Sylvester Stallone has worked with his fair share of actors over the course of his 40-year film career. From Carl Weathers to Arnold Schwarzenegger, he’s collaborated with some of the best, but there’s one actor that may trump the rest in terms of how eccentric he is. The actor in question is Guardians of the Galaxy star Michael Rooker, who worked with Stallone on Cliffhanger. Rooker is known for being a character himself, and it sounds like this was the case when he and Stallone worked together.
Sylvester Stallone recently participated in an Instagram Q&A, in which opened up about different aspects of his illustrious career. During the chat, one fan asked him about working with Michael Rooker on Cliffhanger and Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 2. Stallone had nothing but praise for his former co-star and even recounted some of Rooker’s behind-the-scenes antics on the set of Cliffhanger:
This guy’s fantastic, just committed to the part, fearless, has an incredible soul, very witty and brave. He was doing things on Cliffhanger between takes of just sliding back and forth over a canyon. This is on his own, for fun, in between takes, 4,000 feet straight down with just a simple cable, like he was on in the film itself. So Michael is crazy great.
It’s safe to say that not many people would emulate some of the things Michael Rooker did on the set of Cliffhanger. Although sliding across a canyon sounds extreme, Rooker seems like the kind of person who would get his kicks from attempting dangerous stunts for fun.
Michael Rooker has been known for creating some interesting situations when working on film sets. While working on Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 2, the actor nearly ruined one of the film’s key moments because he fell asleep in the middle of shooting. Luckily, things worked out for the crew.
These antics also carried into his work on The Walking Dead. During his early days on the show, the actor was trying on Merle’s costume for the first time and, while wearing the character’s signature hand knife, he didn’t realize just how far along his hand it was. This almost led to him stabbing the wardrobe person, but the result was only a light poke, as Rooker put it.
Aside from his on-set shenanigans, Michael Rooker has also never shied away from speaking his mind. Just recently, he was asked about the possibility of Yondu, his Guardians of the Galaxy character, being revived for the upcoming sequel, which Rooker emphatically shot down.
Michael Rooker isn’t the most conventional actor working in Hollywood today, and that’s certainly not a bad thing. If anything, it’s actually made him more endearing to his various co-stars, and that shines through in Sylvester Stallone’s comments. Here’s to seeing more from Michael Rooker in the near future.
