Sylvester Stallone has been known worldwide as a screen legend since creating the title role in the 1976 Oscar-winning Best Picture “Rocky,” for which he also wrote the screenplay. Over the course of his lengthy career, he has been recognized for his work as an actor, writer and director.
A cultural phenomenon, “Rocky” grew into a six-film franchise, successfully spanning four decades. Stallone brought the character’s story to a close in 2006 with the critical and box office hit “Rocky Balboa,” which he also wrote and directed.
Beginning with the 1982 blockbuster “First Blood,” Stallone has also embodied another indelible character: John Rambo. Following that film, for which he also wrote the screenplay, he wrote and starred in “Rambo: First Blood Part II” and “Rambo III.” In 2008, he directed, wrote and starred in “Rambo,” which continued the saga of the scarred Vietnam vet more than 25 years after his screen introduction.
Stallone more recently wrote and directed perhaps his most ambitious project to date, the action thriller “The Expendables,” in which he also led an all-star cast, including Arnold Schwarzenegger, Bruce Willis, Jason Statham, Mickey Rourke, Jet Li and Dolph Lundgren. The film opened at No. 1 in August 2010, making Stallone the only actor to open a film at No. 1 in five consecutive decades. In 2012, he co-wrote and starred in “The Expendables 2,” which reunited the cast, this time under the direction of Simon West.
Born in New York City, Stallone attended school in suburban Philadelphia, where he first started acting and also became a star football player. He then spent two years instructing at the American College of Switzerland in Geneva. Returning to the United States, he enrolled as a drama major at the University of Miami and also began to write.
But Stallone left college to pursue an acting career in New York City, where the jobs did not come easily. During this period, he turned more and more to writing, churning out screenplays while waiting for his acting break. The opportunity came in 1974, when he was cast as one of the leads in “The Lords of Flatbush.”
With the money earned from the film, Stallone moved to Hollywood, where he landed a few small roles in television and movies. He also continued to pursue writing. Fighter Rocky Balboa was born in a script Stallone wrote in longhand. Several producers offered to buy the screenplay, but wanted to cast a star in the title role. Despite being nearly broke, he held fast in his determination to play the part, and his perseverance was finally rewarded. The rest, as they say, is history.
What interested you in “Bullet to the Head”?
Well, I liked the idea of a very simple story with a dark morality. There’s humor in that later on, but you start with the basic idea that you have two total opposites having to work together for a common cause who you know are going to have to take each other out at the very end, at least that was the original premise. I also really liked the idea of doing it with Walter Hill after the first director bowed out. That made the project especially enticing.
Was that because of his track record with unlikely buddy flicks like Eddie Murphy and Nick Nolte in “48 Hours”?
Yes, and also because he’s kind of gone down the same path as I did. There was a period when I was pretty much untouchable for about 8 or 9 years until I got a big break with Joe Roth when he helped produce “Rocky Balboa.” That was a big, big, long shot. Everybody thought it was a joke, but it worked. [Chuckles] I think there’s a lot of music left to play in a lot of these old instruments. And I felt that Walter Hill is a pro at this genre, yet he’s not getting the opportunity. So, when I saw the opportunity present itself, I decided, “If he does the movie, I’ll do it.” And it worked out that way.
Do you have any idea how many filmmakers and actors you have inspired, and does that experience with making “Rocky” still come into play for you today?
Having that sort of faith in something that only you truly understand and believe in is still prevalent today. If I just know in my gut that a film is going to work, I’ll fight to the death over it, and I convince myself. When a movie is purely a money job, the film doesn’t have the same sort of intensity, and the audience almost senses it, at least that’s the way I perceive it. So, yeah, the idea is to do something that you truly, truly believe in. I understand that a lot of other actors don’t have a choice. They have to eat so they need to work and they’ll do films that they’re not so proud of. But I’ve been fortunate enough to be given a second wind, so I try to pick projects I know will provide the audience the kind of escapism they want from me.
How did you develop your character, Jimmy Bobo?
