Why Sylvester Stallone Was So Unsure About ‘I Play Rocky’ Biopic

Sylvester Stallone recently weighed in on I Play Rocky, the new biopic about the hard road that led to his breakout movie Rocky. The actor admitted that he had doubts at first. Then he saw Anthony Ippolito playing him. “[I was] kind of mixed because I’m going, ‘I’m not dead yet. Aren’t we jumping the gun a little bit?’ And then I saw this video of this kid [Ippolito]. I actually thought it was me the first moment; there were a couple of angles. I go to my daughter and say, ‘That’s unbelievable.’” Stallone spoke at 92NY this week, according to The Hollywood Reporter. Ippolito plays the young Stallone in I Play Rocky, directed by Peter Farrelly. The actor reportedly sent a self-tape after hearing about the project and won the role before a wider casting call was announced. Stallone said he has “nothing to do” with I Play Rocky. He said Farrelly and the filmmakers have handled the project independently, though he offered to answer Ippolito’s questions. “I said, ‘I’ll just sit back and watch.’ I talked to the kid. I said, ‘If you want any questions, here I am,’ and that was it. But they did it all on their own,” Stallone said. Ippolito previously played a young Al Pacino in Paramount+’...