Sylvester Stallone and Arnold Schwarzenegger were 'very confrontational'
Sylvester Stallone has opened up about his rivalry with Arnold Schwarzenegger.
Sylvester Stallone and Arnold Schwarzenegger were "very confrontational" with each other.
The 80-year-old actor had a well-known rivalry with Schwarzenegger, 79, in the early years of their careers, and Stallone admits that it affected both of them at the time.
During an appearance on The Rest Is Entertainment podcast, Stallone shared: "We were very confrontational.
"You have two people arriving at the beginning of a different genre, and we both want to be in charge of that genre.
"I never wanted to be an action guy, but I did First Blood, and I said, ‘This is interesting because action films, if done right, is modern mythology.’ It’s like what they used to do, you know, Iliad and the Odyssey and Hercules and Achilles."
Stallone could "tell right away” that Schwarzenegger would be an issue for him in his own career.
The movie star shared: "We were at the Golden Globe Awards, and he’s sitting there, and he’s eyeballing me. I said, ‘OK, all right. I got it, pal.’ Then, he wins [Best Newcomer]. I went, ‘Give me a break.’"
Despite this, Stallone thinks the rivalry spurned them both on.
He said: "It went back and forth, back and forth on and off screen. It was very contentious, trust me, which I enjoyed. We fought to make the next action film … [and] it just kept elevating."
Stallone and Schwarzenegger ultimately resolved their differences in the early 2000s, when the former bodybuilder ran to be the Governor of California.
Stallone recalled: "It wasn’t put to bed until, like, 20 years later when he decided to run for governor.
"We went to the same cigar place, and he was there. I said, ‘You know, enough of this. We’re not in competition, [you’re] not doing movies anymore. Thank you very much for waking me up, lighting a fire under me.’ He felt the same way."
Stallone previously admitted that they "couldn’t breathe the same air" during their early years in the movie business.
He told WSJ. Magazine: "[Back in the day], we couldn’t breathe the same air. But that made us work harder. And then we eventually realised we’re pretty much cut from the same cloth - even though his cloth is more like itchy wool. I'm like silk."
