WWE Star Blake Monroe Is Ready For Her Close Up

Blake Monroe is in no rush. ‘The Glamour’ is taking her time to make her in-ring debut on WWE SmackDown. She knows it will be worth the wait.

Monroe – a former NXT Women’s North American champion during her relatively brief time under the WWE umbrella so far – exudes star quality not only because it is her gimmick, but because of how confidently the 28-year-old has developed over the course of her eight year career.

Across the independents of the United Kingdom, Stardom in Japan and All Elite Wrestling, the artist formerly known as Mariah May has poured her heart and soul into every element of her work. Monroe has bled for her art, too, with some of her most notorious moments and matches coated in claret.

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It is this dedication to her craft that allows Monroe to be on the precipice of taking over WWE’s women’s division. At a time when the likes of Rhea Ripley, Liv Morgan, Iyo Sky, Stephanie Vaquer, Chelsea Green, Becky Lynch and Charlotte Flair are still tearing up the Fed’s squared circle, that is no small order. Yet Monroe could quite easily become THE name on the marquee.

Good things come to those who wait

Since her first vignettes aired in April of this year, much has been anticipated about Monroe making her way to WWE’s main roster. Almost five months later, the former NXT Women’s North American champion is yet to go bell-to-bell on WWE television as a SmackDown superstar. Instead Monroe has taunted and teased. Providing trailer after trailer before the full picture is ready to be rolled out.

“People are very impatient,” Monroe tells SPORF during an exclusive interview conducted over SummerSlam weekend in Minneapolis.

“Have you guys never taken time and care with anything?” Monroe continues. “When you’re dating a woman, what do you think is going to happen on the first date? I’m betting it doesn’t happen, whatever you’re thinking.

“You have to wait for a good thing. I have always documented my journey very well so I have a strong fanbase that have seen me go from the independent scene to Japan to America, now to NXT and WWE. So they’re so invested in me and want me to do well.

“People can get nervous or scared and I understand that, but you have to have patience. Timing is everything. But I think that’s why people are invested in me, because they know me.”

Blake Monroe is built for the grandest stage

What shines through in Monroe’s work, whether on the microphone or when her high heels are switched for her working boots, is her confidence.

In AEW, Monroe (then working as Mariah May) created cinematic history with Toni Storm across a blood soaked few months in 2024 and 2025. It was a programme that went for broke. The duo brought levels of storytelling and blood curdling violence rarely seen to mainstream women’s wrestling. A bold series and one that displayed Monroe’s admirable self belief. This is a woman who left London behind for Japan in her early 20’s and made more than a name for herself.

Monroe didn’t hang around in Jacksonville, either. She played out a spellbinding arc with Storm. The Owen Hart Foundation Tournament and AEW Women’s Championship were collected along the way. Then it was time for New York.

It almost felt like a surprise when the former AEW Women’s Champion arrived in WWE’s developmental territory of NXT. Monroe’s presentation felt of such an importance that it (respectfully) felt out of place outside of the jurisdiction of WWE’s main roster. This was a character tailor made for the big leagues.

And just over a year on from her NXT debut and five months removed from her initial main roster vignette, Blake Monroe is ready for her close up.

There is nobody like Blake Monroe

“There is no woman like me,” Monroe explains as she compares herself to the rest of the SmackDown’s women’s locker room, “I am The Glamour but I have a grit and an edge that you can’t get taught. It’s something that I learned from years and years of experience. And through failures involuntarily learned. It’s not something you can get taught inside a lab. It’s something that I earned. I come with this grit that the others don’t have.

“I will ruin your life. The rest of the SmackDown women have that in them. They’re there to win a match. I’m there to ruin your psyche. I will make you go home, make you cry and take everything that you love. We are not the same.

“Now you might understand why WWE are like, ‘we can’t let Blake Monroe loose just yet, because she’s about to upset a lot of people’”.

Given the standard of her work and the anticipation she has already generated about being let loose on the main roster, it’s a safe assumption that for everyone Blake Monroe upsets, there will be thousands more who are very happy with her work.

Featured Image: WWE