Episode 6: Going the Distance

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VOICEMAIL MACHINE: Voice call received 8:57 a.m., Wednesday, March 9th.

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PAUL FARBER, HOST: In the early 2000s, a Philly reporter named Michael Vitez got a voicemail he wouldn’t forget.

MICHAEL VITEZ: I see it’s a number from LA, and it’s Sylvester Stallone. And he goes, “Mike, you know, this is Sylvester Stallone. I got to tell you, you’re a hard guy to reach.”

PF: Michael was working with a colleague on a book called Rocky Stories. It’s a collection of profiles of people who made the pilgrimage to the Art Museum steps.

They had been reaching out to Stallone for over a year with questions about Rocky’s origins. But when Stallone finally returned their call, Michael missed it.

MV: And so he fills up my entire voicemail.

SYLVESTER STALLONE: Hello Michael, it’s Sylvester Stallone. I hope your machine runs for a little while.

PF: Stallone didn’t disappoint. He described, in detail, his vision for the Rocky story. His muse: the city of Philadelphia.

[BELL RINGS]

This voicemail would become the preface of the book.

SS: I spent a lot of time in Philadelphia in the ‘60s, and even though I worked along the waterfront area, I went to school at Lincoln High. That whole area, that’s why I used Fishtown for Rocky’s home turf. And when I ran along the waterfront, there would be ships in the background, because I used to work down there.

PF: This industrial backdrop was Rocky’s starting point. And it was a perfect contrast to the Art Museum, where he could glimpse a different kind of life. For Stallone, while the story was about boxing and overcoming your limits, it was also about the power of art. To open up a museum, to make it more accessible.

SS: But the steps were like a magical area. It was like this intellectual bastion that I would only look at from afar. It almost seemed like another city, like the Acropolis. It was just some incredible monument. I thought, when I went back there, what would be interesting, what would define who Rocky is? And now we’ve seen him in squalor, we’ve seen him, you know, running across cobblestones, wet, cold, dank, whatever. But the fact that he eventually runs from all the squalor and poverty, and he decides that the pinnacle of what will determine his success, will be able to run up these steps of this magnificent structure, a structure that he really doesn’t even understand what’s inside, but what it represents.

PF: Like the millions of people who would literally follow in his footsteps, Stallone envisioned this place as a portal. Here you can transform yourself by climbing to the top.

SS: It’s like he’s crossed over into a new dimension and new status. And the first time he tried to go up there, obviously he fails, he’s not qualified. And I think that’s been burned into people’s memories, is that it wasn’t so easy the first time. It required him to go back, rethink, train. And then finally that is the last piece of the puzzle which will complete his transformation.

[THEME MUSIC]

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PF: This is The Statue. I’m your host, Paul Farber.

Today on The Statue, we’ll meet someone who has fully embraced this transformation in his own life. We come full circle, to the place where Rocky made his epic ascent into legend. And from the top of the Art Museum steps, we use the Rocky statue as a lens to explore the future of our monuments.

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While reporting this series, we reached out to Stallone and his team to request an interview. Unfortunately he declined, so we had to get creative. The best we could do to tap into the mind of Stallone was to find someone who sounded just like him.

MIKE KUNDA: Hey, Bob, I’m not emotionally involved, OK? You want to dance? You gotta pay the band. You want to borrow? You gotta pay the man.

PF: A Rocky impersonator.

MK: You guys ready?

MICHAELA WINBERG, PRODUCER: Yeah. Are we getting the full experience?

MK: I’m trying, I promise.

PF: It’s a sunny fall morning in Philadelphia, and we’re about to take a tour of the Rockyverse. That is, the filming locations you can visit in the city. Our guide is more than just a fan.

MK: You want to tell me the sky is burgundy with green stripes and yellow polka dots, I’ll meet you on that somewhere, OK? But you’re never going to convince me Rocky is anything other than the pure greatness that it is and what it meant to this city. It’s just never going to happen.

My name is Mike Kunda, and I was born in Scranton, Pennsylvania. I was 11 years old when I saw Rocky for the first time on television in 1979, and it changed everything about me.

PF: Rocky entered Mike’s life right when he needed him, when he was getting picked on at school.

MK: I get into a schoolyard fight, doesn’t go my way and my dad comes home. He says, “Mikey, there’s a movie on TV Sunday night. It’s called Rocky. It’s about this guy who’s a boxer, but he’s not that good. That’s not the important thing. The important thing is, is that he keeps trying.”

