Sylvester Stallone’s wife revealed the reason why her husband was walking with a cane after he was spotted hobbling down the red carpet at the Kennedy Center Honors.
“We just finished our eighth back surgery,” Jennifer Flavin, 57, told Fox News’s Raymond Arroyo during a pre-ceremony chat. “That’s why he has a cane.
“He’s had three neck surgeries; knees, elbows, shoulders... He’s been through it, and we need one more surgery on the back, so after we finish Tulsa King, we’re gonna head back to the operating room.”
“He’s still punching, though,” she added with a grin. Stallone cut a striking figure as he strolled onto the red carpet dressed in a stylish black tuxedo and sporting a matching gold-tipped cane.
While the star, 79, has often been candid about the laundry list of injuries he’s accrued over decades of playing intense, physical action roles, the appearance of the cane was still a surprise.
The star tore one of his pectoral muscles while filming Rocky II. He spent nine days in the ICU while shooting Rocky IV after being punched in the heart by co-star Dolph Lundgren while filming a particularly intense fight scene.
Another key moment for Stallone came in 2010 while filming all-star action romp The Expendables. During an on-screen brawl with Steve Austin, the former WWE star hurled Stallone against a wall, leaving him with a fractured neck, dislocated shoulders, and long-term spinal damage he has “never recovered” from.
The injury was so severe that it required the star to undergo seven back surgeries and have a metal plate inserted into his spine, and Stallone admits he’s never been the same since.
“I did stupid stuff. I was directing Expendables and, like an idiot, I’m doing take 10, take whatever, and I remember one slam, and I could actually feel one bang,” he said during an episode of reality show The Family Stallone last year.
“I never recovered from it. After that film, it was never physically the same,” he added. “So I warn people, ‘Don’t do your own stunts.’”
Nevertheless, Stallone was all smiles on Sunday as he was celebrated as one of the president’s hand-picked Honorees at the Kennedy Center, alongside George Strait, Gloria Gaynor, and the rock band Kiss.
Host Donald Trump said, “Some of them have had legendary setbacks, setbacks that you have to read in the papers because of their level of fame. But in the words of Rocky Balboa, they showed us that you keep moving forward, just keep moving forward.”
