Arnold Schwarzenegger has admitted that during the height of their careers in the 1980s, he and fellow action icon Sylvester Stallone shared what he described as a “mutual hatred.” In a candid interview on Radio Andy with Andy Cohen, the former California governor reflected on their long-running rivalry, saying, “We hated each other. We were kind of attacking each other and doing nasty things and saying nasty things… all these stupid things.”
Their feud, once emblematic of Hollywood’s alpha-male culture, slowly dissolved by the early 2000s—but not before plenty of real tension and behind-the-scenes gamesmanship played out.
One of the turning points came in the early ’90s, when Schwarzenegger was involved in launching the Planet Hollywood restaurant chain with Robert Earl and Keith Parish. He recalled being contacted by a shared attorney—who also represented Stallone—about bringing the Rocky star into the venture.
“At first, I was like, ‘No way,’ but then I thought—this is actually a good idea. It could bring us together. And I wanted that. At that point, I had grown out of my craziness,” Schwarzenegger said.
What followed was a high-profile business partnership that included not just Schwarzenegger and Stallone, but also Bruce Willis, Whoopi Goldberg, Chuck Norris, and others. Their joint investment in Planet Hollywood marked a thaw in their icy relationship and eventually led to their first major on-screen collaboration in 2013’s Escape Plan.
But the competition wasn’t always friendly. In TMZ Presents: Arnold & Sly: Rivals, Friends—a special that aired in 2024—Stallone revisited their early days in Hollywood, saying he viewed Schwarzenegger as his first real competitor. “As soon as I saw him, it was like bang, two alphas hitting,” Stallone said. Schwarzenegger added, “He was very helpful in my career because I had something I could chase.”
Perhaps the most infamous story to emerge from their rivalry came when Schwarzenegger tricked Stallone into starring in the critically panned 1992 film Stop! Or My Mom Will Shoot. Anticipating the movie would flop, Schwarzenegger feigned interest through his agent, prompting Stallone—eager to outshine his rival—to grab the role.
“I never talked to him about it directly,” Schwarzenegger said. “But I made sure word got to his agent that I was excited about it. Next thing I knew, he was in.”
When confronted with the story during the special, Stallone reacted with stunned disbelief. “You talked to my director?” he asked. “Oh my God.”
Though that stunt left Stallone “stuck” with what he called a permanent stain on his film résumé, the two men have since moved well beyond their Hollywood rivalry. What began as a battle of box office supremacy has turned into a late-career friendship between two of cinema’s most iconic action stars.
