|
| Lowe on a high By BILL BRIOUX -- Toronto Sun HOLLYWOOD, Calif. -- Why did Rob Lowe risk leaving The West Wing, one of the most respected shows on television, to do The Lyon's Den? "I was a working stiff there," he told critics yesterday. "This is my show." A calm and candid Lowe explained it all during a packed session for his new NBC drama, set in Washington, D.C. That's where comparisons to The West Wing end. The lawyers on this show don't all wear halos, one of Lowe's pet peeves about his old series. These guys are a much nastier bunch, with idealistic attorney Jack Turner (Lowe) getting dragged back into the muck as managing partner of Lyon, LaCrosse and Levine. Not that Lowe could completely escape politics. His character's father is a powerful U.S. senator, played on a recurring basis by Rip Torn. A year ago, when the buzz first broke that Lowe wanted off The West Wing, critics and colleagues thought he was nuts. Why walk away from the best-written show on television? Since then, The West Wing has slipped both creatively and in popularity. As a result, the guy with the vision, creator and script machine Aaron Sorkin, was forced off his own show. Today Lowe looks like the guy who jumped off the Titanic before it went down. He hadn't been happy there since mid-way through the second season. "I felt that the show definitely had changed course, without question," he said. The knock on Sorkin was always that he handed scripts in way too late, giving actors, as well as note-happy network suits, fits. At NBC's executive session yesterday, entertainment president Jeff Zucker couldn't resist mentioning that getting an early look at executive producer John Wells' West Wing season premiere script was a nice change. It was never the late scripts that bugged Lowe. "He could be 15 years late on a script for me. When you got it, it was like Christmas morning." Lowe's beef was that his character, deputy communications director Sam Seaborn, had less and less to do and when he did get a scene, it had no "teeth" to it. He gave an example of one recent storyline where Sam was trying to get people to wear seatbelts. He was sick of the secondary roles and wanted in on the real action. Sorkin disagreed and that's where the two parted ways. Lowe says there are no hard feelings. He called Sorkin after his old boss left the show and wished him well. "Aaron Sorkin isn't going anywhere," he predicted. What is bitterly disappointing to Lowe is that he would have been happy playing Seaborn until he was 55. At one point, there was talk of spinning the character off on his own series. Instead, Lowe passed on the short-lived Mr. Sterling and shot a remake of Stephen King's 'Salem's Lot, pointing out that his next two jobs after West Wing are for Warners and NBC -- his old show's studio and network. There's one other disappointment. "I would have liked to have seen Sam leave with a flourish," says Lowe about Seaborn's muted exit. "There was a stretch there for six episodes when they didn't even use me. I got a nice paid vacation around the world." Besides the halo comment, Lowe says he likes the characters on The Lyon's Den because they don't all sound alike, as they do on you know where. Plus they're more complex. They have mortgages and kids and other lives -- things audiences, and Lowe himself -- can relate to. He also likes being an executive producer on The Lyon's Den, giving him a measure of control he didn't have -- and clearly would have welcomed -- on The West Wing. |