Sylvester Stallone and His Friends' Films Podcast

Ryan Rebalkin
  • 4.7 (44)
  • Film Reviews
  • Updated Weekly

Welcome to the *Sylvester Stallone and Friends* podcast, your go-to show for fans of Sylvester Stallone’s action-packed legacy, hosted by Ryan and a variety of other passionate hosts! This podcast dives deep into Stallone’s standalone films and those of his action-hero contemporaries, with special episodes dedicated to Frank Stallone. Please note that *Rocky* and *Rambo* are covered exclusively on our sister podcasts, *One More Round: The Rocky Series Podcast* and *It’s a Long Road: The Rambo Series Podcast*. Join us for engaging discussions, behind-the-scenes insights, and a nostalgic celebration of the films that defined a genre. Whether you’re a longtime fan or new to the scene, subscribe to the *Sylvester Stallone and Friends* feed for action-packed episodes you won’t want to miss!

  1. 16h ago

    Sylvester Stallone - The Steps | Step One | Sly's Buddies, the Pigeons & Moondog

    Stallone The Steps Chapter 7 Ryan and Jared continue their listening party through Sylvester Stallone’s memoir *The Steps*, picking up at Chapter 7, My Buddies, the Pigeons. They are still in step one. The chapter opens with Stallone alone in a cold room that winter, eating chicken and feeding the pigeons on the fire escape, the same window-sill habit that shows up in Rocky. He writes about learning to love himself after affection felt like a mirage, the rigid discipline of open auditions, and the sting of being told his face would not sell. Mid-chapter Bill Conti music swells under the “dreams versus concrete vision” passage. The long stretch is Moondog, the blind street poet in Viking gear on 52nd Street who turns out to be a real composer with an apartment, a girlfriend, and albums. Ryan and Jared note how much of the biography is now on Wikipedia. The chapter ends on New Year’s Eve watching the ball drop as the 1970s begin, still with no first film credit named. The close is the timeline debate and Jared’s plug for The Hyperspace Podcasting in the 25th Century. 0:00 Chapter 7 starts, My Buddies, the Pigeons0:38 Cold room, chicken, pigeons on the fire escape2:09 No love coming from anywhere4:29 Softcore audition note, open calls9:47 Not commercial enough for TV ads11:45 Dreams versus concrete vision, Bill Conti15:40 Moondog on 52nd Street21:15 Wikipedia check on Moondog25:12 New Year’s Eve, the 1970s begin28:56 Chapter 8 tease, timeline questions CREDITSAudiobook: Sylvester Stallone, The Steps, Chapter 7 (My Buddies, the Pigeons)Hosts: Ryan and Jared

    Sylvester Stallone - The Steps | Step One | Sly's Buddies, the Pigeons & Moondog

  2. Oct 21

    Sylvester Stallone - The Steps | Step One | Fight or Flight: Deli, Fishtown, The Tombs

    Stallone Steps memoir chapter 6 Ryan and Jared listen to chapter 6 of Sylvester Stallone’s memoir The Steps, the Fight or Flight section that moves from the deli to a high-school dance and back again. 0:00 Welcome, Jared returns, chapter 6 Fight or Flight5:00 Name tag change, first mention of Frank9:44 Trash guy confrontation, walks away14:05 1961 Father Judge dance, Fishtown18:48 Gets punched, feels like a coward, goes back22:23 Cheap shot, priest beaten, chain-link fence25:15 Shot in the triceps29:44 Back to the deli, hammer and knife32:00 Arrested, the Tombs50:15 Released, apron in the trash CREDITSBook: The Steps by Sylvester Stallone (chapter 6, Fight or Flight)Hosts: Ryan and Jared

    Sylvester Stallone - The Steps | Step One | Fight or Flight: Deli, Fishtown, The Tombs

  3. Oct 10

    Sylvester Stallone - The Steps | Step One | Sly Getting Ready for Failure, Deli Job, Audition, Coat

    Ryan and Adrian continue the live listen of Sylvester Stallone’s The Steps memoir, still on Step One, through the deli shift, an audition, and the winter coat he had to save for.

    Sylvester Stallone - The Steps | Step One | Sly Getting Ready for Failure, Deli Job, Audition, Coat

  4. Oct 9

    Sylvester Stallone - The Steps | Step One | Juilliard and Stallone Cleans Lion Cages

    Ryan and Adrian listen to Sylvester Stallone’s The Steps memoir, still on step one, in the chapter where he cleans lion cages and bombs a Juilliard audition.

    Sylvester Stallone - The Steps | Step One | Juilliard and Stallone Cleans Lion Cages

  5. Oct 3

    Sylvester Stallone - The Steps | Step One | Born Tyrone, Mike to Everyone but Family

    Ryan and Doug stay cold on *The Steps*, chapter three of step one. First two agencies never get past the secretaries. No photo, no resume. Pharmacy booth, fifty cents, four poses, nose against the lens. Third office slides the strip back: professional shots only. Last name on the list. Walk-up, German accent, no secretary. He gives Mike Stallone. Then the birth-certificate fight: mother wanted Tyrone, after Tyrone Power; father blew up and put Sylvester on the form, Americanized from the grandfather, firstborn Italian custom. School years as Sylvester the Cat, Tweety, fists, suspensions. Mike ever since, except at home. That agent offers a 10 p.m. Brooklyn audition and does not come upstairs. Apartment 3D, a man called Ed, robe, sake, Death of a Salesman*, a noise in the closet. Sly leaves. Drink maybe laced. Cigarette, elevated train, proud he did not do something stupid. Bill Conti under the exit. Not *The Party at Kitty and Stud’s — Morton Lewis never shows. End of the chapter. No spoilers in chat. Fuse Gino and Sir Robert were in. Nine hours of audiobook, live and unedited, maybe into Christmas. Ryan’s Rocky and Rambo feeds; Doug is back when the clocks line up.

