Sylvester Stallone Reveals Where He Stands With Former Longtime Rival Arnold Schwarzenegger

Decades after his high-profile rivalry with Arnold Schwarzenegger, Sylvester Stallone shares where he stands with the fellow action star. 

During his appearance at PaleyFest NY 2026 over the weekend, Stallone name-dropped Schwarzenegger while explaining his Tulsa King character Dwight Manfredi’s relationship with Frank Grillo’s Bill Bevilaqua.

“There’s a certain camaraderie… there’s a respect. We’re very similar types,” he explained about the characters. “It’s like me and Schwarzenegger. We’re good friends now. We’ve gotten mellow. But you have these two adversarial guys, and sometimes you really find that in real life, that just continues to up your game. That’s it.”

Stallone and Swarzenegger’s rivalry reportedly kicked off after the 1977 Golden Globe Awards. During that award show, Stallone’s Rocky was nominated in six categories, while Schwarzenegger won New Star of the Year for his film Stay Hungry.

Although Rocky won Best Motion Picture – Drama, Stallone accused Swarzenegger of laughing at him when the film lost in the other categories. When Rocky won its only award, Stallone allegedly threw a bowl of flowers at Swarzenegger.

Less than a decade later, Schwarzenegger claimed that Stallone used body doubles in some of his movies. He later admitted to tricking Stallone into signing on to the 1992 film Stop! Or My Mom Will Shoot.

In a 2022 interview on The Jonathan Ross Show, Stallone recalled that he and Schwarzenegger “truly loathed” each other throughout the 1990s.

“We couldn’t stand to be in the same galaxy together for a while. We truly, truly loathed each other,” Stallone pointed out.

Schwarzenegger also shared in a 2025 interview on Andy Cohen’s SiriusXM Radio Andy show that the rivalry concluded with a business venture.

“All of a sudden, I started working with Robert Earl and Keith Parish to create the Planet Hollywood franchise, those restaurants,” he said.

Schwarzenegger then shared that he and Stallone’s lawyer asked whether the fellow action star could join the venture.

“That’s actually a good idea, because it could bring us together. And I wanted that. At that point I had grown out of my craziness,” Schwarzenegger recalled thinking.

The rivalry ended in the early 2000s. Schwarzenegger even invited Stallone to both of his California gubernatorial inaugurations.

The duo later appeared together in three of The Expendables films and 2013’s Escape Plan.