About this site

Beef: Schwarzenegger v Stallone is an experiment in serialised non-fiction, revealing the untold story of 1980s Hollywood's greatest rivalry, chapter by chapter.

Rambo vs The Terminator, Rocky vs Colonel John Matrix … flashback to the era when two ripped titans scrapped it out to be king of Hollywood. In a world where brawn and bombast ruled, Sylvester Stallone and Arnold Schwarzenegger bid to outdo each other with every movie they made: their biceps measurement, the payoff lines, the size of their knives, the number of people they killed.

This is the personal story of the two stars who defined a blockbuster era and, through their titanic struggle, emerged as new men in a new time. And the Valkryian actress who came between them – and ultimately became the fall girl as the two meatheads drove 1980s action cinema to OTT, ultra-violent and nationalistic new heights.

Stick around

Your paid subscriptions will fund the ongoing research and writing of the account of this epic cinematic pissing contest, including original interviews with people who worked with them, pumped iron with them and mediated between them.

The introduction and first chapter will be freely accessible by all subscribers – then subsequent chapters will be made available only to paid members. They will also receive exclusive posts discussing the challenges of creating long-form cultural writing – as well as a finished copy of the completed book.

The author

Phil Hoad is a reporter, features writer and critic who lives in Montpellier, France. He has written extensively on cinema for over 25 years, most often for the Guardian, but also for the BFI, Independent, the Times, the Big Issue, the Face, Dazed & Confused, Al-Jazeera English, Total Film and others. He can bench-press 17kg.