2025 saw the release of the story behind the creation of AEW, This Book is All Elite. Written by legendary wrestling author Keith Elliot Greenberg, the book documents how All Elite Wrestling went from an idea to the second biggest professional wrestling promotion in the world, along with stories behind the biggest moments, and some of the challenges faced along the way.
Following the success of the 2018 All In show, the biggest independent wrestling event in North America, owner Tony Khan, along with Cody Rhodes, Kenny Omega and The Young Bucks, put the wheels in motion to create a promotion that was very much an alternative to what wrestling fans had seen at that time.
Speaking with Features of Wrestling about the book and how he became involved in the project, Greenberg stated that he was delighted to be approached for two reasons: that he could tell the story of AEW, and that he was able to write about something current, and not just nostalgia:
“Well, actually, it’s been quite a privilege to have gotten involved in the project because I didn’t have to audition for it. AEW were among those who came to me. It was a confluence of positive circumstances. I know that Adam Hopkins, who’s the main public relations person for AEW, who I know from when he was at WWE, he recommended me, and simultaneously, the editor at Random House had recently become a wrestling fan during COVID, and he told me that one of the first books he read when he started reading wrestling books, was my book called Follow the Buzzards: Pro Wrestling in the age of COVID-19. So I had it from two sides being recommended, and Adam Hopkins called me and said, We’re thinking of doing it. Would you be interested? I think the concern was, if I had a retainer with any other company, which I do not, I contribute to anybody as a freelancer who writes about wrestling, and then I was involved. But the great thing is for me, being the age that I am, and the time I’ve spent in the wrestling business writing about wrestling since the early 80s, I’ve always been concerned about being an old-timer, a nostalgia act. My book right before this, which came out earlier this year, was about Wrestlemania III Bigger, Better, Badder. I love writing about the old-timey stuff. I love writing about the stuff that precedes my fandom, but I don’t want to be labelled as somebody who can only talk about nostalgia, and AEW is current, it has transformed the industry. I don’t think anyone would dispute that. You see AEW’s influence on WWE. You see WWE influence, obviously, in AEW. It’s created options for the talent. It’s given certain talents the opportunities to thrive when they didn’t feel they were reaching their full potential elsewhere. Off the top of my head, I’ll just say Toni Storm, Jon Moxley, Ricochet, even someone like Marina Shafir. You could even argue The Hurt Syndicate would be in that category. So this is the current wrestling scene. Now, I watch WWE. I love WWE. I follow both. I write for Inside the Ropes Magazine in the UK, and try to follow as much wrestling as possible. But it’s great to be 66 years old and still writing about the current product, going backstage at AEW and talking to the current talent, and not just going to a WrestleCon and exchanging handshakes and hugs with fellow old timers.”
For the book, Greenberg was granted access to exclusive interviews with many of the big names in AEW, which included industry icon Sting, who retired from the ring at Revolution 2024. Having witnessed a kayfabe-breaking moment backstage, Greenberg was prepared to omit it from the book, but Sting was happy to have the meaningful moment added:
“I’ve been around the business for so many years. I wrote for WWE’s magazines, starting in 1985, for 22 years. So I follow certain protocol when I’m dealing with talent, and one of the things I’m very adamant about is if I witness something backstage or overhear something, that stays with me, I don’t repeat it. When I was interviewing Sting, I told him about a moment I’d noticed before his retirement match. I come around the corner and Sting, his family and The Young Bucks had their arms around each other before they went out and wrestled, and their heads were bowed in prayer. I said to him, of course, that’s not something I would ever put up in the book, because you guys were adversaries. You’re on opposite sides, and it obviously drives home the point that you guys are very close to one another in real life. And he said, No, actually, that’s very touching that you noticed a moment like that, because it meant so much to me. And in fact, if I was going to have a retirement match, I wanted my tag team partner to be Darby Allin, who I’ve come to regard as a family member. And I wanted my opponents to be The Young Bucks, who are versatile and ageless and innovative, and bring just things to this business that I’m in awe about. So it was very cool to be able to put something from behind the scenes in the book without violating anybody’s privacy.”
