Steve Guttenberg Broke Into Elderly Couple's Home to Save Them From Palisades Fire in Heroic Move: 'They Hated Me'

Steve Guttenberg is opening up about an intense rescue story from the 2025 Palisades wildfire.

During a Monday, April 13, appearance on the “On Par” podcast, the Police Academy star shared how he stepped in to help some senior residents who refused to evacuate as flames closed in on their home.

"I have a really funny story that I just remembered the other day," Guttenberg said. "There was a couple inside their house, and a friend of mine texted me and said, 'This elderly couple's in their house, and not leaving.'"

Without hesitation, the longtime Palisades citizen jumped into action — even if it meant improvising along the way.

"So I get the address, I find it, I get up there. And I actually took somebody's car that wasn't my car, because my car was way down, I couldn't find it," he explained.

At the time, chaos had already taken over the neighborhood as people rushed to escape.

"What happened was the fire got so close and everybody was trying to get out that it became sort of a little bit of a panic," Guttenberg previously shared.

The actor said the streets were packed with abandoned cars, making it hard for emergency crews to get through — so he started helping clear the way.

"I knew that we needed emergency vehicles through there, and I wasn't the only one. But I started just moving cars," he said.

One of those cars ended up getting him to the couple’s house — but convincing them to leave was a whole different story.

"I knock on the window and they're watching TV and they go, 'Hey, get away.' I go, 'You've got to leave, the fire is coming,'" he recalled during his chat with Maury Povich.

"I had to break into their house through a window, you know, fall on the kitchen floor, glass everywhere, get up there. The guy's like, 'I'm going to call the cops on you.' I go, 'That's why I'm here, call the cops. You've got to leave!'" Guttenberg said, adding that he had to "unlock the door, pick them up, and carry them outside so one of the fire trucks could come by and get them."

Looking back, he admitted the couple wasn’t exactly grateful in the moment.

"They hated me. I mean, the woman's hitting me in the head. I go, 'Lady, you can't stay in this house. Your house is going to burn down!' And it probably did," he said with a laugh.

Despite the chaos, Guttenberg said he never considered leaving his neighborhood behind.

“At this time I have the choice of sitting down and walking or standing up and doing what I can. I choose to stand and fight. And help,” he told People at the time.

According to the World Resources Institute, the Palisades fire — the first to ignite — scorched more than 23,000 acres and tore through nearby communities. Four weeks later, both the Palisades and Eaton fires have been fully contained, but they now stand among the deadliest and most destructive wildfires in California history.