A Northern B.C. man is continuing his journey onto the global entertainment stage during the upcoming FIFA World Cup in Qatar.
Social media content creator Dancin’ Wayne, who boasts more than 800 million views of his video posts, will host the opening ceremony on Nov. 20 at the 60,000-seat Al Bayt Stadium in Al Khor, north of the capital of Doha. Following the opening ceremony, the first game of the tournament will be played between the host country and Ecuador.
Hosting this event is like running a marathon every day so this super high-energy guy is doing 1,000 crunches a day and hitting the gym hard to prepare. The Northern B.C. resident (he's shy about his real name and where he lives for privacy reasons) knows he can entertain the masses. His social media content puts a comedic spin on cultural topics while also educating and inspiring changes in perspective and with all those people looking at his videos it’s clear that people enjoy it.
Dancin' Wayne has hosted other major sporting events with FIFA in the past and has a flair for engaging and entertaining viewers.
There’s no doubt that Dancin’ Wayne will bring the fun as he interacts with fans throughout the event.
This unique career started when Dancin’ Wayne got bored very quickly at the start of the pandemic.
“I got very, very, very bored,” he said. “I was working a full-time job and just wasn’t getting anything out of it and then I saw people doing TikTok videos and I thought ‘you know what? I can probably do this!”
Earlier in his career he was working at MuchMusic in Toronto, was on a reality television show and hosting events around the world, he added.
“When I came to Northern BC I thought I would do the millennial thing and get that corporate life and then I thought ‘let me try something here,’” Dancin’ Wayne said. “So I started on TikTok and soon I had 100 followers and that turned into 1,000, then it was 50,000 and that turned into 100,000, that turned into 250, then 500,000 and now there’s more than 700,000 and it was just constant work. I just kept making up sketches and started making video content that people felt was relatable. Then when I was given all these opportunities to travel all over the world, I was able to quit my job.”
And a month later his career really took off.
“FIFA called me and asked me to host an event in Las Vegas,” Dancin’ Wayne said. “And I’m like ‘What?' and they said 'Yeah, it’s the CONCACAF Gold Cup – we’re looking for a host, we’ve seen your stuff – would you be interested?’ and I’m like yeah, no question – I don’t care what it takes, I don’t care what kind of vaccination - I am getting on a plane and I am getting the F out of here! So I got on a plane and I was introduced to 40 or 50 thousand people at the new Raider (Allegiant) Stadium. It was the first event ever to be held there – it was so crazy and ever since then opportunity after opportunity showed up – I got to jump out of a plane, did it live via TikTok, it was nuts but it raised money for animal conservation around the world – I just started using my platform for good, I started a global trend by tackling some real issues – and I feel really privileged to be honest with you – having a big profile I wanted to use that to education and offer perspective, especially in these trying times. So I thought I’d provide some education and perspective and have some fun with it.”
FIFA kept calling and Dancin’ Wayne kept answering, so he would do commercials, do his live TikToks at night and travel the world hosting massive events.
And the secret to his success?
“I think the biggest thing is that I just chose happiness,” Dancin’ Wayne said. “If you’re not happy, there’s nothing that’s going to change that so I just leaned into what made me happy – I remember a time before I went into that whole corporate life and I was really happy. I certainly wasn’t making as much money but I was really, really happy and I was thriving and now I’ve come back to that. With the experience behind me and leaving the corporate world it’s totally different now. It’s a weird blessing in disguise. It was like I had to go through the corporate life thing to figure it all out and now I’m hosting the biggest event on the planet and I’m from Northern BC so… it’s kinda crazy, actually!”
He doesn’t have to look too far back to talk about those moments of disbelief that come with the crazy world of entertainment he lives in.
“Back in July I was in France and I hosted the Cannes Creative Festival and I was there with Anderson Paak and Winston Duke from Black Panther and Regina Hall and Ryan Reynolds and I remember at one point I’m looking around and thinking I’m from Northern BC. How is this possible? This is so awesome!”
Tune in from November 20th to December 18th to catch the FIFA World Cup live on TSN Network, TSNGO or FOXSPORTS.
Dancin’ Wayne will invite his followers in for a closer look as he stands alongside his country on this monumental occasion.
For exclusive behind-the-scenes content visit patreon.com/dancinwayne.
Stayed tuned as we see a lot more from Dancin’ Wayne in the coming months.
Check out his links to see what’s next at https://linktr.ee/dancinwayne, tiktok.com/dancinwayne2, instagram.com/dancinwayne.
