ROCKY IV - 1985

Director: Sylvester Stallone
Cast: Sylvester Stallone, Talia Shire, Burt Young, Carl Weathers, Brigitte Nielsen, Dolph Lundgren.

DOLPH'S THOUGHTS:
I was in London 1984, my then girlfriend, Grace Jones was finishing the bond film A View To A Kill. I got a call from Hollywood saying that Sylvester Stallone wanted to meet me for a movie he was making. I didn't know which picture, but they flew me in to LA and I met with him for the first time at the Paramount lot. He had long hair, he was about to start production of Rambo II. He told me it was for Rocky IV, a boxing picture he was working on, and that he was looking at about 5000 people. He thought I had a good chance. He wanted me to gain about 20 pounds of muscle, so I had to start training.

I went through an audition process for about 5 months. Finally in December 1984 I did a screen test. I stayed in a cheap hotel in LA, and on the way to have breakfast I ran into two other tall blond guys who looked incredible muscle bound, both Russians, and it turned out obviously I wasn't alone, there were the two more left from the 5000. They took us to a sound stage, where they had a camera rigged up, and we had a monologue that we had to deliver wearing boxing trunks and gloves. There were about 50 people behind the camera watching, guys in suits, Sylvester and his bodyguards and a bunch of other people.

I was a little nervous to say the least. I had practiced my monologue, and my idea was to play this Russian fighter emotionless, to "underplay" him a little bit. The other guys were screaming, ranting and raving, and I guess people thought my take was better so Sly called me a week later, and I had the part. We shot in LA, Las Vegas, Vancouver (for Moscow) and Wyoming (for Siberia).

Nine months later the movie opened, and I was a known face world wide, which kind of gave me an idea of the power of movies, and how it can change your life very quickly.