have my usual chats and catching up.

"You realise looking back they've been your friends for 18 months- 2 years and when you need someone you know you can rely on them and that's just the fans side of things and we've become a really close knit group. Then you've got the wrestlers themselves, everyone who works for Progress seems to be a nice guy or nice woman by default, they don't book arseholes. Or if they do they book them once and never book them again.

"Everyone just gets involved, it's always a good time."

They say you can't stop PROGRESS, quite frankly I've no idea why you'd want to.

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Topics: British wrestling, Wrestling News, WWE News, Wrestling, WWE