Stallone Bet On Rocky

A story about how Sylvester Stallone wrote and fought to star in Rocky despite being broke and having no screenwriting experience.

"Stallone didn't want to write a movie - he wanted to be an actor. He kept going to auditions and getting turned down because his voice was strange and his mouth moved in a weird way. Instead of taking the no, he said 'if they won't put me in a movie, I'll put me in a movie.'

He hated writing and had never written before, but he decided to force himself to write the screenplay. He said 'I'm going to start writing and I'm not going to do anything else. I will not leave this house until this is done.' He even painted his windows black so he couldn't look outside. In 3 days, he wrote the first version of Rocky.

When he went to sell the movie, they liked it but said he couldn't play Rocky. They offered him $300,000 (equivalent to $1 million today) when he only had $106 in his bank account. He turned it down. Things got so rough he had to sell his dog to make ends meet. He eventually sold the screenplay for just $25,000 but got to play Rocky.

After Rocky became a success, he went back and bought his dog back for $35,000 because the guy wouldn't sell for less. He went from being a valet driver to winning an Oscar within 10 months."