Willow Nightingale

Nightingale in July 2023

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Long Island, New York, United States

**Danielle Paultre** (born January 25, 1994), is an American professional wrestler of Guyanese descent, better known by the ring name **Willow Nightingale**. She is currently signed to All Elite Wrestling (AEW).

Through a working relationship between AEW and New Japan Pro-Wrestling (NJPW) and AEW, she also works for the promotion, where she is the inaugural and a former one-time Strong Women's Champion. She also worked for Tokyo Joshi Pro-Wrestling (TJPW) in Japan, as part of a working relationship between AEW and TJPW.

Paulte began her began her career in November 2015, working in the American independent circuit. She began debuting for All Elite Wrestling (AEW) at start of 2022. Her lovely and positive personality, and her charisma and reaction within the audience led her to signing with AEW in October. Since then, she began being considered as one of AEW's highly regarded on-screen personalities, incluing in its sister promotion Ring of Honor (ROH).

## Early Life

Danielle Paultre was born on January 25, 1994 in Long Island, New York, United States and has two sisters and one brother. She is of Guyanese descent, with her mother being a nationaly recognized Guyanese sprinter.

She did not see herself as "athletic" due to her body type, considering in her head that she was chubby and bigger than the other collegues at school and not "athletic" as shown at the televison. Before professional wrestling, she used to do track and field, shot put and tennis.

## Professional Wrestling Career

### Early Career

Paultre started to engage with wrestling during her childhood, where she would play wrestling video-games along with her cousins, which lead to her interest in wrestling. Afterwards, she began watching wrestling on television, which led her to her goal of becoming a professional wrestler. However, at the time Paultre did not persue it due to being very academic regarding her grades.

After high-school, she went to Northeastern University in Boston, Massachusetts to study in a Barchelor of Arts. At the time Paultre had lot of interests; although, she dropped out of college during her second year due to financial reasons. She later worked in a movie theater, where after leaving her job, due to a bad relation she had with her job, she decided to become a professional wrestler despite the hardships facing at the time.

Paultre was trained by Mike Mondo at the New York Wrestling Connection (NYWC) school in Deer Park, New York due to being close to her house, since she did not have her driver's license at the time. She went to the training sessions, where trainers would often be impressed at her resilience. On February 27, 2015, Paultre, under the ring name Willow Nightingale, made her professional wrestling debut on NYWC's We Can Do It event, losing to Sammy Pickles.

### Tokyo Joshi Pro-Wrestling (2022)

As part of a working relationship between AEW and Tokyo Joshi Pro-Wrestling (TJPW), Nightingale was originally schedule to take part at the 2022 Summer Sun Princess facing Miyu Watanabe. However, due to the then-restrictions caused by the COVID-19 Pandemic, Nightingale was not able to get her Japanese visa at the time of the event, leading her to cancel her appearance and her match being reboked, with Miu Watanabe facing Ryo Mizunami instead of Nightingale, who made her TJPW debut. On October 14, TJPW announced that Nightingale would make her debut at the company taking part at the 2022 Mountain Top and the Autumn Tour. At the 2022 Mountain Top, Nightingale alongside fellow AEW wrestler Yuka Sakazaki faced Maki Itoh and Yuki Kamifuku in a winning effort, while at the Autumn Tour, Nightingale alonside Shoko Nakajima defeated Miu Watanabe and Suzume in her latest appearance for TJPW.

### New Japan Pro Wrestling (2023-present)

On April 28, NJPW announced the creation of the Strong Women's Championship, with it being contested in a singles-elimination tournament and with the bracket being revealed on the same day. The tournament featured Nightingale, Mercedes Mone, CMLL's Stephanie Vaquer, and Stardom's Momo Kohgo. On May 21, at Resurgence, Nightingale defeated Kohgo in the first round and later Mercedes Mone in the finals to become the inaugural Strong Women's Champion after Mercedes got injured during the match, in a huge upset in her career. After the event, Dave Meltzer of the *Wrestling Observer Newsletter* reported that the original plan was to Mercedes Mone win the match and become the inaugural champion; however, due to Mercedes getting injured during the match, the plans shifted with Nightingale winning the match instead and becoming the inaugural champion. On June 2, Nightingale defended the title against Emi Sakura on All Elite Wrestling's television show *AEW Rampage*, marking the first time that title was defended outside of NJPW. A week later, on episode of *Ring of Honor Wrestling*, Nightingale made her second title defense against Rachel Ellering. She lost the title to Giulia on July 5 at NJPW Strong Independence Day.

