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Sylvester Stallone has recently opened up about his late mother, Jackie Stallone, revealing that he was not present at her funeral in 2020. The news of her passing came to him unexpectedly while he was playing golf. “I was playing golf and someone called, ‘Your mother’s dead,’” Stallone recounted in an interview.
When questioned about his absence from the funeral, Stallone initially responded with a simple “No,” before adding with a hint of irony, “Now you’re getting the scoop.”
The 80-year-old actor is currently promoting his new memoir, The Steps, which delves into the more challenging aspects of his life, beginning with his childhood. He shared a particularly striking memory of his mother telling him, “The only reason you’re here is because the hanger didn’t work.”
Stallone also reflected on his mother’s approach to motherhood, describing her as “very, very immature” and noting her aspirations to be a star. He detailed her various pursuits, including palmistry, astrology, rumpology (the practice of reading fortunes from one’s buttocks), trapeze artistry, and piano playing. Despite these ambitions, he said she never truly connected with her children or grandchildren.
By the end of her life, Stallone and his mother had grown distant. “It got to the point where she just didn’t want to talk to me,” he said.
“So she died in isolation.” Jackie left behind three children and seven grandchildren, but the relationship between her and Sylvester remained strained.
Despite this difficult relationship, Stallone does not seem to harbor bitterness. Instead, he believes his upbringing played a significant role in shaping his creativity and drive. “It’s the ones that have all the issues that usually end up being the most creative,” he remarked.
This determination propelled Stallone to success, most notably with the 1976 film Rocky, which he wrote and starred in. The movie became the year’s highest-grossing film and received 10 Academy Award nominations. However, the physical demands of his roles, especially in Rocky and Rambo, came with personal costs.
In an interview with The New York Times, Stallone revealed that his intense physical transformations led to struggles with an eating disorder, fueled by years of steroid use in the 1980s. He described how he viewed his physique as a form of armor, evolving from a “smooth, normal-looking guy” in Rocky to a more “animalistic” warrior in Rambo.
“I started to think, design your body like a jaguar, a cat,” he explained. “And then it became an obsession, really bad.”
Stallone’s candid reflections offer a complex portrait of a man shaped by a challenging family history and relentless personal ambition.