He may have gone on to become one of the most successful action movie stars of his generation, but the path to success was not easy for Sylvester Stallone.
The actor suffered a complication during his birth that left him with a slight droop on his face and a minor speech impediment, which led to bullying at school.
On top of that, Stallone and his brother were beaten by an abusive father, so they both ensured a tough childhood in which they also moved around a lot to different cities. Stallone even spent part of his childhood in foster and boarding care.
As a young pupil, Stallone let some of his frustrations out at school and was even voted by teachers as “the student most likely to end up in the electric chair”.
The start of Sylvester Stallone’s acting career
As a young adult, Stallone moved to New York to try to make it in the entertainment industry, but there was no immediate breakthrough.
He apparently spent time sleeping in a bus station and earning just one dollar and 12 cents per hour cleaning up lion dung at the Central Park Zoo.
A part in a terrible play then followed, before his breakthrough came when auditioning for the Woody Allen film called ‘Bananas’.
Although he was initially overlooked because he wasn’t considered intimidating enough, Stallone didn’t give up.
“Stallone and his friend Johnny, another aspiring actor, rubbed soot on their faces, ran Vaseline through their hair and returned, scaring Allen into giving them parts,” wrote Nick de Semlyen in the new book ‘The Last Action Heroes: The Triumphs, Flops, and Feuds of Hollywood’s Kings of Carnage’.
A few other minor roles followed, before Stallone hit it big with his starring role in ‘Rocky’ in 1976, which he wrote himself. The rest, as they say, is history.