Wrestling as Performance Art: The Wild and Wonderful Career of Al Snow

Allen Sarven ran away with the circus at age 18 and never looked back. At least, that’s how he sees it.

Born in northwestern Ohio, Al was captivated from a young age by the idea of becoming a professional wrestler. As a teenager, he maintained a monthly ritual of calling up every major wrestling promotion he could find and asking for a shot at training with them. Each month, they said no. And each month, he called them again. 

He finally got his big break just after graduating high school, when a promoter who had originally turned him down changed his mind and agreed to train him. He made his debut in the ring on May 16, 1982 in Springfield, OH. From there, he spent time performing for the likes of Smoky Mountain Wrestling, Extreme Championship Wrestling, and beyond, claiming at least 50 championship titles throughout his career and going on to become a WWE Superstar.

Al Snow. Photo courtesy of IMDb.

REAL PEOPLE, AMPLIFIED

Although Al’s ring name has varied throughout the years - some of his more notable personas include Avatar, Leif Cassidy, and Shinobi - his favorite and most persistent moniker is Al Snow, who he describes less as a character and more like his own personality dialed up to 11. That nugget of truth is crucial to any performer’s success, he says, but it’s perhaps especially necessary in the over-the-top world of wrestling.

“It’s an effort to find an aspect of yourself that resonates with the audience,” Al said in an interview with Kentucky to the World. “If you can make someone believe in who you are, I promise they will believe in anything you say and anything you do. I was able to make a very good living, making grown adult people by the millions believe that I could knock out another human being unconscious with a plastic head.”

Have we mentioned the plastic head yet? No? His most iconic character gimmick, Al unveiled Head in 1997 after working for several years as a jobber, a wrestler who routinely loses to more well-known names. Channeling his real-life frustration with his career into his character, the story was that his years as a jobber had driven him to madness. That madness took the form of Head, a plastic mannequin head with the words “HELP ME” written backwards in black Sharpie on its forehead.

Al Snow and Head. Photo courtesy of Wrestling Inc.

“It worked so well because it gave a voice to the frustration I had at that time,” Al said in an interview with Wrestling Inc. in 2018. “I would talk to the Head, I would make comments and remarks, things that I would normally not be able to say, I would do as if the Head were saying it. And that's why it worked, because it was really me and the audience could tell, they could relate and they could connect to it.” 

While much of what happens in the ring is planned, Al takes issue with the notion that wrestling is “fake.” While some may see it as an act, he considers it storytelling.

“It’s not the actual physical activity, or the athleticism, or even the injuries. Those are all quite real,” he said in an interview with Kentucky to the World. “You’re selling the intent: the idea that you go out there and the wins and losses actually matter. [...] It’s the art of physical storytelling in the context of a competitive situation.”

FORGING THE FUTURE OF PRO WRESTLING 

Though Al’s time in the ring eventually came to an end, he was by no means ready to leave the industry. Instead, he purchased Louisville’s own wrestling promotion, Ohio Valley Wrestling, alongside two business partners in 2018. With decades of professional wrestling experience under his belt, Al was determined to develop a world-class training program unlike anywhere else in the nation. His first priority was filling a gap in the industry - one that could potentially be life-threatening to a young wrestler. 

“The lack of standards, both physical training-wise and educationally, I thought was appalling,” Al said. “We know the outcome [of a match beforehand], but that doesn't minimize or completely dissolve the risk that's always present for these young men and women, who could suffer a life-altering or life-ending injury while they’re in the ring…We initially bought OVW with the idea of creating standards and raising the bar educationally.”

And raise the bar it has. OVW offers a 12 month, full-time training program that covers not just the athletic component of wrestling, but the performance and business aspects as well. Students take courses in Writing, Fitness, Nutrition, On-Camera Presentation, Character Development, Financial Management, and more. Such robust training offers graduates a leg up in an industry that’s often hard to break into.

“There are thousands of people all over the world who want to be able to pursue this as a full-time career. [...] If you are the one talent who not only knows what to do in the ring, but you also know how to shoot a camera, what the cameraman is looking for, and you as a performer know how to play to it and maximize your time in front of the camera…your odds increase that you're going to be a success.”

Photo courtesy of Ohio Valley Wrestling Academy.

OVW’s program is so comprehensive, in fact, that it was certified as an accredited trade school by the Kentucky Department of Education in 2019 - making it the only school of its kind for professional wrestlers in the world. Al believes that Kentucky can be a model for other states, and the industry at large, to follow.

“I think it's a huge accolade for Kentucky, the fact that it was taken seriously as an educational institution…Hopefully it leads the way, so other commissions and other state institutions acknowledge and understand the inherent differences in pursuing a career as a professional wrestler…and see the value in in treating [a training program] no different than you would college or a university.”

Join us on June 11, 2025 at the Speed Art Museum for Kentucky to the World’s program Spectacle of Excess: Wrestling as American Performance Art, where Al Snow will be in conversation with Sam Ford, KTW Board Chair and MIT wrestling media maven. Featuring a celebration of iconic wrestlers who got their start in the region and taking place inside an actual wrestling ring, this is a night you won’t want to miss!