new memoir, \u201cThe Steps,\u201d<\/a> Stallone recounts the years before fame, including his arrival in New York City in 1969, determined to become an actor despite poverty, rejection and uncertainty.<\/p>\nThe 80-year-old told Fox News Digital that even in his darkest moments, he held on to the belief that his life would eventually change for the better.<\/p>\n
\u201cI think it comes from na\u00efvet\u00e9 and the folly of youth, that you still have this sense of, \u2018I can do it, I can break the mold,’\u201d Stallone said.<\/p>\n
\u201cI hadn\u2019t been beaten enough by life yet to say it\u2019s over because, as an actor, if you haven\u2019t made it by 30, I\u2019d say 99% you\u2019re never going to make it. I wasn\u2019t aware of that, so I kept going.\u201d<\/p>\n
Sylvester Stallone opened up about living in poverty in New York City in a new Fox News interview. Fox & Friends<\/p>\n
\u201cIn New York, when I was really down and out, I didn\u2019t focus on, \u2018God, you\u2019re going to be destitute,’\u201d Stallone said.<\/p>\n
\u201cThere was this certain optimism that if you put every effort forward, if you denied yourself every moment of pleasure of going to the movies, dating a girl \u2014 if you abandoned all that and dedicate yourself, I believe that you\u2019ll know 100% whether you actually have a chance to be this character you always wished you could be.\u201d<\/p>\n
Stallone never stopped believing he would one day make it as an actor.<\/p>\n
Stallone as Rocky Balboa in the original \u201cRocky\u201d movie (1976). Moviestore\/Shutterstock<\/p>\n
After leaving the American College in Switzerland without graduating and dropping out of the University of Miami just a few credits shy of a drama degree, Stallone returned to New York City with little to his name. <\/p>\n
He rented a room so cramped that he later compared it to the minimum size recommended for a federal jail cell. He shared a bathroom with 10 other people.<\/p>\n
Stallone also found work as an usher at a movie theater, earning just $34 a week. He said the job became an education in filmmaking. Night after night, he studied the movies he watched, keeping his dream alive.<\/p>\n
Sylvester Stallone recounts his years before fame in his new memoir, \u201cThe Steps.\u201d Amazon UK<\/p>\n
Stallone said he would shower with his clothes on to save money on laundry. If he were lucky enough to find a bar of soap that didn\u2019t have a \u201cstrange hair\u201d stuck to it, he would use it to lather up \u201cmy shirt, pants, underwear, socks \u2014 and myself.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cI could never afford to go to a laundromat,\u201d Stallone said. \u201cMy wife thinks this is so gross, \u2018Why would you take a shower with your clothes on?\u2019 I said, \u2018It made sense to me at the time, rather than going down to the laundromat. But this was a tenement home. It was so bad. But you do what you could to survive.’\u201d<\/p>\n
To stave off hunger, Stallone would eat spoonfuls of cottage cheese, then down three or four raw eggs. In the book, he recalled later treating himself to chicken breast and apple juice.<\/p>\n
Stallone and Billy Dee Williams in \u201cNighthawks\u201d (1981). Moviestore\/Shutterstock<\/p>\n
\u201cIt\u2019s the only thing that made sense numerically, financially,\u201d he said. \u201cOf course, it\u2019s all wrong. It\u2019s terrible. I\u2019m surprised I didn\u2019t get salmonella, really. It\u2019s really quite remarkable. But these two things at a certain time of year, because in the summer, the cottage cheese would rot, and the eggs would spoil.<\/p>\n
\u201cBut if you brought it from around October, it would sit on your windowsill until March. So that became my refrigerator. And at the time, I just thought it was so convenient. No dishes. You drink the egg, so you don\u2019t have to wash anything. You didn\u2019t need a fork. And the cottage cheese, it\u2019s a spoon, and you throw the cup away.\u201d<\/p>\n
Stallone wrote in the book, \u201cI wouldn\u2019t recommend this diet to anyone. But if you\u2019re young and poor, it will suffice, which is why I used eating raw eggs in \u2018Rocky\u2019 to give some insight into Rocky\u2019s ways of approaching his life.\u201d<\/p>\n
Sylvester Stallone steps out at BBC Radio 2 in London on Oct. 3, 2026. Mattpapz \/ BACKGRID<\/p>\n
Stallone had a dollar or two a day for food. He needed a job, and fast.<\/p>\n
One of Stallone\u2019s earliest gigs was cleaning the lion cages at Central Park Zoo. The smell was bad enough \u2014 but it wasn\u2019t what frightened him.<\/p>\n