Arguably, the most important name interviewed for the book was AEW owner Tony Khan, who is also responsible for the creative direction of the brand. In previous interviews and press conferences, Khan has made it very clear that he is a lifelong fan of the industry and that the promotion is something he cares a lot about. When asked about Khan, Greenberg noted that his fandom was shown throughout their interviews:
“Tony Khan is like anyone in his position. I think he’d be comfortable with me saying this, a rather centric person. You sit with him, he’s distracted. He has other things going on. And then somehow we get into a chat about the Rock and Roll Express against the Midnight Express in the Mid-Atlantic territory. Suddenly, I see Tony Khan’s eyes, and they go from looking here and looking there to being focused on me. From that point forward, he was locked in, I think we spoke for about two hours. If I wanted to keep going, I think he would have spoken to me till somebody till the cafe we were in closed for the night.”
Another notable name that was interviewed for the book was MJF, who has become a master of being able to blur the lines between fantasy and reality by remaining almost constantly in character on and off TV. Although other interviews have seen Maxwell Jacob Friedman barely break character, Greenberg noted that MJF was very open with his responses while also outlining some of his key moments in the promotion so far:
“MJF was very open. And at times we would stop and say, ‘Well, how open should this be?’ There’s a little bit of history there with MJF. I didn’t know her in high school, but I did go to high school at the same time as MJF’s mother and my best friend, who since passed away, dated one of MJF’s mother’s good friends Nina. So even though I don’t remember ever having a conversation with her, we were definitely at the same parties and in the same place. So I feel very comfortable with MJF, and he invited me to come to his house and talk to him there. So we were very relaxed. There were times when we said, because I respect the business and I respect the magic of the business, and that means that sometimes you can’t give everything. As a fan, I don’t want to know everything. I want to watch an event, and I want to be surprised by things that occur during the event, and I want to speculate beforehand and mark out with my friends beforehand, and afterwards say, ‘Wow, I didn’t expect this!’
So MJF, there were times when we would stop and say, Yeah, this is a little too personal, or this is a little too much telegraphing what might occur in the future. We could leave this out. But MJF wanted to be open, because he knew the importance of this book, and he knew that this was real history we were talking about, and he didn’t want that history to be told by others, since he was the one creating the history. That’s why we spoke about the angle with CM Punk, which was one of the most unsettling angles I’d ever seen. I mean, MJF is talking about being picked on because he was Jewish, and it’s tapping into things. MJF said this, ‘Everyone’s been in this situation, because either you’ve been bullied or you’ve been the bully.’ Or maybe more likely, you’ve been in both situations. Then he brings up a topic that’s probably never been brought up before, honestly, and he’s actually inducing sympathy as a heel. And when CM Punk, playing the benevolent human being, goes to hug him, MJF punches him in the balls, and it was shocking, and it made MJF a bigger heel than he even was. And interestingly, no one spoke about the whole anti-Semitism angle afterwards, because you were talking about the emotion of that moment.
Another thing that MJF said when he wrestled Bryan Danielson in that Iron Man, which I think can rate with the Iron Man match that Shawn Michaels and Bret Hart had, which was one of my favourite matches that I’ve ever seen in my life. He said he learned more in that hour-plus in the ring with Bryan Danielson than he thinks he’d learned in his entire career. Now he probably was exaggerating somewhat, but it was a testament to how much he admires Bryan Danielson, and most likely Bryan Danielson’s influence is going to continue to be felt in some backstage capacity at AEW, because he’s been a player coach, and if he stays on as a coach, that’s one coach who has universal admiration.”
