Ahead of his 80th birthday and the publication of his new autobiography, “The Steps,” screenwriter, director and action star Sylvester Stallone decided to lay everything bare in an intimate and candid interview with The New York Times.
At the heart of the interview is a surprising revelation: Stallone suffered from extreme bulimia.
“It got to the point where I became bulimic,” Stallone admitted. “I got down to 2.6 percent body fat when I was doing ‘Rocky III,’ and I couldn’t hold anything down. Or I didn’t want to keep it down because I became so obsessed with staying at that point of fitness, literally an obsessive body-worship kind of thing.”
Alongside his eating disorder, Stallone also put to rest the myth surrounding his naturally developed physique, openly admitting that he used steroids and other banned substances to maintain the hulking appearance of Rocky and Rambo.
“Nobody does it without additives and drugs, period. I don’t care what they say. It isn’t as though you’re a junkie, but if you’re going to work out and try to stay in shape for six months straight, and you’re eating yogurt and pudding, it’s not happening.”
Today, describing himself as living on “borrowed time,” Stallone suffers from chronic pain and has undergone no fewer than 14 major surgeries, including nine back surgeries and three neck fusions, the result of his obsession and his stubborn refusal to use stunt doubles.
Stallone in “Rambo: First Blood Part II”
(Photo: Screenshot)
That obsession with proving to the world that he was “unbreakable” did not emerge in a vacuum. In the interview, Stallone offers a harrowing glimpse into a childhood spent with emotionally and physically abusive parents who had not wanted him in the first place.
The actor, who was born with partial facial paralysis after forceps were improperly used during his birth, recalled his father’s unimaginable violence.
“He’d start spinning his fork and suck his teeth, and you knew what was coming. The next thing you know, wham! He had very big hands. You learn to duck. I didn’t put a lot of stuff in the book because I didn’t want a pity party, but it was insane. For example, before we go to church he said, 'Go to the store and buy some bread.' I bring home sandwich spread, not bread, and he kicked me in the stomach, laid me out, got in the car and went to church. I’m there in the street with mayonnaise. Really, it’s unbelievable.”
In another incident, his violent and fiercely competitive father dragged him off a horse during a polo match and beat him in front of everyone.
“He had this sort of imperiousness and he was cold as hell, and so my father was very, very cold and tough,” Stallone said, describing his tendency to injure himself throughout his career as “very masochistic,” intended to prove to his late father: “No, you’re not going to break me.”
Stallone also reveals for the first time that when he was sent as a teenager to an institution for special education and disciplinary problems, he was subjected to a severe physical and sexual assault in a bathtub by another resident. Guards eventually had to rescue him, beating his attacker with leather straps.
The interview also touches on Stallone’s glory days in Hollywood, when he and Arnold Schwarzenegger, the era’s other major action star, could not be in the same room because of their intense hatred and fierce rivalry.
“He was a challenge. I was a blunt force; he was Machiavellian cool.,” Stallone said with a laugh, acknowledging that their rivalry pushed both men to make films with “bigger guns, louder, more action, disemboweled bodies,” helping shape the action genre of the 1980s.
Sylvester Stallone and Arnold Schwarzenegger in “Escape Plan”
(Photo: Public relations)
Sylvester Stallone and Arnold Schwarzenegger in 'Escape Plan'
(Photo: PR)
In a rare display of openness, Stallone also spoke about the greatest tragedy of his life: the death of his eldest son, Sage, in 2012 at just 36 from an undiagnosed heart condition, and the guilt that has haunted him ever since.
“The thing is, you have so many episodes of guilt. Like: What could I have done? Should I have been there? What if I did that? If I went right or went left? I’ll never forget, it was so cold: My mother’s new husband, who I’d never even met, who was a doctor, called me and goes: 'Sly, he’s gone. Sage — he’s gone.' I went, 'Gone where?' 'He died, he’s gone. I’m sorry.' Click.”
At 80, admitting that he succumbed to unbearable arrogance at the height of his fame, Stallone is no longer trying to look like a superhero.
“I built a castle with thousands of stones made of regrets,” he said, summing up his life with pain. “I’m trying to make up for it in my own petty way, and I don’t know if there’s enough time. There is not enough time. I’m making up for it as much as I can, because you’re never too old to be in love, never too old to dance with the great memories that you’ve had, and not wallow in the worst swamp of all, which is the swamp of loneliness.”