10 Actors Who Legitimately Hurt Their Co-Stars On Movie Sets
6. Dolph Lundgren Legitimately Breaks Sylvester Stallone - Rocky IV
Sylvester Stallone is a performer known for delivering the most authentic action possible.
Even in his later years, the movie legend has frequently put his body through hell in films like The Expendables (2010) and Rambo: Last Blood (2019) just to capture the feeling of a human genuinely being in harm's way.
Back in 1985, however, Stallone's quest for realism led to a near death experience for the Rocky star.
As he was shooting the fight at the end of Rocky IV with towering blonde powerhouse Dolph Lundgren, Stallone felt their bout needed to feel more personal due to their characters' absolute hate for one another. So, he asked his co-star to legitimately try to knock him out. Excellent idea.
Lundgren hit his director, also Stallone, and the 'Italian Stallion' started to feel a burning in his chest, but chose to ignore it. Later that night it became clear this wasn't just a brief spell of heartburn. The actor was rushed to hospital where he spent eight days in intensive care.
Stallone later revealed to Ain't It Cool:
'He struck me so hard in the chest that my heart slammed against my breastbone and began to swell, so the beating became laboured, and without medical attention the heart would’ve continued to swell until it stopped.'
This tends to happen to people who've been in car accidents, so Stallone quipped, "in a sense I was hit by ‘a streetcar named Drago."