Burt Young is dead. The actor, famous as Rocky’s (Sylvester Stallone) friend and later brother-in-law in the “Rocky” saga, died on October 8th at the age of 83 – the news of his death only reached the world on that day Wednesday.
Sylvester Stallone reacted immediately and posted a picture of the two of them from 1976’s “Rocky” on Instagram. In the films, Young played the windy butcher and brother of Rocky’s lover Adrian (Talia Shire). He didn’t treat Adrian well and thought Rocky was a failure. At some point Adrian can’t take it anymore, and Rocky also whistles at his chubby partner so much that he usually just grumbles to himself afterwards. After Rocky’s rise to boxing world champion, Paulie mostly keeps his mouth shut and becomes a sidekick who knows what he has in store for his brother-in-law’s millions. Paulie thought R&B was “jungle monkey music,” as he revealed in “Rocky 3,” but he also received a lecture for that because Rocky wanted to calmly win back the “eye of the tiger.” After that, the faxes were finally over, and Paulie no longer complained when the Balboas bought a robot for “Rocky 4” that looked like the ratings “TED” from ZDF Saturday television in the 1980s.
However, Paulie was also fundamentally involved in Rock’s career: He opened the cold store for the “Italian Stallion” so that he could practice hammering the hanging cattle slabs using an unorthodox but effective training method.
Stallone now writes: “To my dear friend BURT YOUNG, you were an incredible person and artist, I and the world will miss you very much… RIP”. One follower aptly condoled: “Rocky taught me that a friend can be imperfect, moody and stubborn, but a good friend never lets us down, like Paulie. “Thank you for being a part of my childhood, Burt.”
They appeared together in “Rocky,” “Rocky II,” “Rocky III,” “Rocky IV,” “Rocky V,” and “Rocky Balboa,” all of the “Rocky” films; Only in the “Creed” contributions with Balboa as the mentor of Apollo Creed’s son, Young was not involved.
Young’s wife, Gloria, died in 1974. He had a daughter and a grandson. He lived in Port Washington, New York. Young owned a restaurant in the Bronx, New York. He took part in the 1984 New York City Marathon. His last major (supporting) role was in “Russian Doll” in 2019. For the role of Paulie, Young received an Oscar nomination for “best supporting actor” in 1977.