Even though every business faces challenges in its first year, few could have predicted that a global pandemic would be AEW’s biggest challenge within its first 12 months of TV. However, in the spring of 2020, the world shut down until further notice, and wrestling promotions didn’t know when or if things would revert back to normal. With all wrestling companies forced to be more creative at this time, AEW showcased The Stadium Stampede at Double or Nothing, which saw 2 teams battle it out all over the Jacksonville Jaguars’ home turf. In the book, it is detailed how the match was created from nothing, with Greenberg recalling how inspiration struck at multiple moments:
“It was quite fortuitous that the Khan family owned an NFL stadium. So they’re like, Well, we have it. No one’s using it. Let’s do something. And that was a surprise to me, what you mentioned, that rather than everything being planned out in advance, the participants walk into the stadium, and they’re looking around and they’re like, ‘Oh, look, there’s a swimming pool on this level. We can do a fight in a pool.’ ‘There’s a bar. We could do a saloon fight.’ ‘There’s a goal post. Maybe I’ll do a moonsault from the goal post.’ That was how that match was put together. What I also found interesting because I really didn’t know a lot about this, was that they taped it over two nights. At one point, it started to rain, and so that slowed down the taping. I think there was some official there who was like, you have to be done by this time. Also the sun was about to come up, 20 minutes or so before the sun came up, they were done. They did their last shot. And I think then they ran back to a studio and edited the whole thing together. I think Chris Jericho was in the studio basically supervising the edit, among others.”
The story of All Elite Wrestling’s evolution is a unique one. When the promotion was first created, it heavily relied on fans being aware of the likes of Chris Jericho, Kenny Omega and The Young Bucks due to what they had accomplished in the likes of WWE and NJPW. However, at a point in time, AEW went from relying on history to making history. When asked when that moment was, Greenberg believes that it was 5 years in:
“It might be the five-year mark. Every successful enterprise has a honeymoon period, and they struggle. When AEW started, you knew who Chris Jericho and Jon Moxley were because they had been in WWE. When Bryan Danielson came in, you certainly knew who he was, and CM Punk when he was there, you knew who he was. Then there were people like MJF, Jungle Boy Jack Perry, who a lot of fans did. There were people like The Bucks and Omega, who were superstars in Japan and had been in Ring of Honor, but the mainstream wrestling fan might not have been watching those. So there was no choice but to rely on history of what preceded AEW, and now you have six years of storylines. So when Swerve Strickland comes to the ring and rescues Hangman Page, it doesn’t matter what Swerve did in WWE and it doesn’t matter what Hangman did in Ring of Honor or in New Japan. What matters is the storylines where Swerve broke into Hangman’s house and violated his child’s nursery and Swerve burned down Page’s childhood home. That’s what we’re thinking about when we’re seeing that kind of reconciliation. But at the same time, you’re aware that these guys in storyline have had major heat with each other. So yes, Swerve came to Hangman’s rescue, but Samoa Joe is the champ, and they’re both going to want to have that title, and so you know that the tensions can obviously resurface very quickly, and it’s easy to suspend your disbelief, and it’s easy to lose yourself in these plot lines. They’re making sense, and they’re based on AEW history. Now we’re thinking in terms of what Tony Khan has created, not what others have created.”
“When I Write A Book, I’m Always Going To Be Criticised”: Keith Elliot Greenberg On Not Everything Being Covered In AEW Book
While the book shines a very positive light on AEW and what happened during the first 5 years, a number of backstage incidents hit the headlines for all the wrong reasons. Arguably, the most infamous event that occurred was the backstage brawl between CM Punk and Jack Perry at All In 2023, which led to Punk’s termination from the company. The “brawl in” incident is not covered in the book, and Greenberg explains why:
“Some people have brought this up. Whenever I write a book, I’m always going to be criticised, and I take that for granted. Whenever I do an interview, I’m criticised sometimes by the same exact people on Twitter. I know their handles. By this point they’ve criticised me so much, I know their names. So one of the criticisms I telegraphed in advance, and I even discussed this with AEW, was the people were going to be unhappy that I don’t talk about whatever chicanery occurred backstage that led to the departure of CM Punk. This is a tribute book. If I wrote a book about the New York Mets, which is my favorite baseball team, I even have a Mr. Met tattoo. I would talk about the two World Series runs. I would talk about their marquee players, but I wouldn’t talk about the fact that the owners at the time were supposedly investors with Bernie Madoff, this very corrupt financier who ended up, apparently, [stealing] millions of dollars from the US Holocaust Foundation, the guy was just robbing everybody. As a fan, it’s a lot of suspicion that may have compromised the team, because who knows? Was Mets money being used? They said not. But as a baseball fan, as a fan of the team, you suspect things. But if the New York Mets asked me to do a tribute book about the New York Mets, I could do a really great tribute book, and not mention Bernie Madoff. So I was asked to do a book that is a tribute to AEW during the first five years, and that doesn’t belong in a tribute book, because really, we’re just talking about one or two incidents, but there’s a lot of backstage stuff in it, and a lot of positive backstage stuff in the book. There’s a lot about how Stadium Stampede came together and how The Acclaimed got their name, and why Tony Khan wanted to put Max Caster and Anthony Bowens on the same team. Let’s go to Mariah May, who’s now in NXT, and Toni Storm, the movie that inspired Tony Khan’s mind, that story. So it’s not like it’s all surface stuff, there’s deep stuff that you wouldn’t know about, and I don’t think the book suffers at all from not mentioning an unfortunate incident backstage.”
