When I tried to branch out into comedy, I didn't do very well at it, so I went back to doing what I do naturally well, or what the audience expects from me - action pictures.

Rambo isn't violent. I see Rambo as a philanthropist.

Playing polo is like trying to play golf during an earthquake.

When you're on top and you lead the parade, everyone's there throwing lilies and lilac water on your head. But when those parades have gone by and there's a storm in your heart, there are very few people that are going to sit there and listen to you bemoan life.

I think that gravity sets into everything, including careers, but pendulums do swing and mountains do become valleys after a while... if you keep on walking.

I'm a patriot of the heart.

I've been involved in something which was chaotic and insane. All I can say now is that I am, and intend to stay, a single man.

That's what Rocky is all about: pride, reputation, and not being another bum in the neighborhood.

I love being verbal in films.

I have great expectations for the future, because the past was highly overrated.

It would be great to be able to pass on to someone all of the successes, the failures, and the knowledge that one has had. To help someone, avoid all the fire, pain and anxiety would be wonderful.

Suddenly I've got an overwhelming desire to surround myself with the aura of classical and Romantic art.

When I tried to branch out into comedy, I didn't do very well at it, so I went back to doing what I do naturally well, or what the audience expects from me - action pictures.

Once is a man's life, for one mortal moment, he must make a grab for immorality; if not, he has not lived.

I was very much into buying contemporary art, but I've just decided I want to get rid of it all. Not that it's not great art, but all of a sudden my mood has changed, and I want to go back to seventeenth- and eighteenth-century masters.

I believe there's an inner power that makes winners or losers. And the winners are the ones who really listen to the truth of their hearts.

I am a sensitive writer, actor and director. Talking business disgusts me. If you want to talk business, call my disgusting personal manager.

Once in one's life, for one mortal moment, one must make a grab for immortality; if not, one has not lived.

I tend to think of action movies as exuberant morality plays in which good triumphs over evil.

Like I said, I've got too much respect for women to marry them, but that doesn't mean you can't support them emotionally and financially.

If bad decorating was a hanging offense, there'd be bodies hanging from every tree!

I never quite understood these actors - though I envy them sometimes - who can lie out for a year or two. I feel as though time is a real pressing issue, and I want to get as much work done in the time that I have left.

I think everyone has a certain kind of formula in their life. When you deviate from that formula, you're going to fail big or you're gonna win big.

I'm more focused and have a greater sense of challenge, because I constantly feel the weight of time.

I've kind of fashioned my life after a Slinky. Bend me in a million shapes, and eventually I'll spring back to what I originally was.

Success is usually the culmination of controlling failure.

I think that's become passe, but if you can surround yourself with a kind of monument to yourself and your family - a statement - and you can afford it, then that's a noble project.

I respect a woman too much to marry her.

Most action is based on redemption and revenge, and that's a formula. Moby Dick was formula. It's how you get to the conclusion that makes it interesting.

I take rejection as someone blowing a bugle in my ear to wake me up and get going, rather than retreat.

What I'm trying to do now in my life - not just with the building, but with everything - is to construct things that will have enduring qualities, and won't just be ephemeral flashes in the pan.

I have two lovely sons and some good memories, but I've had a rather tumultuous personal life. It hasn't been dull; I've been the Hiroshima of love.

I have a lack of fear, whereas in the past the fear of failure was a powerful motivator. Anyway, I have great expectations for the future, but I just don't know if I'm the monarch of all I survey.

When I was in junior high school, the teachers voted me the student most likely to end up in the electric chair.

'Rocky' represents the optimistic side of life, and 'Rambo' represents purgatory.

A lot of actors, and artists in general, never feel secure in love. They always feel everything's going to be taken away from them, professionally and personally; they're extremely emotional and volatile.

A lot of guys don't want to admit that they have a propensity for generosity and for violence.

A lot of guys have muscles. A lot of strong men in this world. I think it's important to show that even under all this strength there's a fragile side, a side that can be affected.

A lot of women read male magazines. Of course, a lot of guys read female magazines, but they've got another issue to deal with. But a lot of women read men's magazines and think, 'Oh, this is what these guys are thinking? Studying up on the enemy here.'

Action is always seen as the bottom rung of thespian endeavour, that's just the way it is.

All good actors are unpredictable, and a little crazy in a good way, because they feel more secure playing other people than themselves.

At the end of the day, 'Rocky' is a love story, and he could never have reached the final bell without Adrian.

Boxing is sort of an inevitability. We know they are going to be pounding each other.

Clothing is the first step to building a character.

Don't be gullible, use life before it uses you. Understand there are no free lunches, and for every action you take, there's a reaction.

Early on everyone should do, every time they do a big film, they should do a little film. It really does keep you grounded.

Every morning, I crawl out of bed. I sit there and think, 'Do I really need this?' And I drag myself to the gym in my garage. It's not fun. I hate it. I work out alone. Weights.

Every time I've failed, people had me out for the count, but I always come back.

For 'Rocky II,' I got a torn pectoral muscle, I got all beat up inside, I had to have an operation to splice things back together.