Harley Cameron – From small town to AEW world stage

Danielle Glanville was born in a small town on along the Northern Rivers of the Queensland / New South Wales border and in just a short period of time would change her life in such a dramatic way as she became the person we know today as Harley Cameron.

Cameron has not had the traditional start to her pro wrestling career as she originally moved to the United States in 2018 to pursue a career in singing and modelling. Eventually, she would become a ring girl for Bare Knuckle Fight Championship and her partner at the time was the NXT talent, Xyon Quinn which would help spark her interest in the world of pro wrestling while maintaining a career outside of the industry.

Recently Harley sat down with the Lightweights Podcast with Joe Vulpis to discuss her time with AEW, the difference between Australia and America and everything in between. Below you will find extracts from their conversation which is available for watching on YouTube.

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JV – What’s the best part about being Harley Cameron?

HC – Oh my gosh that’s a loaded question to start. The best part, you know what I will say? I do like um I do like being myself and like not like worrying too much about like not having to be silly. You know what I mean?

JV – You seem like you’re you.

HC – Yeah. Yeah. It’s funny. Like I would say that a lot of people would say that what you see on TV is me times like a thousand. Just like an amped up version of myself really.

JV – Did you ever think that you’d be able to bring all these different traits of your actual personality into what you’re doing now in wrestling?

HC – I had no idea I could any of this really when I started wrestling. I definitely was when I first started really thinking about who I could be in the world of wrestling. I think overthinking it in a big way, and it wasn’t until that I had complete freedom and was on my own that it kind of organically just like allowed me to do the things I did externally, so it was cool to be like “Oh shit I can do the things that I like.” and bring it into this world, you know.

JV – Let’s go back to the beginning. What was your first impression when you were running the ropes? You’re taking the bumps. Was that something you though you wanted to do?

HC – Yeah. So, I mean, to be honest, when I started, I was thinking, “oh, I can do this. It’s going to be great.” And I still remember my first day inn wrestling school, which is at Flatbacks Wrestling Orlando. Shout out Breeze and Spears. Um, I remember being too scared to take a front bump and they were kinda looking at me like and I was like, “but my my, you know, my chest is so gigantic. It’s going to hurt.” And I for like the first week I was like, ” I don’t think I can do the front bumps guys.”

JV – That’s just going to be my thing

HC – Literally. And then I look back at how embarrassing that is. But that’s how timid I was when I first started, and I had a rude awakening. I thought “Shit, I don’t know if I can do this.” Yeah. So, I definitely went in with high hopes and then lost my confidence very quickly and then, you know, just kind of had to push myself out of the comfort zone really.

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JV – Did you watch a lot as a kid?

HC – I did when I was younger with my, I’ve got a lot of siblings, but I have one little brother and he and I kind of grew up together and we would watch. We lived in like this tiny little country town and I still have like memories of us like pretending like to wrestle in the living room and he’d always pretend to be The Undertaker. So yeah, definitely grew up watching it. And then you know you got in your teenage years and for me, I grew out of watching it in in those years and it wasn’t until I came back to America that I kind of lie fell in love with it again.

JV – Yeah. So, you came to America on a Visa, or you didn’t have one?

HC – No, I came to America with nothing. So, I couldn’t even work here. I could I like I literally came here with a hope and a dream. I was like I just want to get to America, and I’ll figure it out. So, when I moved here, at the time I had no idea what I was going to do. I couldn’t work. I left my career. Um, I didn’t have any company interested in me to get a visa, but I knew if I came here that like I’d be in the land of possibilities, you know. So, I came here and the first thing I ever did actually was um, the hotel where I was staying at, there was like a brochure for a rock show, and I went into the rock show and it was an impersonation show and I went in there and I just said to them, “Hey, I I want to perform here.” And they were like, “it’s an impersonation show. Who do you impersonate?” and I was like, “Um, Christina Aguilera and Lady Gaga.” And they were like, “oh, okay. Hey, like you can audition.” I was like, “shit.” And I went to Spirit Halloween, bought a costume. Um they had a piano and stuff and I went and just did some Gaga songs. Um and they were like, “Yeah, sure you can start like this week.” and I was like, “well, you can’t pay me. That’s the thing, because I can’t work legally, but I can volunteer.” and they were like, “hell yeah.” So, I just like dove into that, and I was a Lady Gaga impersonator randomly for the beginning of my time in America.

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JV – What was the American Dream like as an Australian?

HC – It’s honestly like it is everything that it sounds like. And um I say that in the way of growing up in Australia, you always want these big, amazing things to happen and we watch movies and it it just seems so surreal cause everything’s so big and different here. It’s like, I can’t explain it. Like Australia is really small compared to here in so many ways and it just feels like I’m living in a movie still.

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JV – So how do you find your way into AEW?

HC – I basically um was in Orlando, and I had the opportunity to do a taping at the Dark shows when they were at Universal, the AEW Darks. So, I was there as an extra. Um, and then Spears was my coach at the time. Um, communicated that they were doing a new group. Um, and put me in touch with QT Marshall, who they were kind of like looking for a girl to be in this group, which was the QTV. Um, and I know they were considering a few different people, but I got brought in. I got to cut some promos; I got to have a match. Um, and they kind of decided that I was the person for the role. So, honestly like if you had told me that I was going to end up in AEW, like I would never have believed it because I knew there wasn’t like a system there to like learn and train like as other federations like do have. Um, so I was like “shit” like you go there and it’s like business. You like got to be ready and you’ve got to be for the most part established. So, I definitely am lucky because I got a huge opportunity. Um, and I I do think there was like for the most part, in our company, you have to be an established known wrestler. Like, so I I came in not that. So, I was very lucky.

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You can check out more of the interview in the video below.