Sylvester Stallone

Stallone says in his original script the loan shark was Rocky's brother but he was made to change it.

“no one ever realized it, but in the movie, the loan shark was his brother. And they made me change it”

On Purpose with Jay Shetty: SYLVESTER STALLONE: “I Wasn’t Stupid. I Was Just Misunderstood.” (Sep 28, 2026) · Listen from 40:12

Stallone says he played the Mickey scene as what he had wanted to say to his father.

“I'm gonna play this scene, like what I've wanted to say to my father. and I never did”

On Purpose with Jay Shetty: SYLVESTER STALLONE: “I Wasn’t Stupid. I Was Just Misunderstood.” (Sep 28, 2026) · Listen from 33:54

Stallone says selling Rocky without starring in it would have been selling out and would have made him miserable for life.

“if this was going to be my gateway to heaven, if I sold it for money, I'm going to hell”

On Purpose with Jay Shetty: SYLVESTER STALLONE: “I Wasn’t Stupid. I Was Just Misunderstood.” (Sep 28, 2026) · Listen from 28:30

Stallone says being called stupid by his father motivated him to write a screenplay others could understand.

“that was motivation for proving I wasn't stupid by actually writing a screenplay that other people could understand and identify with”

On Purpose with Jay Shetty: SYLVESTER STALLONE: “I Wasn’t Stupid. I Was Just Misunderstood.” (Sep 28, 2026) · Listen from 19:47

Stallone explains Rocky's success as recognition for people who live without acknowledgment.

“everyone has that character that very few people get recognition for. They live in quiet suffering”

The Daily: Sylvester Stallone Hid His Struggles for Decades. Now He’s Coming Clean. (Sep 26, 2026) · Listen from 1:00:32

Stallone describes Rocky as an imagined father figure and role model that served as his substitute for therapy.

“So I found this to be like a therapeutic beyond anything I've ever, like you asked, you know, you go to therapy. That was my Sigmund Freud right there”

The Daily: Sylvester Stallone Hid His Struggles for Decades. Now He’s Coming Clean. (Sep 26, 2026) · Listen from 1:09:24

Stallone argues that hurtful words leave permanent internal scars, especially on children.

“Words are literally verbal bullets that will penetrate you, pierce you, scar your interior forever”

On Purpose with Jay Shetty: SYLVESTER STALLONE: “I Wasn’t Stupid. I Was Just Misunderstood.” (Sep 28, 2026) · Listen from 14:06

Stallone says his parents told him he had cost them their destiny and treated him as a burden.

“they actually said it to my face, where you impeded on our life. You cost us our destiny”

On Purpose with Jay Shetty: SYLVESTER STALLONE: “I Wasn’t Stupid. I Was Just Misunderstood.” (Sep 28, 2026) · Listen from 9:49

Stallone contrasts his mother's claim to have no regrets with his own sense of living on regret.

“I live on regrets. I can make a castle out of regrets. I mean, when people say I have no regrets, I go, bullshit”

The Daily: Sylvester Stallone Hid His Struggles for Decades. Now He’s Coming Clean. (Sep 26, 2026) · Listen from 33:23

Stallone says his emotionally deprived childhood made him tough in an unhealthy way and delayed his capacity for real love until around age 70.

“I literally haven't figured out real, real, real, real true love until, you know, like 70”

The Daily: Sylvester Stallone Hid His Struggles for Decades. Now He’s Coming Clean. (Sep 26, 2026) · Listen from 6:39

Stallone argues that parents shape their children like sculptors, for better or worse.

“the parents are the mold makers they're sculptors they don't realize it But they're sculptors. They're Rodin's. And they're sculpting their masterpiece or their disaster”

The Daily: Sylvester Stallone Hid His Struggles for Decades. Now He’s Coming Clean. (Sep 26, 2026) · Listen from 2:49

Stallone says he rewrote Rambo from the novel's homicidal maniac into a man running from violence.

