Sylvester Stallone

His mother was an American from Washington, D.C. with Breton French and Ukrainian Jewish ancestry, while his father was an Italian immigrant from Gioia del Colle who moved to the U.S. in the 1930s.

His younger brother is actor and musician Frank Stallone.

Many biographies of Stallone indicate that his birth name is "Michael Sylvester Gardenzio Stallone" and his mother explained in an interview that she originally named him "Tyrone" because she admired the actor Tyrone Power, but Stallone's father changed it to "Sylvester".

His nickname as a child was "Binky" but he chose to go by the nickname of Mike/Michael after schoolmates began calling him "Stinky".

His middle name "Gardenzio" is an alteration of the Italian given name "Gaudenzio" and he usually shortened it to "Enzio".

Complications during Stallone's birth forced his mother's obstetricians to use two pairs of forceps while delivering him, accidentally severing a nerve in the process.

This caused paralysis of the lower left side of his face (including parts of his lip, tongue, and chin) which gave him his signature snarling look and slurred speech.

As a result, he was bullied in his childhood, with which he coped by getting into bodybuilding and acting.

He spent part of his infancy in foster and boarding care, rejoining and moving back with his family to Maryland when he was five.

Sylvester Gardenzio Stallone (born July 6, 1946) is an American actor and filmmaker.

He has received numerous accolades, including a Golden Globe Award, as well as nominations for three Academy Awards and two BAFTA Awards.

Stallone is one of only two actors in history (alongside Harrison Ford) to have starred in a box-office No. 1 film across six consecutive decades.

Sylvester Gardenzio Stallone was born in the Hell's Kitchen neighborhood of New York City's Manhattan borough on July 6, 1946, the elder son of women's professional wrestling promoter Jacqueline "Jackie" Stallone (née Labofish; 1921–2020) and hairdresser Francesco "Frank" Stallone Sr. (1919–2011).

In the early 1950s, his father moved the family to his mother's native Washington, D.C. to open a beauty school.

In 1954, his mother opened a women's gym called Barbella's. He initially stayed with his father following his parents' divorce when he was 11, but joined his remarried mother in Philadelphia when he was 15.

Stallone attended Notre Dame Academy and Abraham Lincoln High School in Philadelphia, and Charlotte Hall Military Academy in Charlotte Hall, Maryland, prior to attending Miami Dade College.

He spent two years, from September 1965 to June 1967, at the American College of Switzerland.

He returned to the United States to study as a drama major at the University of Miami, from 1967 to 1969.

While attending the University of Miami, Stallone had a role in the drama That Nice Boy (aka The Square Root), filmed in 1968.

Struggling as an actor for a number of years upon moving to New York City in 1969, Stallone found gradual work in films such as The Lords of Flatbush (1974).

Until 1969, he appeared on the stage under the name Mike Stallone; in 1970, he started using the stage name Sylvester E. Stallone.

Moreover, he and John Herzfeld worked together in 1969 on a low-budget self-produced film called "Horses".

Stallone had his first starring role in the softcore pornography feature film The Party at Kitty and Stud's (1970).

He was paid US$200 for two days' work.

Stallone later explained that he had done the film out of desperation after being evicted from his apartment and finding himself homeless for several days.

He has also said that he slept three weeks in the Port Authority Bus Terminal in New York City prior to seeing a casting notice for the film.

In the actor's words, "it was either do that movie or rob someone, because I was at the end – the very end – of my rope".

The film was released several years later as Italian Stallion, in order to cash in on Stallone's newfound fame (the new title was taken from Stallone's nickname since Rocky).

Stallone also starred in the erotic off-Broadway stage play Score which ran for 23 performances at the Martinique Theatre from October 28 to November 15, 1971, and was later made into the 1974 film Score by Radley Metzger.

After moving to New York City, Stallone shared an apartment with his girlfriend, Sasha Czack, an aspiring actress who supported them by working as a waitress.

He achieved his greatest critical and commercial success starting in 1976 with his iconic role as boxer Rocky Balboa in the first film of the successful Rocky franchise, which he also wrote.

In 1977, he became the third actor in history to be nominated for two Academy Awards for Best Original Screenplay and Best Actor.

From the mid-1980s to the late 1990s, Stallone would go on to become one of Hollywood's highest-paid actors acting in action films such as Cobra (1986), Tango and Cash (1989), Cliffhanger (1993), Demolition Man (1993), and The Specialist (1994).

He portrayed the PTSD-plagued soldier John Rambo in First Blood (1982), a role he would play across five Rambo films (1982–2019).

After Stallone's request that his acting and life experiences be accepted in exchange for his remaining needed college credits to graduate, he was granted a Bachelor of Fine Arts (BFA) degree by the University of Miami in 1998.

Stallone continued his established roles in Rocky Balboa (2006) and Rambo (2008) before launching The Expendables film franchise (2010–present), in which he starred as the mercenary Barney Ross.

In 2013, he starred in the successful film Escape Plan and appeared in its sequels.

In 2015, he returned to Rocky again with Creed, in which a retired Rocky mentors former rival Apollo Creed's son Donnie Creed.

The film brought Stallone widespread praise and his first Golden Globe Award, as well as a third Academy Award nomination, having been first nominated for the same role 40 years prior.

Since 2022, he has starred in the Paramount+ crime series Tulsa King.