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Sylvester Stallone sat down for an interview to discuss his extensive career in Hollywood and what it means to be a so-called “action actor” in this day and age (via The New York Times). The actor didn’t mince words when he said what he doesn’t like about the term and how it fails to engender the importance of what films have become for this generation.
“I actually hate the word ‘action’ actor because I call it mythology,” he explained. The star went on to pontificate about the importance of stories and how their oral tradition has kept them alive across multiple generations because of their importance to the history of a people or culture. “We need mythological heroes,” Stallone said with emphasis.
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It’s easy to see what Stallone is getting at here, as many mythological heroes have been passed down through generations and are still remembered today (via Canadian Museum of History). However, with television and film as the main purveyor of epic stories for modern generations, it seems clear that he thinks it’s more of a responsibility than some might have considered. “Every generation has to find itself, define its own heroes, define its own mythology,” Stallone went on to explain.
While not everyone would agree that characters like the Terminator or the heroes of the MCU are among the most important cultural figures of our generation, it sounds like Stallone sees it that way.