    Sylvester Stallone - The Steps | Step One | Born Tyrone, Mike to Everyone but Family

  6. Oct 3

    Sylvester Stallone - The Steps | Step One | Sly Showers With His Clothes On!

    Ryan and Doug keep the cold listen of Sylvester Stallone reading *The Steps*. Step one is New York. Off the bus at Port Authority, heat, horns, no bed, no one he knows. Walk to 46th and 9th, Hell’s Kitchen, where it started. Born July 6, 1946. Mother in denial until labor on a bus. Forceps, crushed nerve, left side of the face, the slur. Cold-water flat, plywood on the tub, $15 rent, steel wool in the baseboards, pink mice under the sink. Father the barber who wanted to sing. Mother the cigarette girl at Billy Rose’s Diamond Horseshoe who later claimed she was the star. She never divorced truck-driver Tommy; a four-year-old son she denied. Furniture broken. Then three years in Queens with Mama Hansen, visits once a month. Frank is not in the room yet — Ryan and Doug flag the half-brother from their Frank coverage and wait for the split. Back to 1969. Bench at Port Authority, Woodstock headline, $80, Bowery flophouses, two nights by the garbage cans, then the Sutton at $21.80 a week. Room smaller than a modern cell. Shared bathroom, shower with the clothes on, Yellow Pages open to talent agents. Bill Conti still under the steps. Ryan’s Conti interview is in the comments if you ask. Frank Stallone coverage lives on the other show.

    Sylvester Stallone - The Steps | Step One | Sly Showers With His Clothes On!

  7. Oct 3

    Sylvester Stallone - The Steps | Step Zero - Avoid Comedy and Marriage!

    Ryan and Doug go in cold on the first listen of Sylvester Stallone reading The Steps (William Morrow / Harper Audio). Ryan has been skipping the press tour so the book stays a surprise. Doug takes the inaugural episode after years on the Rocky and Rambo runs. Dedication: Jennifer, Sophia, Sistine, Scarlet, then Sage and Serge. Chat flags Sasha as a character in I Play Rocky (Sir Robert). Sly did not write that film. Then step zero. Pyrenees, 1969, 100 pesetas, Madame Pilar, an egg in a handkerchief. Double lifeline, change around 25, three marriage lines, fortune by 1976, drama not singing, avoid comedy. University of Miami, a few credits short. Draft-dodge line left as a claim; hearing-loss story (amp at a concert) not in the pages yet. Costa Brava at dusk, a fisherman’s mussels, driftwood, time undefeated, then New York. Piano under it is Bill Conti. Live, pauses for comment, no spoilers in chat. Thunderlips is in. Rocky 50th is this year; Star Wars is next. Ryan’s Rocky and Rambo feeds; Doug is back when the clocks line up. The Steps, Sylvester Stallone, memoir, audiobook, Madame Pilar, 1969, Bill Conti, Sasha, I Play Rocky, Rocky 50th

    Sylvester Stallone - The Steps | Step Zero - Avoid Comedy and Marriage!

  8. Sep 7

    Rambo III - (Episode 6) - Failed Rescue, Sewer Escape, and One Bullet

    Ryan welcomes Variety writer Matthew Chernov (How the West Was Cast) to It’s a Long Road for a scene-by-scene look at Rambo III’s botched rescue. They talk Variety lists, why Matthew ranks Rambo III second in the franchise, then the failed raid: Trautman still captive, the injured boy, the sewer swim, the RPG that buys time, handing over Co’s necklace, and Stallone’s classic self-surgery with gunpowder. Matthew also walks through the 2021 Julian’s Auctions Stallone sale — First Blood knife, poncho, bow, Rocky script pages — and plugs How the West Was Cast plus his Variety pieces, including Tulsa King costume design. Ryan also hosts One More Round, the Rocky series podcast. 00:00 – Intro and Matthew’s Variety work  08:40 – Why he ranks Rambo III #2  12:50 – Bond and western podcasts / How the West Was Cast  41:00 – Sewer escape, the boy, and the failed mission  43:30 – Sending the boy northwest / Co’s necklace  45:30 – Wound-cauterizing sequence and the body cast  48:30 – How the episode felt as a first-time video guest  49:50 – Plugs: How the West Was Cast, matthewchernov.com, Tulsa King  51:20 – Julian’s Auctions Stallone memorabilia  56:10 – Wrap-up

    Rambo III - (Episode 6) - Failed Rescue, Sewer Escape, and One Bullet
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4.7
out of 5
44 Ratings

About

Welcome to the *Sylvester Stallone and Friends* podcast, your go-to show for fans of Sylvester Stallone’s action-packed legacy, hosted by Ryan and a variety of other passionate hosts! This podcast dives deep into Stallone’s standalone films and those of his action-hero contemporaries, with special episodes dedicated to Frank Stallone. Please note that *Rocky* and *Rambo* are covered exclusively on our sister podcasts, *One More Round: The Rocky Series Podcast* and *It’s a Long Road: The Rambo Series Podcast*. Join us for engaging discussions, behind-the-scenes insights, and a nostalgic celebration of the films that defined a genre. Whether you’re a longtime fan or new to the scene, subscribe to the *Sylvester Stallone and Friends* feed for action-packed episodes you won’t want to miss!

Information

  • Creator
    Ryan Rebalkin
  • Years Active
    2016 - 2026
  • Episodes
    86
  • Rating
    Explicit
  • Copyright
    © 2026 Ryan Rebalkin

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