I decided to approach it this way. I, Sylvester Stallone, am really not much like Rocky. Rocky is a much more ethical, moral person than I am. [Chuckles] He’s really a great guy. And Rambo is a much darker person than I am, and much more reserved and withdrawn. I thought, let me try something different. What if I, Sylvester Stallone, were transported into the world of hit men? In other words, what if I were the hit man but just played myself. So, that’s the way I approached this character. I wanted to be as casual and comfortable with the character as possible. I said, if Sylvester Stallone were a hit man, this is how he would be.
How did you go about creating the father-daughter dynamic with Lisa [played by Sarah Shahi]?
Having children, they tend to be very angry, if you’re not there growing up. Of course, he was never there for her growing up, and she has done everything that’s rebellious. So, I tried to think how I would approach that in my own life. I decided that he would be a little remorseful, but he’d have a little resentment because she’d ask for a favor every time he came to see her. When she decided to be a tattoo artist and to cover herself in tattoos that weren’t exactly the most flattering, I realized she was doing it out of spite and for attention, and as a way of getting back at me. So, there are all sorts of possible approaches to developing that kind of relationship.
Is there a message you want people to take away from the film?
That a tiger never really changes his stripes and that Jimmy Bobo is what he is, without regret. But he’s not an amoral person, since he only takes out, as he puts it, “the hard to get at stains.” That is his job. He takes out the trash. In effect, he’s doing a service. He’s a people person. He removes the bad people.
Are you still an art collector?
Yes, an avid art collector. [Chuckles] In fact, every day, I’ll read a chapter of some art book. I don’t know why. It’s just a habit.
Who is your favorite director and how has he or she influenced your work?
Hmm… To me, the greatest director ever was Elia Kazan. He did “On the Waterfront” with [Marlon] Brando, and he did “East of Eden.” He made some truly epic, monumental films, when no one else was really doing it. His contemporaries were making relatively lighthearted movies. I’d say he was far and away the best. Everyone today is pretty … derivative of Kazan. So, to me, he was the real master.
What advice do you have for aspiring actors who want to follow in your footsteps?
In this day and age, if you’re aspiring to be an actor, and you’re putting all your eggs in one basket, you could be disappointed. I started out as an actor, but I forced myself to be a writer, even though I wasn’t very good at it and had never written. I don’t think I ever passed an English course in my life. My first 8 to 10 scripts were pretty horrendous, but I stayed at it, stayed at it and stayed at it, until I eventually found a voice and a subject like “Rocky” that people were interested in.
So, I recommend that you go out and try to be as versatile as possible: writer, actor, producer and especially director. Look at Ben Affleck. He’s literally had a career reversal. I tell so many young actors that if I hadn’t written, directed and acted, I’d have been long gone. I would not have made it out of the ‘90s.
Are you interested in writing a memoir which gives us more of look into your life than Sly Moves did?
[Laughs] I don’t know. It all depends on how deeply I’d have to delve into it. I’d be willing to do it, if I only had to write about what inspires and motivates me. But I couldn’t go into the personal aspects of my family, because I’m way too private. But my career, absolutely.
Would you ever consider running for public office?
No. I talked to Arnold [Schwarzenegger] about running for office, and he said he loved it. But he is also much more of a people person. You have to have an almost boundless reservoir of energy and interest to enter politics, because quite often it’s thankless and fruitless and you can’t accomplish much. But he loved it. I don’t have that. I’m much more of an introvert.
How much of an ‘offer they couldn’t refuse’ did you make to assemble the cast of matinee idols, not once, but twice, for “The Expendables”?
[Laughs] This was an idea I got thinking about how there’s strength in numbers. I would always see these Rock and Roll revivals comprised of 25 different bands that had once been very famous, but weren’t anymore. However, the name value was still there. I said to myself, “Why don’t I do this with actors?”
Every one of these guys had had phenomenal careers but had fallen on hard times, including myself. I thought that together this might generate the same sort of interest that fans have when they go to see a Rock and Roll revival. Instead, they’d be going to see a revival of action stars.
I didn’t know if it was going to work, but I thought of it as an experiment. And since I had known them for years, I could call on favors, and all of them could trust me that I wasn’t going to embarrass them. And that’s how I was able to make it happen.
