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Soleil will take to the skies on Saturday night during Awesome Championship Wrestling’s (ACW) Indypendence Day in a tag team match with Dante Casanova as they look to get one over on the duo known as The Righteous.
Sidney Akeem, the former WWE star, is the man behind the mask. It will be his first appearance at ACW since 2025 at Mischief Night when he took on Casanova and AJZ in a triple-threat match. Casanova was the winner of that battle and now gets to team with Soleil.
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He told Fox News Digital he was excited to get an opportunity to take on Vincent and Dutch as they have progressed as one of the top tag teams across pro wrestling, primarily competing in Total Nonstop Action Wrestling (TNA) on Thursday nights.
“I’m not going to say there’s any nerves. I’ve been in the ring with a lot of great talent in my career,” he said. “This is the first time I get to tangle with The Righteous and I’m excited. Actually, I was talking to the brothers not too long ago, telling them how much I enjoy their work and so getting to share the stage in the ring with them is going to be fun.
“It’s going to be different because me and Dante Casanova, you know, this came together unexpectedly, but I think we’re two guys that are done proving ourselves that we belong in this wrestling world, the ACW locker room. I think we’ve more than proved that we belong. I think right now it’s about making a statement. Making a statement and making an impact and hope this tag team division.”
The ability to wear the mask again is an important part for Soleil.
He said he’s been working on the character for several years and tried to introduce it in WWE but it never took off. He was known as Scrypts and Reggie during his time with the company.
“Yeah, I mean this is the new me and this is also the real me,” he explained to Fox News Digital. “Everyone knows Sidney Akeem, former WWE superstar Reggie, NXT star Scrypts, and you know I never quite found my footing of who I really am when I was in WWE and then when I got to the indies I had a great run as Sidney Akeem, but something was missing. Something was missing not only from myself but that connection with the fans all around the world. And so, I’ve had this character Soleil. … I’ve been creating it for almost say six years and it never came together because it was just it wasn’t the right time and in NXT this is what I wanted Scrypts to be, but it was too many chefs in the kitchen. I did debut this on Ring of Honor but the real debut for Soleil with the music, the jumbotron everything was on ACW.
“So, the fact that I debuted this character, the real me, and on ACW. I think it’s only fitting that moving forward. You may see Sidney Akeem again. But it’s Soleil because it’s what I stand for and what it means to not only myself, but so many people around the world. This is a sign of courage of breaking those barriers of the boxes they tried to keep people in. I grew up in a place where you weren’t allowed to be a superhero. You weren’t allowed to be your true self and so you put these masks on to be other people. Well, this mask is put on to show you who I really am. And it’s Soleil, the dark sun who comes from the circus but now making his statemen, his footing in the wrestling world.”
Soleil said he wants to express to the audience that it was OK to express who you are as a person. You can be a superhero and fly through the air like he can.
“The wrestling world is big and you can try to target a certain group of people or you can try to target everyone. I found who I want to be a symbol for and it’s so many kids around the world that not only look like me, but that go through or went through things that I went through in my life and let them know that it’s OK to unlock your inner superhero,” he said. “It’s OK that you dream big and sometimes a little crazy and outlandish because the world will tell us no. People will tell us no.
“And Soleil is me telling everyone yes. It doesn’t matter where you come from or what you’ve done before or what your reputation might be. There’s a superhero inside of everyone. And I want people to understand that I’m not just putting a mask on tas a as a gimmick. I’m putting a mask on because this is truly who I am. I already move like a superhero. And circus people the closest thing to real life superheroes that we have for all of the things that we do. And I said I’m not in the circus anymore, I’m in the wrestling world and wrestling started in the circus. So, this is the story. There’s so much deeper than just putting a mask on as a gimmick.”
Even as a superhero character, Soleil was not exactly committed to having one tag team’s back who previously had a dangerous experience with The Righteous
At Reckoning in May, The Righteous came out of the back and handcuffed Hale Collins to the cage as Vik Dalishus was getting beat up by Sent 2 Slaughter’s Danny Maff and Shawn Donovan.
The Now and Sent 2 Slaughter will be on opposite sides of the ring again on Saturday as they are participating in a lumberjack match between Tommy Dreamer and Josh Shernoff.
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“I’m also on my own journey and I understand that Dante has now entered into my world, into my journey. We just have to see how the cards are dealt because I can’t tell you right now that, yes, I will have this person’s back or that person’s back,” Soleil told Fox News Digital. “We, regardless, of how confident we are, we have a tall task in front of us. The Righteous, they aren’t walkovers. We are going into this match believing that we can win, but we can’t go in it halfcocked and not focused thinking that, oh, this is just cake-work because it’s obviously not one of the best tag teams in this business that we have. So, that’s a question that we’re going to have to cross once we get there.”
Indypendence Day takes place at the MJN Center on Saturday in Poughkeepsie, New York.
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