Legendary wrestler continues to find success in acting, while coming back home to N.C.

ASHEVILLE, N.C. (WLOS) — Many know Adam Copeland by another name, and as a multi-time world champion in the professional wrestling world.

It is a story,” Copeland said. “A movie, a sitcom, a soap-opera all rolled into one. At a moment, you can run through a concrete wall. You feel on top of the world.

The performer known as “Edge” mastered those elements and gained fans worldwide because of it in the WWE.

But in 2011, he sustained a neck injury that effectively ended his career in the ring.

“Wrestling, that was it. But then you’re told you have to retire,” the wrestler said.

As it looked like the lights were dimming on one career, another shined thanks to executives with the SyFy Network show "Haven."

“They watched my retirement speech, and they were in tears,” Copeland said. “They didn’t know I wasn’t acting. I was ending the one thing I’ve ever wanted to do."

With more time on his hands, Copeland went down a new path. He found himself picking the brains of actors, not wrestlers.

I would just be sitting with directors and ask them why they made the choices they made,” he said. “I met with other actors and was asking them why they made the choices they made. Everyone was gracious in helping me learn this thing. That’s when I started to fall in love with what acting is.

After 41 episodes of "Haven," Copeland continued to grow his new career, playing a role in "Vikings" on the History Channel. It was a project that drew viewers from all around the globe, and increased Copeland’s confidence as an actor.

“Thankfully, I felt like Vikings helped me kind of round that corner to gain my confidence to be able to walk on and go ‘right, I got it,’” he said. “I walked off that show saying ‘okay, I think I’m rounding a corner here.’”

Copeland’s third show would see him working with one of the biggest entertainment companies in the world: “Edge” was now Ares, the Greek god of war, in Disney’s "Percy Jackson and the Olympians."

His casting was just as author of the original novel series, Rick Riordan, wanted.

He was the one who chose me. He saw my audition, and he was like, ‘That’s how I always pictured Ares as I wrote him,'" Copeland said.

While Copeland had worked over 100 episodes of television to this point, he was still feeding off the energy of his teenage co-stars.

Walker [Scobell], Aryan [Simhardi], and Leah [Jeffries], are just full on, 'How many push-ups can you do? How much can you bench,’” Copeland said. “At 13 years old, I was wiping out my BMX and knocking myself out. I wasn’t the three pivotal characters in a multi-million-dollar Disney project.

"Percy Jackson" gained millions of viewers and was one of the most-watched shows in all of 2023.

“In just reading the numbers of hours viewed, all those things, it hit pretty good,” he said. “I think for now, that will be the one [project I’ve been a part of] that will have the most eyeballs.”

Copeland noticed the show’s success quickly in his everyday life.

“I started having kids and their grandparents come up to me and say, ‘Are you?’ I’m used to them saying Edge or Adam Copeland,” he said. “But they say 'Ares?' Yeah, I play Ares. Whole families coming up to let me know it’s a show that they can watch as the entire family and mark it on their calendar to watch it live.”

When considering why the transition from wrestling to acting has gone so well, Copeland credits his focus on being "a storyteller."

" I still want to tell a story, however that is: Whether it’s writing, television show, a movie, or wrestling,"" he elaborated. "I say acting, wrestling, music: pick your form of entertainment. It’s all in the same tree, it’s just different branches."

After healing from the 2011 injury, Copeland is back in the ring for All Elite Wrestling.

However, he says he only has one full-time job.

I don’t think I’ll ever be a full-time anything, besides dad,” Copeland said with a smile. “I’m doing this now because I love it. Everything now just goes to them. They don’t care if you’re on a tv show or if you’re a wrestler, you’re a dad.

Through all his travels, Copeland, with his wife, Beth, and two daughters, Lyric and Ruby, settled down in Asheville.

“When I’m either flying in, or if I’m close enough driving in, and it’s close enough, as soon as I hit the incline up the mountain, you just have a sigh of relief,” he said. “Our roots are deep now. We’ve established a framework for our kids for the rest of their lives. Fatherhood is easily the best thing I’ve ever been involved in. It just changes everything, but it changes it all for the better.”