\u201cI also feared for my life,\u201d he wrote. \u201cThe lions were always close by, always watching. They looked through me. They were behind a set of bars, but that didn\u2019t stop the great sad creatures from wedging their huge snouts between the bars to sniff me out.<\/p>\n
Donald Trump and Sylvester Stallone onstage at the America First Policy Institute Gala at Mar-a-Lago on Nov. 14, 2024. Getty Images<\/p>\n
\u201cThe way they inhaled and exhaled made an eerie moaning sound, like they already knew what I was going to taste like.\u201d<\/p>\n
During that period, Stallone faced repeated rejection from agents, including one who criticized his deep voice and asymmetrical mouth \u2014 two traits that would later become signatures of his screen persona.<\/p>\n
Walking home one day, he spotted a \u201cHelp Wanted\u201d sign at Dover Delicatessen and took the 6 p.m.-to-2 a.m. shift. While he was able to save enough money for a coat to brave the city\u2019s bitter winter, it\u2019s one gig he doesn\u2019t miss.<\/p>\n
Stallone said he showered with his clothes on to save money on laundry because he couldn\u2019t afford a laundromat. Fox & Friends<\/p>\n
\u201cEvery customer gets cranky over this and that, \u2018Hey, there\u2019s not enough coleslaw here. This sandwich should weigh an ounce and a half more,’\u201d Stallone said with a laugh.<\/p>\n
\u201cYou\u2019d be shocked. I learned to be a really good fish cutter, like for lox on bagels. I still would hear, \u2018I can\u2019t see through the salmon.\u2019 They wanted the cut so thin that you could actually see light. Oh man. And you\u2019re cutting your fingers off, too.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cAnd then the characters that come in at two in the morning, the outrageous drunks and gangsters, unbelievable,\u201d Stallone continued.<\/p>\n
\u201cYou\u2019d be shocked who walks into a place at two in the morning and wants a sandwich. So that\u2019s colorful. And of course, I ended up in jail, but that\u2019s only because of the stupid deli.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cI thought I was living OK, a decent life,\u201d he said. \u201cBut by today\u2019s standards, you were on the cusp of oblivion.\u201d<\/p>\n
After an altercation at the deli, Stallone found himself handcuffed in the back of a police car, still wearing his apron and name tag. He was sent to \u201cThe Tombs,\u201d New York\u2019s notoriously violent detention facility<\/a> \u2014 or, as Stallone put it, \u201cthe place of nightmares.\u201d<\/p>\nHe was put into a 20-foot-by-20-foot holding cell with at least 25 other men. One man was already pounding another\u2019s head into a small hole that prisoners used as a toilet.<\/p>\n
A criminal court judge eventually released Stallone.<\/p>\n
\u201cI took the apron, balled it up and tossed it in the trash on the way out the door,\u201d he wrote.
Today, Stallone has zero regrets.<\/p>\n
\u201cIf you don\u2019t sacrifice completely and fail, you\u2019ll suffer for the rest of your life going, \u2018Why didn\u2019t I try harder? Why didn\u2019t I use whatever God-given talent I had to be the absolute best?’\u201d Stallone said.<\/p>\n
\u201cIf you fail, you can say, \u2018I tried.\u2019 People can never point a finger in your face and say, \u2018You didn\u2019t try hard enough.\u2019 But my biggest fear was that I would leave something on the table.\u201d<\/p>\n
Looking back, Stallone said those difficult years taught him a lesson that still resonates in \u201cRocky\u201d decades later.<\/p>\n
\u201c\u2018Rocky\u2019 still points out that if you\u2019re willing to completely sacrifice good times, pleasure and escapism for the goal, it\u2019s really possible,\u201d he said. \u201cThere is no halfway point.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Before Sylvester Stallone became one of Hollywood\u2019s biggest stars, he had just $60 to his name \u2014 with…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":869570,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[33],"tags":[1508,91,88,11260,53559],"class_list":["post-869569","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-entertainment","tag-actors","tag-celebrity-news","tag-entertainment","tag-rocky","tag-sylvester-stallone"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/869569","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=869569"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/869569\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/869570"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=869569"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=869569"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=869569"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}