I finally got around to seeing Rocky Balboa. I’ve always been the biggest Rocky fan in the world but I was putting it off because I’m not feeling so optimistic anymore like I used to in my foolish youth. When I first saw the original Rocky it had a huge impact on my life. Even though I was only a child, I had already discovered I could write and I knew the moment those end credits rolled that I wanted to be a filmmaker. And Stallone became my idol.

But one of the best things about living in Los Angeles can also be one of the worst: you get to meet celebrities. And sometimes they don’t live up to your expectations. I was at a party after a boxing match at this cool rooftop club at the Staples Center, and lo and behold there was Sly. Back in 1990, I saw him when I got to be an extra in Rocky V but I couldn’t get near the guy. A few years after I moved to LA, my friend worked on Get Carter but I didn’t get to meet him then either. Once I had even bumped into him on the Universal lot but I didn’t have the guts to go up to him and say Yo. But that night, I was finally going to get the chance to say hello. How could I let the opportunity escape me, right? I mean how often do you get to be at a party with your idol? No bodyguards, no crowd control. Total access.

At one point, my wife and I were in line to get drinks when I saw Stallone walking towards us. Ah, the drink line, I thought, the perfect place to have a conversation. He reached the line just as it was our turn to order. It was then I discovered that Rocky Balboa may wait his turn but Sylvester Stallone does not. He simply walks up to the bar and gets a drink. Now don’t get me wrong, I’m not so naïve that I don’t know how celebrities act. Hell, you don’t need to be a star to be a complete asshole in Hollywood. It’s just that Stallone had always seemed so down to earth to me. Now the guy was cutting in front of me in line. While he waited for his drinks, I was still thinking of saying hello and even mentioning I was from Philly. In my foolishness (okay, delusion), I thought it would be some sort of bonding experience. “Yo, really? Come on over to my table and have a drink. Do ya wanna job? Got any good scripts?” Certainly that would be the outcome. That’s when some stupid drunk girl had to say, “Hello, Rocky” and although he graciously said hello back, you could tell he was annoyed. On the one hand, I could understand the guy being irritated because he’s an actor and it’s a character he portrays, not his true self. Then again, I found it amusing that he would get angry when someone calls him Rocky since he’s the one who keeps insisting on putting Roman numerals after the guy’s name in the first place.

In any case, I decided I wasn’t going to say hello after all. In hindsight, I guess he wasn’t all that bad. He wasn’t rude. Not like his friend, writer-director John Herzfeld, who rode Sly’s coattails to the bar and ordered around fifteen drinks that needed to be mixed. The bartender didn’t have a blender so he had to shake all the damn things by hand. And there I was frustratingly (I had passed patiently miles back) waiting my turn when all I wanted was a stupid can of iced tea. Not to mention the fact that here’s my wife who hates LA and all the Hollywood bullshit that goes along with the industry and I had been trying to convince her it wasn’t all that bad. Now here was this sub-par writer-director who was proving me wrong with a vengeance. So what if the guy did Two Days in the Valley and 15 Minutes? He was no Scorsese. Come to think of it, John Herzfeld is the perfect example of the quintessential Hollywood asshole. The lower on the food chain you are, the more insecure you are, the bigger your ego and the more of an asshole you become. It’s a vicious circle.

Anyway, the last few years Stallone’s career had been sinking further and further. A few of his films even went straight to video. Soon he wasn’t in demand for films at all. After years of studio resistance, he finally got to make Rocky Balboa but I wasn’t sure if I wanted to see it. Not only because of the party incident but because things weren’t going well with me and I didn’t want to buy into the whole “you can beat the odds” crap again. I figured it was time to settle into “this is your life so deal with it” mode.

Back in September, Sly was here to dedicate the Rocky statue being placed at the Art Museum. He seemed incredibly sincere when he talked about how much he loved Philly and how you should follow your dreams. By coincidence, the statue was dedicated on my birthday. Of course, keeping with my Mario luck, I was recuperating from my hernia operation and couldn’t go to the ceremony. Listening to Sly’s speeches and interviews, I could feel my wall of resistance gradually begin to crumble but I still fought to keep my barrier up. After all, he’s an actor. He gets paid millions of dollars to seem sincere. A few weeks before the film’s release, he even answered fans’ questions on the website Ain’t It Cool News and, again, seemed so genuine.

Though my walls were not tumbling down just yet, I had to admit the film did look like it could be good. It even began getting good word of mouth. Stallone struggled to get the film made and it had become his passion and dream. Even when he was finally able to get the film greenlit, it was only if it was made on a low budget. The film and him soon became fodder for jokes. Everyone figured it would fail. Stallone didn't care. He wanted to prove that, just like Rocky, he had one final round left in him. Once again, he was the underdog. I'm an underdog too so I figured what the hell? I’ll go see it. Besides, anyone who can turn their dream into a reality deserves to have it be seen.

The film was great and so was Sly. During many moments, his performance was even heartbreaking. Particularly the scenes where he’s mourning Adrian, and when he tells Paulie there is “still stuff in the basement.” During the end credits, there are scenes of people running up the steps of the Art Museum imitating Rocky's famous moment of triumph. Being the Rocky fan that I am, many of my friends are stunned when I tell them I’ve never done that. You see, I can’t run up the steps just to run up the steps. There’s no moment behind it. It’s hollow. I’d rather never run up those steps than to run up them for no reason. Weird, I know, but hey, consider the source.  

In the end, while the party incident wasn’t exactly forgotten it was, at the very least, forgiven. After all, the film did get me thinking. I still have stuff in the basement too. When the lights came back up and I returned to reality, I sat there with one question swirling around my mind:

Do I have one final round left in me…?