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PF: Mike has built a career off being Rocky. Watching him on the job is like seeing the statue step off the pedestal and come to life — so much so that a whole documentary was made about him. It’s called The Pretender.

THE PRETENDER: There’s nothing that just hit me that I wanted to do. I wanted to be Rocky! That’s what I wanted to be.

PF: When he first stepped into the role of Rocky, Mike felt a surge of confidence.

MK: A couple weeks later I get into a few more fights, my grandfather calls me up to his house and he says, “Mikey, I got something for you.” And he gives me his old fedora and leather jacket, much like Rocky’s. So now I begin wearing this thing 24/7, and it becomes my new suit of armor.

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I used to dress in that fedora and leather jacket that my grandfather gave me, and I had audio recorded Rocky on a walkman. And in the early ‘80s I would walk around the streets of West Scranton with the fedora on. I would angle the headset and I would listen…

[TAPE REWINDING, PLAYS CLIP FROM ROCKY MOVIE]

… And I would say the dialog over and over and over and over. And that’s how I got really, really good at it.

PF: Blurring the Rocky film and real life became Mike’s regular practice, evolving from a kid’s fascination into his full-time livelihood. Now, he runs Rocky tours and hosts a fan podcast.

ROCKY FILES PODCAST: We are in fighting shape for our Rocky Files podcast.

PF: He met Stallone, and they became friends. Mike even won a national Rocky look-alike contest.

MK: It was at Love Park on a stage in front of like a thousand people. It was live on television as well.

NEWSCASTER: According to Cumberland County resident Mike Kunda, who, at the urging of friends and family, recently entered a Rocky look-alike contest in Philadelphia.

MK: The judges asked, “Hey, Rock, what did you have for breakfast?” Now, any fan worth their salt is going to say five raw eggs. But these guys didn’t see themselves as Rocky. They saw themselves as themselves. You know why? Because they’re normal.

So the guy said, “Oh, yeah I went to IHOP this morning and I had pancakes.” And the judge goes, “No, you’re Rocky. What did you have?” He goes, “Yeah, I had pancakes.” Another guy says, “Oh, I had a bowl of oatmeal.” Another guy says, “I had some fruit and a protein drink.”

Well, I knew what they were looking for. By the time they got to me, I grabbed the mic and I just launched into a Rocky riff. I don’t know where it came from. I said, “Yeah, I had five raw eggs.” But I said, “You know, my doctor says the cholesterol is getting me, you know, the older I get. So like this guy over here with the Quaker Oats, that’s like a good, healthy meal.” And I just started going on and on and on, and they loved it, and I won the contest. And that changed everything for me.

MIKE KUNDA ON NEWS: Yo Adrian! We did it!

NEWSCASTER: Kunda came in first place, winning a trip to the new Rocky movie premiere in November, where he will spend some one-one-on time with Stallone…

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PF: Mike doesn’t take his role lightly. He’s come to represent Rocky’s underdog spirit. On his tours, people who are struggling with their health, their jobs, who need a boost from the harshness of life, they now flock to him for inspiration.

MK: If I allow myself, I’ll get emotional right now. I will get that emotional, because I’ve never taken for granted what I do. Obviously, when people are paying to take this tour, I cannot allow that to come out because it takes away from their enjoyment. But I am so proud of what I do for a living. I’m very, very proud.

PF: Everyone has their own way to work through adversity. This is Mike’s.

MK: All of us have been beaten by life so ferociously. You know, being an underdog is not an American anthem. This is a universal theme. We all like to think through hard work and perseverance, we’re going to attain some level of success. And for me, it was never about being the best in the world. It was always about being the best in my world. And this is what we get from Rocky.

PF: There was one place Mike had to take us. To see the city from his perspective.

MK: Well, here we are at the Philadelphia Museum of Art, better known as the Rocky steps. Now there are 72 steps going up at the end of the Ben Franklin Parkway to this building that represents probably everything Rocky wasn’t.

PF: Rocky made a name for himself here. Now there’s a statue of a struggling, down-on-his-luck boxer at this temple of high art. That’s always been inspiring for Mike. And he knows he’s not the only one.

MK: This building represents intellectual-ness. It represents success. And Rocky was so intimidated, he had never gone in there, but he knew it wasn’t for him. He didn’t fit in there. So that’s why, when Rocky runs up the steps, it’s all the more inspiring. Rocky brings them here. But when they run, they’re running for themselves.

