In an interview with Wrestling with Freddie (via Fightful), Mariah May said that her kissing segments with Mina Shirakawa and Toni Storm leading up to AEW Forbidden Door were improvised.
She said: “It was not pitched, we just did it. Mina and I are extremely close, we’ve always been close since STARDOM. We just did it. The next time around, they were like, ‘Hey, can you guys stop kissing?’ Like you said, I think there’s a bit of an archaic view on it and people seem to think we have no autonomy of our bodies. It’s my choice who I kiss, it’s my choice what I do. If I’m not comfortable doing something, I would always say so. I remember seeing the usual suspects being like, ‘Oh my god, this is setting women’s wrestling back so much.’ It’s like, nobody made us do it. We chose to do it. That’s just how we show affection to each other and we always have in our friendship. Like I said, if I don’t wanna do something, I won’t. Myself, Mina, and Toni are three extremely decorated women’s wrestlers who off our own backs have become very successful all over the world. To try and tell us we’re setting women’s wrestling back was pretty crazy to me and like you said, the numbers don’t lie and I think myself, Mina, and Toni for the best rated segments for about eight weeks in a row as we should.”
