For a decade spanning the late 1980s and early 1990s, the rivalry between action titans Arnold Schwarzenegger and Sylvester Stallone was the stuff of legend. Their careers were a non-stop, hyper-masculine box office competition, marked by bigger muscles, higher kill counts, and more explosive stunts. However, no event perfectly encapsulates the intensity of this professional animosity quite like the infamous tale of a terrible script, a clever ruse, and the disastrous film, Stop! Or My Mom Will Shoot.
The Deception: A Machiavellian Plot As Schwarzenegger later admitted, he and his agent concocted a brilliant, Machiavellian plan when the script for the 1992 action-comedy landed on their desks. Schwarzenegger instantly recognized that the screenplay for Stop! Or My Mom Will Shoot was critically flawed—a “piece of shit,” in his own candid words. Instead of simply rejecting the role, Schwarzenegger saw an opportunity to strategically sabotage his chief rival. The plan was simple: spread rumors throughout Hollywood that Arnold was desperately interested in starring in the film, even going so far as to call the film’s director, Roger Spottiswoode, to feign enthusiasm. The Trigger: As intended, this false rumor reached Stallone’s camp. Driven by their intense, decade-long desire to one-up each other, Stallone’s agent, knowing his client’s competitive nature, aggressively pursued the role for his star, believing he was snatching a coveted project away from Arnold. The Role: Stallone took the lead role of Sergeant Joe Bomowski, a tough cop whose life is complicated by a cross-country visit from his meddling mother, Tutti (played by Estelle Getty).
The Box Office Bomb The result was precisely the disaster Schwarzenegger had engineered. Released in 1992, Stop! Or My Mom Will Shoot was panned by critics, with reviews calling it “thoroughly witless and thuddingly unfunny.” The Data: Produced on an estimated budget of $45 million, the film only grossed approximately $70.6 million worldwide, making it a clear box office failure for a star of Stallone’s caliber. Stallone himself later acknowledged his regret, famously calling it “maybe one of the worst films in the entire solar system.” Related Notable Event: This infamous stumble occurred despite both actors being at the height of their career rivalry, a period punctuated by other commercial missteps in comedy roles. Today, the two former rivals have since become close friends and frequent collaborators, notably starring together in The Expendables franchise, allowing them to laugh about the prank that gave Schwarzenegger years of gleeful satisfaction.