‘Welcome to Wrexham’ director Bryan Rowland admits to thinking that Ryan Reynolds’ takeover and documentary plans were “crazy” and “nuts”.
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Remarkable deal completed in 2021Quite the journey since thenRed Dragons starring on & off pitchWHAT HAPPENED?
The Hollywood superstar, in partnership with Rob McElhenney, acquired the non-league football club from North Wales back in February 2021. Everyone connected with that deal openly admitted that they were walking into the unknown, but a calculated gamble has delivered an emotional rollercoaster that nobody wants to get off.
AdvertisementFXWHAT ROWLAND SAID ABOUT REYNOLDS & WREXHAM
Rowland, who has seen ‘Welcome to Wrexham’ become an Emmy Award-winning production, has told the podcast of joining Reynolds’ surprising venture off the big screen: “I had heard nothing of Wrexham. All I remember was being on a call and hearing that Ryan Reynolds – essentially my boss – that he was going to be acquiring this football club in the UK. Those were all things I didn’t know anything about. Wrexham, I didn’t know anything about the town. I didn’t know anything about football at all, I haven’t followed it ever my whole life. I knew nothing about it. I just thought ‘this is crazy, what are we going to do with this, it’s nuts!’ This has been very much jumping into the U-bend and trying to figure out what this is all about. But it’s also been the most thrilling thing of my life that I’ve been involved with.”
THE BIGGER PICTURE
He went on to say of a series that has opened a window to the world and earned the Red Dragons a global fanbase: “I believe what we’re doing with Welcome to Wrexham is important. We are telling some really beautiful stories. It goes so far beyond football. This is a story that people are excited about. This is real life. People have a passion about this like I have never experienced with anything before. It’s something that people and brands want to be a part of. Like Ryan said, in the documentary last season, ‘listen, we are open for business and anybody that wants to be a part of this story, let’s go’.”
Getty/GOALDID YOU KNOW?
Few could have predicted that Wrexham would enjoy such a meteoric rise on and off the pitch, but Rowland is loving every step of the journey. He added, with season three set to be released on April 18: “At the very end of season two of Welcome to Wrexham, the parade has happened and you hear the announcer say a line that is so powerful. He says ‘football writes the greatest scripts’. For me, that is what Wrexham is all about. We think we can plan all this stuff. We think we can plan our lives. We think we can write the best commercial. But the magic happens when you just let things play out. That’s very much how this came together, we just let it play out and the pieces fell together and we kind of got that lightening in a bottle moment. It’s once in a lifetime and an absolute honour to be a part of.”