One of the most notable aspects of AEW since its inception has been that many stars who found some success in previous promotions have levelled up significantly since becoming All Elite. Although the likes of Chris Jericho, Dean Ambrose/Jon Moxley and Bryan Danielson were already main event stars when they signed with Tony Khan’s promotion, Swerve Strickland, Toni Storm and Ricochet have shown new sides of their personas that have made them much bigger in AEW. When comparing the two companies, Greenberg noted how the competition has been a factor in some stars finding that new gear:
“The AEW position would be there’s more creative freedom. Now I’m going to be objective about this, I think if you’re working for WWE, and you have the support of management, and you know guys like Hunter and Shawn, who you know were great performers in the ring, and understand that the art of professional wrestling, appreciate what you do, what you’re trying to do., I think you could get your chance and thrive there. No one can deny what Cody Rhodes accomplish, has accomplished in WWE and I think we all can agree that we’re not for AEW, he might not have been given that shot. So that’s where I feel that the companies complement each other in some ways. You can go from one to the other and perhaps be a better version of yourself. That doesn’t always work for some people. It’s a lateral move, you know, but it’s better to have competition than for it to be monolithic.”
“Tony Khan Knew He Could Sell Out Wembley Stadium”
The book comes to a fitting conclusion by discussing the promotion’s biggest show to date. In August 2023, All Elite Wrestling presented All In from Wembley Stadium, marking the first time that a pro wrestling show took place in the iconic venue since WWE held SummerSlam in London in 1992. When the show was first announced, there were many who were sceptical that the show would draw enough interest given the size of the venue and that AEW was not as well known in the UK at that time, despite the fact that Dynamite and Collision airs on free TV in the UK.
However, proving a lot of doubters wrong, British wrestling legend and AEW announcer Nigel McGuinness made the announcement during the show that 81,035 tickets had been sold, breaking the existing record for the most attended show in the UK. Along with MJF and Adam Cole headlining the show, the Wembley Stadium debut saw London’s own Will Ospreay pick up a huge win over Chris Jericho, and Norwich native Saraya won the Women’s Championship with the Knight family in attendance.
Reflecting on the build-up to the show and All In itself, Greenberg noted that Tony Khan always knew he could make the show a historic one, and how the show was much more than one for the UK fans:
“I did a book on WrestleMania III. Vince McMahon knew that was going to be a sold-out stadium. Tony Khan knew what was going to happen. And as you know, Tony Khan has a deep connection with Fulham football. So he understands that UK market. I was there, and when you when you get off the tube and you walk through that plaza where there are the sports bars and shops heading to Wembley Stadium, I was listening to the conversations, and I was hearing people speaking Flemish and people speaking Swiss, German, Polish. I mean, people came from all over Europe. This wasn’t just the UK market. This almost felt like a gift to the UK, to Europe in the European wrestling fan and people got on planes and traveled. One guy told me he had tears in his eyes when he said he was going there, he kind of felt like this represented his love of wrestling. And again, this is Tony Khan feeling what the fans feel, because he grew up like we did as fans, but just a little more passionate than us, and that’s why he could deliver that and we can’t. That and being a billionaire son.”
This Book Is All Elite: The Inside Story of All Elite Wrestling by Keith Elliot Greenberg and AEW is out now and can be purchased here.
Featured image: Penguin Random House.
