The Statue, the story of a monument to the greatest Philadelphian who never lived, from WHYY Digital Studios. Coming in 2023.

An estimated 4 million people visit the Rocky Statue every year. That’s more than double the amount that go to the Liberty Bell. Surprising for a monument that the city once rejected as merely a movie prop. We speak to people who wait in line to snap a picture or run up the Art Museum steps to find out what motivates this pilgrimage. Their surprising answers take us across the globe and range from quirky to deep.

Show Notes

• Laura Holzman’s book Contested Image: Defining Philadelphia for the Twenty-First Century.
• 6ABC News clips from the Temple University Libraries Digital Collections.
• Website for Steadicam inventor Garrett Brown.
• Learn more about Haseeb Payab’s journey from Afghanistan to Philly in this article from the Philadelphia Inquirer.
• Visiting the Rocky Statue and Art Museum Steps.
• The official Rocky Statue website.

We go down the Rocky rabbit hole to understand how the fictional fighter grew from one man’s rough sketch into a global icon. Exploring Stallone’s Instagram art history lessons, interviews about his paintings with Oprah, and a limited-edition art book worth thousands of dollars, we learn that hiding behind the macho action star is a man who longs to be understood as a thoughtful artist.

Show Notes

• Sly Stallone meets Rocky Balboa
• Official website for filmmaker André Robert Lee
• Sylvester Stallone, Rocky. The Complete Films
• Sylvester Stallone, The Official Rocky Scrapbook
• Stallone on the Oprah Winfrey Show
• Stallone giving a tour of his painting exhibition, 2011