He’s enjoyed a long career as an athlete, an actor, and a politician. However, despite his mega-star status, we’re willing to bet there’s a lot you don’t know about the Austrian Oak.
He Won a Golden Globe For One of His First Roles
Schwarzenegger landed a handful of supporting roles throughout the 1970s as his acting career was building up steam. One of those roles was Joe Santo, a bodybuilder training for the Mr. Universe competition, in theJeff BridgesfilmStay Hungry.
Schwarzenegger was clearly a natural choice for the part, as he was essentially a real-life Joe Santo, but he threw himself into the role anyway. He lost a significant amount of weight for the film, which wound up causing him some problems in his bodybuilding career, but he won a Golden Globe for his performance.
He’s the Youngest Mr. Universe In History
Before he was traveling through time as a relentless cyborg, battling villainous sorcerers and aliens, Schwarzenegger was a champion bodybuilder. (We know, it’s hard to believe.) He won the annual Mr. Universe competition at age 20, becoming the youngest person ever to do so.
He didn’t rest on his considerably muscular laurels after that record-breaking win, either. Schwarzenegger continued to compete, and went on to win the Mr. Universe title a staggering four more times before retiring from bodybuilding at age 33 in 1980.
Schwarzenegger always dreamed to move to the United States and become a famous actor, and he figured the best way for a poor Austrian kid like him to do that was to become a champion bodybuilder. It’s hard to argue with his results.
In addition to his history-making Mr. Universe title at age 20, Schwarzenegger also thoroughly dominated the Mr. Olympia competition. He won the Mr. Olympia title 7 times, nabbing his first victory at age 23, making him the youngest champion ever.
Before he became a legendary bodybuilder and world-famous actor, Schwarzenegger was already a successful businessman. He began his rags-to-riches journey in just about the most unlikely place imaginable – by starting a bricklaying business in California. We suppose if you’re going to hire someone to lay bricks, it might as well be Arnold.
Schwarzenegger started the business in 1968, when he was only 21 and had just moved to the United States. His partner in the venture wasFranco Columbo, a fellow bodybuilder whom Schwarzenegger eventually dethroned in the Mr. Olympia competition. The business was remarkably successful, owing in part to Schwarzenegger’s well-known business savvy and a rise in demand for building materials following the San Fernando earthquake in 1971.
He Was the Governor of California
After acting in Hollywood for three decades, Schwarzenegger decided to try his hand at running the state that had become his home. He served as the 38thgovernor of California, after Governor Gray Davis was recalled in a special election in 2003.
Schwarzenegger won the election by a massive margin of 1.3 million votes. He won his re-election by an almost identical margin. To date, Schwarzenegger is only the second foreign-born governor of CA, serving from 2003 to 2011.
Schwarzenegger’s desire to become a self-made man and leave his home country of Austria might have had something to do with the fact that things at home were very strained. He had a terrible relationship with his father, an Austrian police chief who had sided with Germany in World War II and regularly abused Arnold.
Part of his father’s overbearing nature was due to the fact that he didn’t believe Arnold was his biological son, favoring Arnold’s older brother Meinhard. When Schwarzenegger finally left Austria for America, he didn’t look back. Although he maintained a close relationship with his mother, he didn’t attend his father’s funeral, nor his brother Meinhard’s.
He Was Originally a Soccer Player
Although he was always athletic, Schwarzenegger wasn’t immediately drawn to weightlifting. Much like the rest of us, Arnold got his start in sports by playing soccer, mostly to try and impress his overbearing father. According to him, he was in shape, but pretty skinny.
Arnold’s soccer coach took him and his team to do some weight training at a local gym when Arnold was 14 or 15. From that moment on, Schwarzenegger was hooked. He gave up soccer and began pursuing a career as a professional bodybuilder.
His First Film is a Camp Classic
Schwarzenegger’s first foray into the world of film was the title role in the legendary B-movieHercules in New York(1969). In the film, Hercules becomes bored with life on Mount Olympus and travels to New York City to engage in delightful hijinks, which include fighting a bear in Central Park and chasing a car full of mobsters in an actual chariot.
Schwarzenegger had only recently learned English, and his accent was so thick that the producers of the film were worried nobody would be able to understand him. So, his voice was dubbed over by another actor for the film’s release. You can find the film now with Arnold’s original voice track.
He Was Influenced by Other Athletes-Turned-Actors
Schwarzenegger is a smart guy, but he didn’t come up with his success plan of segueing a bodybuilding career into a Hollywood career on his own. He claims he was heavily influenced by athletes-turned-actors who had followed a similar path, includingJohnny Weissmuller, who famously played Tarzan in a series of films in the 40s and 50s.
Schwarzenegger credits seeing these movies as a kid with his initial inspiration to come to America as a hulking metahuman and become an action-adventure star. He was particularly inspired bySteve Reeves, a fellow Mr. Universe champion who went on to a successful acting career.
He Became a Competitive Bodybuilder at Age 17
Schwarzenegger became so obsessed with working out and sculpting a bodybuilder’s physique that he made sure he lifted every single day. Unfortunately, his local gym wasn’t open on the weekends, but he didn’t let that stop him.
Arnold would actually break into the gym when it was closed, just so he could get in his crucial Saturday and Sunday workouts. He trained this way for several years as a young teenager before he finally went pro, officially beginning his career as a competitive bodybuilder at age 17.
