INTERVIEW: Showtime Eric Young finds adventure in North America
On Fridays at 8 p.m on Animal Planet, it’s Showtime. That is, Showtime Eric Young.
The IMPACT World Heavyweight Champion and star of Animal Planet’s No Limits is a man in love with adrenaline. Whether cutting down bad guys in the wrestling ring or reeling in huge catches on the open ocean, Young is a bucket-list type of traveler, an adventurer enticed by the call of the open road.
His previous Animal Planet effort was Off the Hook: Extreme Catches. After two seasons, Young is expanding his reality-series horizons with the newly christened No Limits. There’s still crazy fishing, but now it’s coupled with adventuring of all types (and sizes).
“Off the Hook did very well actually for Animal Planet,” Young said recently during a phone interview. “The first episode was get the sharks from the paddle board, so there’s not a lot of places to go from there. … We wanted to make a show about the United States, and crazy people and crazy stuff that goes on here. So it kind of transitioned into kind of an adventure show. There’s 10 episodes of Off the Hook that are going to air under the No Limits banner, but it’s the same show. It’s just not all fishing. It’s crazy cars, and slacklining, and caving, and going into an abandoned mine and all kinds of just really wild stuff.”
The formula featured in the two shows is identical: Young meets someone who does something extreme, interesting, dangerous or a combination of all three. They teach him how it’s done, and then it’s his time in the spotlight.
“Adrenaline junkie, I guess, is the term that’s thrown around a lot, and that’s part of it. I don’t think I crave adrenaline. I like the feeling of adrenaline. I like to be kind of scared and to be doing something that’s kind of on the edge. That kind of feeling can’t be replaced. I’ve always been a kind of an experiential person, and I want to experience everything, stuff that I like, stuff that I don’t like, stuff that’s dangerous, stuff that’s not dangerous. I want to do all of it. I want to say that I’ve done it or tried it, and the show allows me to do that in all kinds of different ways. It’s super cool, man. It’s just really handmade for me.”
Young said each episode is kind of like a baby, so he doesn’t like to choose favorites. But the new season offers some definite highlights. From rock crawling in Bangor, Maine, to climbing 400 feet up the trunk of a tree, No Limits lives up to its ambitious name. The fishing episodes include a shark sequence in Florida and marlin in Baja.
Each and every experience relies on Young’s mind, but also his body. His wrestling career helps tremendously in that regard.
“There is no off-season in wrestling,” he said. “It’s 365 days a year. That’s part of my everyday life, and it is all year round. It never stops. I’ve been doing that for 10 years. It’s definitely part of what makes me able to do the show. … There was kind of like a long casting process going into Off the Hook. They lucked out with me because a regular person, someone that’s not fit or used to this kind of thing, would be pretty beat up, I think, most of the time. I get pretty beat up doing the show, and it’s really demanding. So, yeah, like I said, it’s kind of like a match made in heaven. I’m able to take the abuse the show dishes out. I like it. I don’t like being hurt. I like challenging myself physically.”
Young said he loves the diversity of the environments showcased on the series. From the mountains to the oceans to the freshwater lakes, he’s been up and down North America several times. He called the desert by Phoenix “plain and ugly,” yet beautiful. He was there for some spider wrangling and finding of poisonous scorpions. He also enjoyed San Diego and Jones Pass, Colo., a place he called one of the most stunning in the world. “It allows me to travel and see all of these things and be like right in the middle of beautiful scenery and like really, really crazy stuff,” he said. “I leave for Alaska tomorrow for the final two episodes. Alaska is kind of like the final frontier. It’s a wild place.”
The bar on “wild” continues to rise.
“No pun intended, but there’s really no limits. The more harsher conditions we’re in, the more interesting the show is often. We actually shot two episodes in Alaska in January of last winter, so when Alaska is at its worst. We were in the Bering Sea in January, and that’s the worst month to be there. It’s the coldest that it is in January, and it’s the wettest that it is in the Bering Sea. We’re always very prepared for the weather and stuff. When it’s raining or snowing, it makes the show very difficult, but that’s part of what the show is, the adventure of being in the outdoors, being in the elements, being just out there doing what these people do.”
When he’s not pile-driving foes in the wrestling ring or free-diving in some picturesque locale, Young can be found on a beach or on the open road.
“My time off is spent just kind of relaxing, man,” he said. “I like to go on trips where I can lay on the beach and don’t have to do anything physical. I still work out; that’s part of my everyday life. I’m actually a Harley guy. I have a 2012 Softail Custom Deluxe, and I ride that like every chance I get. That’s my alone time, my zen time.”
By John Soltes / Publisher / John@HollywoodSoapbox.com