PF: He can still remember the first time he made the pilgrimage.

MK: When I was 14 years old, my parents didn’t know what to get me for my birthday. They drove down from Scranton with my brother and I, and we ran the Rocky steps.

PF: Mike didn’t know then just how far the Rocky story would take him.

MK: That was my inspiration. Now, I do this as a career. I help other people climb the steps. This just gets me because how many people follow a dream from 11 years old? How many people can say, “What I wanted to do when I was a child, I’m doing now successfully and happily”? So I don’t know. It’s a grateful feeling.

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PF: With Mike and many who interact with the Rocky statue, it seemed that life was actually imitating art. So what’s going on here? I asked one of the nation’s leading monuments experts, someone who has guided my work.

KIRK SAVAGE: My name is Kirk Savage. I’m a professor at the University of Pittsburgh, been working on public monuments for several decades now.

PF: At first, Kirk didn’t get why people would embrace a statue of a made-up character.

KS: I just saw it as a kind of marketing trick.

PF: But when Kirk thought more about it, he realized plenty of monuments include elements of fiction — and even misrepresentation.

KS: My original reaction to the Rocky statue was really pretty misplaced because, in a sense, he’s the logical conclusion of what’s been going on in the monumental landscape for centuries.

PF: My team at Monument Lab conducted the first-ever audit of America’s monuments. Kirk was one of our advisors. We found way more monuments of mermaids than actual U.S. congresswomen. In a top 50 list of the most monumentalized individuals, we counted more Confederates than Black Americans.

KS: It doesn’t really matter whether he’s real or not, because even, you know, so-called real heroes, they’re mythified in so many ways anyway, that they’re so far from their original kind of historical selves, that they become fictional characters also.

PF: The intent of many monuments is to elevate a single hero, to inspire us with one triumphant individual. And to look up at them, to keep them above our reach, freeze them as timeless. But this practice of hero-making is maybe the biggest fiction of all when it comes to monuments.

KS: We should be trying to move beyond the hero, because while the hero, the invented hero, speaks to deep needs in our psyche, it doesn’t help us come to grips with our actual past. So the myth of the underdog is incredibly powerful and irresistible, but it really distorts history in that it doesn’t actually tell us anything about real resistance to oppression, the tremendous struggle that marginalized peoples or true underdogs have had to undertake in history.

PF: And in some ways, the Rocky statue is a product of that thinking.

KS: I’m not criticizing the Rocky statue in that sense. I’m not criticizing the underdog story or the need for it. You know, I have my escapist literature that I read and this is kind of an escape. This is an escapist monument.

PF: So what would a different kind of monument look like?

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If statues of our heroes don’t tell the full story, then what kind of statue would?

SALAMISHAH TILLET: My name is Salamishah Tillet, and I am professor of African American studies and creative writing at Rutgers University, Newark.

PF: Salamishah earned a Pulitzer for cultural criticism. She and I are working on a public art project for the National Mall. We’ve been talking a lot about the future of monuments.

It was fitting that she wanted to speak to us with a pair of big thinkers by her side: her son Sidney, age 7, and daughter Seneca, age 10. Seneca had her own idea for a new kind of monument. One that doesn’t come from the government, or from movie stars — but from the very people who walk by it every day.

SENECA STEPLIGHT-TILLET: Like a huge piece of like a white board on a wall.

[SOUND OF WRITING ON A WHITE BOARD]

And then I would put three sections: something I love, something I like, and something I dislike. Everyone could just, like, put what they want, so people can express how they feel and it feels like they’re not, like, having it to be trapped inside.

PF: Sidney had some thoughts for the Rocky statue.

SIDNEY STEPLIGHT-TILLET: That there should be a photo of him running, like in a jogging pose, and then there’s a bunch of kids with colored t-shirts on.

PF: Sidney’s instinct was to have the individual hero share the spotlight equally with those who helped lift him up along the way. Salamishah picked up on this distinction immediately.

ST: This is, I guess, back to Sidney’s point with, like, the Rocky statue being an individual, versus having the children behind him. I mean, there is this emphasis in the United States on individualism and individual heroism that comes at the expense of community, collectivity, and coalition. It’s as if we don’t know how to imagine monuments that acknowledge collective work and collective labor.

PF: Monuments elevating only one individual can distort our sense of history, and offer an unrealistic explanation for how true change happens — through struggle, across generations.