“When I took it over and started to rewrite it, I had him running away from everything, avoiding it, trying not to confront his demons”

On Purpose with Jay Shetty: SYLVESTER STALLONE: “I Wasn’t Stupid. I Was Just Misunderstood.” (Sep 28, 2026) · Listen from 54:01

Stallone takes responsibility for turning Rambo into a shallow, bravado-driven character in the sequels.

“Absolutely right. That's my fault. It's my fault”

The Daily: Sylvester Stallone Hid His Struggles for Decades. Now He’s Coming Clean. (Sep 26, 2026) · Listen from 1:10:07

Stallone says the breakdown at the end of First Blood was not scripted and came from his identification with veterans who felt dismissed by their country.

“I really identified with this dismissive attitude that I grew up with. All the time”

The Daily: Sylvester Stallone Hid His Struggles for Decades. Now He’s Coming Clean. (Sep 26, 2026) · Listen from 26:49

Stallone says he is in panic mode about mortality and is trying to make up for a lifetime of regrets.

“I built a castle with thousands of stones made of regrets. And I'm trying to make up for it in my own petty way. And I don't know if there's enough time”

The Daily: Sylvester Stallone Hid His Struggles for Decades. Now He’s Coming Clean. (Sep 26, 2026) · Listen from 1:16:39

Stallone describes learning of his son Sage's death by phone and breaking down alone a week later.

“And then about a week later, I was all alone in my room and a whale came out of me. I've never heard before since. It was just such pain and grief and guilt”

The Daily: Sylvester Stallone Hid His Struggles for Decades. Now He’s Coming Clean. (Sep 26, 2026) · Listen from 40:43

Stallone says he was not a good parent during his first marriage and treated the movie set as reality while his life felt unreal.

“Reality was the movie set. The surreal world was my life. I have no control out here. I'm at everyone's beck and call”

The Daily: Sylvester Stallone Hid His Struggles for Decades. Now He’s Coming Clean. (Sep 26, 2026) · Listen from 38:37

Stallone advises people down on their luck to be honest about their talent, arguing ambition should not exceed ability.

“Your ambitions should never exceed your ability. Period”

On Purpose with Jay Shetty: SYLVESTER STALLONE: “I Wasn’t Stupid. I Was Just Misunderstood.” (Sep 28, 2026) · Listen from 1:21:12

Stallone says he made peace with rejection through 'mirror therapy', talking to himself to understand his strengths and weaknesses.

“I used, I guess you might say, a strategy called mirror therapy. I would actually talk to myself”

On Purpose with Jay Shetty: SYLVESTER STALLONE: “I Wasn’t Stupid. I Was Just Misunderstood.” (Sep 28, 2026) · Listen from 16:39

Stallone says he overcomes writer's block by refusing to leave his desk until ideas come.

“You block the block. You sit there and I'm going to outlast you”

On Purpose with Jay Shetty: SYLVESTER STALLONE: “I Wasn’t Stupid. I Was Just Misunderstood.” (Sep 28, 2026) · Listen from 1:13:44

Stallone says writing about Edgar Allan Poe taught him to write beyond himself, preparing him to create Rocky.

“I didn't know how to write very well until I wrote about Edgar Allan Poe”

On Purpose with Jay Shetty: SYLVESTER STALLONE: “I Wasn’t Stupid. I Was Just Misunderstood.” (Sep 28, 2026) · Listen from 17:48

Stallone says after an eight-year slump he wrote Rocky Balboa, a film about grief, which studios rejected before it became a hit.

“the studio said, You're over, and Rocky is dead. You both are finished. And I found one person who said, all right, let's just give it a try”

On Purpose with Jay Shetty: SYLVESTER STALLONE: “I Wasn’t Stupid. I Was Just Misunderstood.” (Sep 28, 2026) · Listen from 54:43

Stallone says studio heads told him he and Rocky were finished, and that writing Rocky Balboa at 60 was the hardest and proudest moment of his life.

