Franky Monet On New WWE NXT Ring Name: “I Fought Really Hard For Taya”
WWE NXT star Franky Monet was on a recent episode of The Wrestling Inc. Daily. Monet has been well known as Taya Valkyrie for nearly a decade, and Wrestling Inc. Managing Editor Nick Hausman asked Monet about her name change.
"I fought really hard for Taya, but sometimes, it's time to evolve, and change and kind of make this new chapter in my career, and I feel like this was the time for it," Monet admitted. "It was a little bit sad at first because I felt like she died, but she's always a part of me. Franky is an evolution of Taya, definitely. Anybody who knows my career knows that this is just a natural transition into Franky Monet.
"The creative team allows us to come up with a bunch of names, and it's kind of just going back and forth. It's like naming a baby. You're gonna be remembering and being associated with this name for the rest of your life, so it has to be something that you really, really like, and so we went back and forth with different names. 'Franky', I've always liked for a girl. I really like unisex names for girls. I think that they're fun. They're different. It's definitely something that no one has really used on the pro wrestling platform before, other than Frankie Kazarian.
"I just really, really liked the name. I remember hearing the name for the first time in a movie, Stigmata. That was the first time I ever heard a girl being called Franky, and I remember many many, many years ago when I heard it, I thought it was really really cute. And Monet actually comes from the French artist. My dad is from Switzerland, so when we would travel to Europe a lot as a kid, we would always go to the art exhibits all over Europe.
"And I just always remember the Monet paintings and Salvador Dali exhibits, and so I thought it was important to have something artistic as part of my name because I do feel I am an artist and what I do every week is art, and self expression, and sports entertainment and all these wonderful things. I felt that was just a nod to my life being brought up around the arts."
Hausman then asked how Franky Monet differs from Taya Valkyrie.
"She's just so much more extra than Taya," Monet said. "Now she has a Presley with her. Come on, it's great. My dog gets to come to work with me every day, and he's been doing an excellent job. He's just the crowd favorite. To be fair, he's probably stealing all the scenes from me. She's just that much more intense and that much more crazy, and we haven't even gotten to see any of that yet.
"I'm excited for this natural evolution into Franky Monet to evolve in front of all of you because you guys are experiencing it at the same time as I am, and I'm so happy that Triple H, and Shawn Michaels, and Road Dogg and the entire creative team have really been so open minded and accepting of my ideas, and really allowing me to be creative in expressing who I think Frankie is in my own way and being supportive.
"Sometimes, I come up with some really crazy stuff, but that's part of it. I'm constantly taking notes, and watching movies and finding pop culture references. I'm constantly thinking. Franky is in my head 24 hours a day, and I am so happy that I have such a wonderful place like NXT to be growing in front of you all as fans and for myself."
"Unchained" featuring Taya Valkyrie (aka Franky Monet) will be released On Demand on July 2. You can follow Franky on Twitter @FrankyMonetWWE. You can find the full audio and video from her conversation with Nick via the embedded players below:
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