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ST: And the same way that, you know, Rocky Balboa was part of a community that the movie hints at but doesn’t really explore fully. That’s the challenge of monuments. Like American history or world history is rarely made up of individual players who determine the fate of the world.

[PROTEST SOUNDS]

It’s actually created by tension and conflict and cooperation, and a series of encounters between people and a set of events. And so sometimes that’s hard to kind of tell in one moment, but often the emphasis is on just one single figure, almost always white men.

PF: Salamishah is pointing out the tension we’ve been trying to unpack in this series.

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There’s no question that Rocky has inspired millions, including Mike Kunda. At this point, I feel that too. For many, this individual is worth celebrating. He is an underdog symbol for a world that is bursting at the seams with pain, grief, and challenge. We need places to celebrate our victories, big and small. To feel there’s a way up, a way through.

At the same time, we can imagine a future in public art where we don’t neglect the many for the few. Where we acknowledge the gaps — and downright erasures — in our history. Where we ask more questions of the monuments we’ve inherited and the systems they uphold.

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PF: The statue came into this world as a movie prop. After years of intense debate, it is now understood and experienced as a monument.

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I hope we bring the same kind of scrutiny to other statues. The ones we pass by every day without questioning who or what they celebrate. To unpack their relationships to power, then and now.

History doesn’t live inside of statues or on pedestals. It lives with us.

MK: Here we are standing out at the top of the Rocky steps, looking out over the Ben Franklin Parkway, looking out over the city of Philadelphia. The buildings have all drastically changed.

PF: From this historic vantage point, Rocky reminds Mike of what he’s overcome.

MK: Here, you can actually see your whole life if you look close enough and hard enough, I think you’ll see a ton of success from this view. At least, that’s what it reminds me of. This view is success. Maybe it’s because Rocky made it. I’ll leave that up for the individuals.

PF: That’s the beauty of the statue: it helps us see ourselves and one another.

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In the end, like all monuments, the Rocky statue is a mirror.

SS: Now I’ll call back and give you a part two, OK?

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[BEEP]

SS: Why people run there? It’s because I think Rocky has represented something that when you’re training for Rocky, you’re basically training for yourself, because we are underdogs. And there’s very few things, iconic situations, that are accessible.

You know, you can’t borrow Superman’s cape. You really can’t, you know, use the Jedi, whatever it is, the laser sword. But the steps are there and the steps are accessible. And standing up there, you kind of like have a piece of the Rocky pie. You’re part of what the whole myth is. And I think that it’s something that will endure. And I’m just glad to have stumbled upon the idea and came up with Rocky, which is basically a euphemism for the city of Philadelphia.

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[THEME MUSIC]

PF: This is The Statue. I’m your host, Paul Farber. Our producers are Michael Olcott and Michaela Winberg. Our executive producers are Tom Grahsler and Paul Farber. Our engineers are Charlie Kaier and Al Banks.

Sound design and mixing by Jon Ehrens for Rowhome Productions. Rowhome’s executive producers are Alex Lewis and John Myers.

Marketing support is provided by The Podglomerate.

Our tile art was made by William Hodgson. Our theme song is a remix of Bill Conti’s Gonna Fly Now, created by Moqita, that’s Justin Geller and Billy Dufala. Special thanks to Gabriel Coffey, Kayla Watkins, Grant Hill, Sophia Schmidt, and the Monument Lab team especially Laurie Allen, Lola Bakare, Aubree Penney, Gebby Keny, Clare Fisher, and Florie Hutchinson.

The Statue is a production of WHYY and part of the NPR podcast network, in partnership with Paul Farber Projects, with in-kind support from Monument Lab. Thank you for listening.

Executive Producers: Tom Grahsler, Paul Farber
Producers: Michael Olcott, Michaela Winberg
Engineers: Al Banks, Charlie Kaier
Sound Design and Mixing: Jon Ehrens for Rowhome Productions
Executive Producers, Rowhome Productions: Alex Lewis, John Myers
Tile Art: William Hodgson
Theme Song: Justin Geller and Billy Dufala of Moqita

Special Thanks to Kayla Watkins, Sophia Schmidt, Grant Hill, & Gabriel Coffey

Special Thanks to the Monument Lab team including Lola Bakare, Aubree Penney, Gebby Keny, Clare Fisher, Laurie Allen and Florie Hutchinson.

Gonna’ Fly Now by Bill Conti, courtesy of Sony Music

The Statue is a production of WHYY and part of the NPR podcast network, in partnership with Paul Farber Projects and with in-kind support from Monument Lab.