Production
According to Stallone, the film was financed by "a group of wealthy lawyers, very, very solid." The actor said in a 1978 Playboy interview that he had done the film out of desperation after being bounced out of his apartment and finding himself homeless for several days, sleeping in a New York City bus station in the middle of winter. In Stallone's words: "It was either do that movie or rob someone because I was at the end—at the very end—of my rope. Instead of doing something desperate, I worked two days for $200 and got myself out of the bus station".