## Professional wrestling style and persona

Paultre is often regarded as an energetic, postive and lovely character, with she often having an outstanding reaction from the audience. The inspiration for her character came during her childhood, where she loved being in front of a camera and had a very supportive family, that made her seeing the positive aspects of life and feel the people's energy. With her personality that gives energy and power to the people's souls, led her creating her in-ring character.

Paultre mostly wrestles in a "powerhouse" style. Her finishing moves are a deadlift gutwrench powerbomb dubbed the *Babe With the Powerbomb* and a running Death Valley Driver, better known as the *Babe Breaker*.

## Personal life

Despite her in-ring gimmick, she is considered to have a shy, reserved and insecure personality behind the scenes, with Paultre always reminding herself to step out of her comfort zone. She often likes to pass time with her family, with she often citing her elder sister as her best friend and her assistant during the most difficult times.

Paultre is currently in a relationship with fellow Long Islander wrestler Rex Lawless, which often accompains her on the road. She regards Victoria and Sarah Del Rey as one of her greatest inspirations to become a professional wrestler.

## In wrestling

* **Finishing moves**
	+ *Babe With the Powerbomb* (Deadlift gutwrench sit-out powerbomb)
	+ *Babe Breaker* (Running Death Valley driver)
	+ Camel clutch
* **Signature moves**
	+ Avalanche Frakensteiner
	+ Cradle back-to-belly piledriver
	+ Cutthroat seated armbar
	+ Double arm DDT
	+ Front powerslam
	+ Hip thrust followed by a somersault elbow strike to a cornered opponent
	+ Inverted sharpshooter facelock
	+ Lariat
	+ Multiple suplex variations
		- Fisherman buster
		- Fisherman
		- German
		- Regular, sometimes to an opponent towards the apron
		- Superplex
		- *Three Amigas* (Three sequential suplexes)
		- Two sequentials followed by a fisherman
		- Vertical lifted and dropped into a neckbreaker onto the knee
	+ Multiple strike variations
		- Carthweel superkick
		- Dropkick, sometimes from the middle-rope
		- Elbow/back elbow/roundhouse kick combination
		- Overhand chop
		- Step-up Enzuigiri
	+ Multiple senton variations
		- Cannonball
		- Diving back from the apron
		- Rolling followed by a crossbody
		- Running
	+ Multiple moonsault variations
		- *Bermuda Triangle* (Diving moonsault onto a standing opponent outside of the ring)
		- Regular, sometimes from the middle-rope
	+ Multiple back/neckbreaker variations
		- *Lung Blower* (Double knee backbreaker, somtimes while hanging in the ropes)
		- Spinning
		- Sit-out pumphandle neckbracker
	+ Multiple powerbomb variations
		- Regular
		- Sit-out
	+ Oklahoma Stampede
	+ *Pounce* (Running low-angle shoulder block, after an opponent has been Irish whipped off of adjacent ropes)
	+ Running Bulldog
	+ Russian legsweep followed by a grounded octopus hold
	+ Samoan Drop
	+ Spinning spinebuster
	+ STF
	+ Uranage
	+ One-handed wrist-clutch Olympic slam
* **Nicknames**
	+ **"The Babe with The Power"**
* **Entrance themes**
	+ **"Hip Twitch"** by Chase Baker

## Championships and accomplishments

* **New Japan Pro-Wrestling**
	+ Strong Women's Championship (1 time, inaugural)
* ***Pro Wrestling Illustrated***
	+ Ranked No. 40 of the top 150 female wrestlers in the *PWI Women's 150* in 2022