The Bunny Reveals Which Movies Inspired Her AEW Character
On a recent episode of AEW Unrestricted, Allie, a.k.a. The Bunny, sat down with Aubrey Edwards and Tony Schiavone to talk about her AEW journey so far. She discussed when she found out she would have her AEW debut match.
"That was unexpected. I was actually in line at Target buying Oreos, shocking, I know, and I got the call," Allie recalled. "And it was like, 'Can you be available to wrestle on Fyter Fest? And I think it was a couple of days, maybe two days, and I remember I was holding the Oreos in my hands and I was like, yeah, okay, I think I'll just put these down.
"I was given the opportunity, and I remember just feeling so happy and excited to walk out during my entrance and seeing the fans. It was one of the coolest experiences ever, and I really felt, at that moment, I was now officially part of AEW because leading up to that, it's like that thing where you know that you work there but you haven't really had a full taste of it yet. And then once I actually walked out and I felt the crowd, what a high. I rode a wave. I was so happy."
The Bunny character coincided with the debut of The Butcher and The Blade. Allie described what it meant to her to not only debut her new character but also be there for her husband's, The Blade's, AEW debut.
"Well, I guess first and foremost, working with my husband and not only working with him but being in the moment where he got to debut at AEW was probably one of the highlights of my entire career," Allie admitted. "It was very emotional for myself for Andy, Butch, and for Jesse, obviously, The Blade. I felt very, very lucky because I know how hard he's worked to get to this point. I mean, he's been in the business for 20 years, just to be able to crawl out of a ring and stand side by side with him was, man, that was so cool. I'm getting emotional just talking about it because I was so proud. I was so proud of him.
"I was like, yes, you deserve this. I was happy for me, obviously, but it was more like, nah, this is your moment, and I just want you to soak it up, so that was really cool. And I love working with him, and I love working with Andy and I feel very lucky because I've got my husband and one of my best friends with me, so it's pretty cool. But in terms of reinventing my character, I felt like having my hair cut off was a bit of a breaking point for the character Allie and also for myself. Coming into AEW, I was going through a really hard time, and I felt really directionless in my life in general.
"When I was able to reinvent myself as The Bunny, I got to take all that energy and all of those things that I was going through and inject them into the character, which I think helps make her more authentic because it was coming from a real place. I needed change I desperately needed change, and I feel like The Bunny, I guess she's a little crazy sometimes, but she's crazy for a reason. She's crazy for a reason, and I felt like creatively, it helped me express some of those feelings I had. And I felt like it was time. I had been this super bubbly, happy persona, and it was time to switch it over. It was time to show a different side of myself as a Bunny."
The Butcher and The Blade have spoken in detail about the inspirations behind their characters. Allie discussed the influences behind The Bunny.
"The Bunny is kind of a combination of a lot of different things," Allie stated. "I love horror movies. It's my favorite genre, and I like to draw things out of characters that I've seen and kind of take little pieces of that. One of my inspirations for The Bunny is a character from House of 1000 Corpses and The Devil's Rejects. There's a character called Baby, so I drew a little inspiration from her. I drew some inspiration from another TV show that I love called The Vampire Diaries. There's a character named Katherine. She's a very interesting character.
"I took some from. The movie The Strangers, I took some from that, but then also, I took a lot, believe it or not, from my own experience in my own life. I kind of took all of that and threw it into into The Bunny because when you're a character, there has to be some authenticity there. There has to be some real life there or it's going to come across as completely fake. So I feel you have to draw from your own experiences a little bit, even if those are amplified, even if those are over the top, to make your character work, and so I draw a lot from real life into The Bunny."
Before AEW, Allie was in Impact Wrestling where she is a former two-time Knockouts Champion. She revealed which WWE veteran and current ROH star helped her out the most during her time in Impact.
"When I first came into Impact, actually, Jesse and I signed our contracts on the same day. It was really cool for me, obviously, because it was my first television contract, but I was so happy for him," Allie said. "At that point, he'd been working for 10 years. I cried for myself, but I cried for him. I was just like, yes, yes, show them, show everybody how good you are, so it was really cool, and then when I went and I got to work alongside Maria Kanellis, as her assistant, I learned so so much from her.
"She was so giving, and so helpful and gave me a lot of encouragement when it came to talking because up to that point, I hadn't really talked a lot. I hadn't had a lot of promos. I hadn't done anything like pre-tapes, no acting, none of that stuff. So I was just kind of thrust in this position where I got to learn alongside her, and then I started talking a lot more. My time in Impact taught me how to build a character and how to embody a character.
"I learned a lot while I was there, and to be honest with you, working on television is very different than working on the indies. It's just a different dynamic. It's learning how to work the cameras. That's a big thing that you don't really learn on the indies very much, even if you're doing iPPVs, it's just a whole other ballgame. Keeping to your times, understanding your entrance, when to take a beat, all of those things that you don't think about when you work the indies, I learned while I was in Impact."
If you use any quotes from this article, please credit AEW Unrestricted with a h/t to Wrestling Inc. for the transcription.