I mean there's still also an element of the audience looking for role models. In my day, when I started, if you were an action hero, you were a little bit of a role model like the person.

In my career, whether it's a big or a small movie, when I've worked on something for a long time, like [Ivan] Drago in Rocky IV, they start to take on a life of their own.

I was this Swedish kid who came over here to study engineering, but I got into movies, and suddenly I'm in this 'Rocky' picture with Sylvester Stallone. And then the movie comes out, and it's a big hit, and I'm famous. Like, world famous. I wasn't thinking of ruling Hollywood; I was thinking of just trying to make it to the next day, trying to figure out what the hell happened.

Your body's made to run, to walk, to trek long distances and carry things, work in a forest, and hunt animals. You have to keep it alive to function.

I mean there's still also an element of the audience looking for role models. In my day, when I started, if you were an action hero, you were a little bit of a role model like the person.

Life is stranger than fiction. It's nice to have stuff that people don't know about. And it helps when you read a bad review. You can go, "This guy doesn't have me figured out." There's more mystery to you than they understand.

You know which guys are doing steroids and which ones aren't. I don't judge anybody. Everybody has their own life and people do what they want. It's like smoking pot. If you experiment with it, it doesn't mean you're the devil, and it doesn't mean you've ruined your body. It just means you tried it.