“So the hardest and the proudest moment by far in my life is Rocky Balboa because nobody wanted it. I was done”

The Daily: Sylvester Stallone Hid His Struggles for Decades. Now He’s Coming Clean. (Sep 26, 2026) · Listen from 1:05:36

Stallone attributes his reputation as a political conservative to naivete, saying he had never voted and did not know the parties apart when Rocky came out.

“When Rocky came out, I was so naive. I'd never even voted. I was like pushing 30 years. So I had zero. I didn't even know the difference between Democrat and Republican”

The Daily: Sylvester Stallone Hid His Struggles for Decades. Now He’s Coming Clean. (Sep 26, 2026) · Listen from 1:13:44

Stallone says he now considers all war futile and profit-driven, reversing his earlier gung-ho public stance.

“And now I realize all war is futile. It's stupid. It's a mechanism to make tons of money for the war department and manufacturers”

The Daily: Sylvester Stallone Hid His Struggles for Decades. Now He’s Coming Clean. (Sep 26, 2026) · Listen from 1:11:35

Stallone describes his first panic attack at 36 while watching dailies and says the episodes have recurred, including in crowds.

“It was the first time I did is when I was 36. And I was watching dailies. And then all of a sudden, I stood up, and the hair on my neck went up”

The Daily: Sylvester Stallone Hid His Struggles for Decades. Now He’s Coming Clean. (Sep 26, 2026) · Listen from 35:14

Stallone says he never went to therapy because he believed it would not help, and that anxiety stems from deep-rooted causes.

“No. I said it's not going to help. It's just not going to help because it doesn't go away”

The Daily: Sylvester Stallone Hid His Struggles for Decades. Now He’s Coming Clean. (Sep 26, 2026) · Listen from 34:37

Stallone credits his wife's patience with sustaining their marriage and says he says 'I love you' every night.

“I never go to bed without saying I love you, ever. Never, ever”

On Purpose with Jay Shetty: SYLVESTER STALLONE: “I Wasn’t Stupid. I Was Just Misunderstood.” (Sep 28, 2026) · Listen from 1:04:33

Stallone says years of physical punishment left him with nine back operations, three neck fusions and heart problems, and advises young actors to use stuntmen.

“I've had nine back operations, three neck fusions. I've had heart problems”

On Purpose with Jay Shetty: SYLVESTER STALLONE: “I Wasn’t Stupid. I Was Just Misunderstood.” (Sep 28, 2026) · Listen from 59:13

Stallone says he wasted much of his life on anger and competition until he stopped around age 70.

“it took me until maybe 70 years old to stop doing that. to just like, let it lie”

On Purpose with Jay Shetty: SYLVESTER STALLONE: “I Wasn’t Stupid. I Was Just Misunderstood.” (Sep 28, 2026) · Listen from 53:28

Stallone says he was too shy to accept Elvis Presley's 1976 invitation to watch Rocky with him and urges people not to pass up such opportunities.

“1976 when Rocky came out, he invited me to Tennessee to his home and to go to a local theater and watch Rocky with him alone”

On Purpose with Jay Shetty: SYLVESTER STALLONE: “I Wasn’t Stupid. I Was Just Misunderstood.” (Sep 28, 2026) · Listen from 5:30

Stallone says a fortune teller he met in his early 20s made predictions of which roughly 80% came true, including fame by 1975–76.

“I wrote down everything, and I would say 80% came true”

On Purpose with Jay Shetty: SYLVESTER STALLONE: “I Wasn’t Stupid. I Was Just Misunderstood.” (Sep 28, 2026) · Listen from 1:18

Stallone likens his continued acting to a racehorse that cannot stop running, saying performers cease to exist without the format.

“It's like a racehorse. You just keep going until it falls down. It doesn't know how to walk. It knows how to run”

The Daily: Sylvester Stallone Hid His Struggles for Decades. Now He’s Coming Clean. (Sep 26, 2026) · Listen from 1:15:38