‘It was disgusting!’: Sylvester Stallone, worth $400M, reveals he lived in a transient hotel and shared a bathroom with 20 people before making it big with Rocky in 1976… adding looking back on his old life could make him cry
Sylvester Stallone, 76, has been promoting his new series Tulsa King in New York City this week.
On Wednesday morning, he dropped by Live With Kelly And Ryan to talk about his early years living in crime-ridden, poverty-stricken Hell’s Kitchen in Manhattan.
Before his big break with Rocky in 1976, he resided in a transient hotel and shared a bathroom with around 20 people. ‘It was disgusting,’ he said. ‘You could lay on the bed — open up the window, close it,’ he recounted about the cramped living conditions he endured at the time.
Stallone on Live: The filmmaker joined cohosts Kelly and Ryan on their morning show before the premiere of his upcoming television debut show Tulsa King
According to Celebrity Net Worth, he is worth $400million.
He then talked about revisiting his hometown of Hell’s Kitchen.
In response to co-host Kelly Ripa asking if it would be emotional to go back to his old neighborhood and recall where it all began, he said yes.
‘Yeah, it really is, because, you know it’s like, you don’t want to cry like I was back there. You know, like I took a bath at that fire hydrant,’ he shared.
Rocky times: The Rocky actor told Kelly Ripa and Ryan Seacrest about one of his early gigs in his decades-spanning career and how he taught himself about filmmaking
The movie that changed it all: He was living in a transient hotel in NYC before he made it big with 1976’s Rocky
He talked about embracing his emotional propensity, ‘I hate to because I am one of those guys that cries at the opening of a letter.
‘I do not know why or where that came from…but that’s my feminine.’
One of the first jobs in his early career was as an usher.
He would secretly record shows to later study the dialogue. ‘I would listen to the tapes, and I would be like, let me try to write that line differently. Let me try to write that line.’
He began to play a game — ‘a crossword type of puzzle’ — to discover and develop his own film style. ‘That is what you do when you have nothing to do, right?’
The actor told Kelly and Ryan that’s how he taught himself about filmmaking when he couldn’t afford to go to film school at the time. ‘Let’s face it, you watch a movie a hundred times and you try to figure out the tricks.’
In his hometown where he lived while struggling to break into the film industry, Stallone revealed his part in creating an upcoming Netflix documentary about the history of Hell’s Kitchen.
Tribute: The actor posted a throwback picture of himself meeting Queen Elizabeth II during his Rocky era
Later, he spoke about the throwback picture he posted to his Instagram as a tribute honoring the late Queen Elizabeth II. He reminisced about the time when he had the opportunity to meet the queen around his Rocky era.
He described the interaction he had with his favorite queen. ‘She actually said, “Oh, that is Rocky.” And I was like, oh come on.’
On his Tulsa King press tour, Stallone also recently visited Italy. There, he encountered and met another head of state — president Sergio Mattarella.
Looking sharp: The Tulsa King lead donned a gray blazer over his black turtleneck and trousers as he arrived to morning show Live on Kelly and Ryan
The Rambo actor was stuck in a parking lot for around three hours because the president was having a meal nearby.
‘Everything [was] blocked — the doors, the guards, everything.’ When Stallone finally walked in to ask for help to unblock his vehicle, he saw ‘a knight in shining armor’ guarding the president.
‘When the president shows up, they always have this traditional knight hanging around, so I got past the knight, and I was like, “Hey, how are you doing?”‘ Stallone said to the president.
Stallone the Stallion: The silver fox wore a sports jacket and black oxfords for the morning show taping in New York City
The president then told him how to get out of the parking lot and Stallone left for his Tulsa King press event.
The upcoming mob drama will be the award-winning actor’s first television debut, but he said he still favors movies.
Stallone said he had no choice in whether or not he only worked in movies anymore: ‘The film business as I knew it and grew up with is gone.’
A lot has changed. These days, he observed that the film industry focuses on making ‘big, mega, tentpole movies like Marvel’. A ‘little’ film like Rocky never would have been released but instead streamed.
The new show he will be starring in tells the story of New York mafia capo Dwight ‘The General’ Manfredi. The protagonist is released from prison and exiled by his boss to set up shop in Tulsa, Oklahoma.
After becoming suspicious of his mob family, The General slowly builds his own crew from a group of unlikely characters to help him establish a new criminal empire.
