Paul Dion Monte was born on April 7th 1967, in Washington, D.C., and raised by his mother Rosa in a single-parent household. When he was nine years of age Rose married and the family relocated to Sacramento, California, where he began his acting career in junior high school plays and, eventually, community theater. When he was 18, his cousin, Sylvester Stallone, gave him his start in the film business in Cobra (1986) in which he was Sly's stand-in and had a small part as "The Supermarket Clerk". When Paul was 20, he discovered that there was another actor also named Paul Monte, so he changed his own name to Paul Dion Monte. He is still very close to his family including his mother, Rosa, his cousins Sly and Frank Stallone, and also his cousin Sage Stallone.