Of course, Lowe, who resurrected his career with a seven-year stint on The West Wing, still gets to indulge his talent for
drama with his serious role on the current series Brothers & Sisters, on which he portrays a troubled Republican senator
married to a talk show host (Calista Flockhart).
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Since then, Lowe has kept himself out of the tabloids. He married a makeup artist in 1991 and they have two teenage sons. We
caught up with Lowe during the Toronto International Film Festival, where he chatted about comic riffs, Nerf guns and white lies.
Q. Watching The Invention of Lying, it made me wonder: What was the first lie I ever told?
A. I’ve been asked that a lot and I don’t really know, which is frightening because it only means it was so early in my life.
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Q. For me, it was probably about homework.
A. Or “Did you brush your teeth?” I remember when my favorite TV shows were on, my mom would say, “Take a bath, take a
shower.” I’d throw water on my hair and run back down to the television. She would go, “Did you really take a bath?” “Absolutely!”
Q. What were you watching?
A. All in the Family.
Q. That’s pretty sophisticated television for a kid.
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A. My parents were really good about letting me watch sophisticated stuff, and I do the same with my kids. I don’t mind
language, inappropriate material. I don’t mind any of it. What I do mind is banal, lowest-common-denominator entertainment.
That’s way more offensive to me.
Q. Were your kids psyched to see you working with all these great comedy TV people from 30 Rock and Arrested
Development?
A. My kids are obsessed with Louis C.K. They looked him up online and they love his stand-up. They think he’s the
greatest. I love their total infatuation with this movie. Out of all the amazing people in it, Louis C.K. is their favorite.
Q. I was reading that there some corpsing during The Invention of Lying shoot. People were laughing and having trouble
staying in character?
A. Is “people” a euphemism for Ricky Gervais?
Q. He took a lot of responsibility for it.
A. He was the sole culprit. I think Ricky has ruined more good takes than faulty film cameras in the history of Hollywood.
He’s a fan. He only casts people he loves and thinks are funny, and so when he’s on the set, he’s loving them and thinking
they’re funny and therefore he laughs, but he does it in the middle of actual performances.
Q. I read in one of the British tabloids that he threw a dart at you.
A. He shot me with a Nerf gun. I think Ricky is still very wide-eyed about American consumerism, so it’s like, “Yes,
Ricky, we have big, fancy bright toys over here. We really do. Would you like one?” And he runs amuck whenever he gets his hands
on one and shot me.
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Q. Was it a reaction to one particular scene you were trying to shoot, and you were making him laugh too much?
A. It may well have been. I was just glad that I was wearing glasses.
Q. Maybe these takes could resurface on DVD with Ricky laughing through all of them?
A. The DVD is amazing. There’s a three-and-a-half-minute sequence where we’re all cavemen and it’s the beginning of the
first lie. It ended up not working in the movie, so they cut it, but it’s hilarious if you can imagine all of us as cavemen.
Q. What do you think makes people gravitate toward Ricky? People who could lead their own films seem to want supporting
roles when it’s his project.
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A. It was strange, watching how much people worshiped him. At this moment in time, Ricky is who Woody Allen was in 1979.
He's just got that touch. He’s the state-of-the-art comedic auteur, so everybody wants to be a part of his work and everybody
wants to be anointed into that club.
Q. When he cast you, did he talk about one film in particular, maybe the Mike Myers’ movies, that convinced him you would
be good in his film?
A. He knows all of the stuff that I’ve done, and we were on the phone together and we made each other laugh.
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Q. What were you talking about?
A. I think he insulted me and then I insulted him and the rest was history.
Q. You can’t insult an auteur.
A. Right.
ROB LOVES
TORONTO!
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Q&A: ROB LOWE...ACTOR,
THE INVENTION OF LYING
By Norman Wilner
NowToronto.com
September 30, 2009
Rob Lowe makes an awfully good cad – and he knows it.
He first mocked his matinee-idol jawline as a scheming record executive intent on stealing Tia Carrere away from Mike Myers in
Wayne’s World, and then swanned through Myers’s Austin Powers sequels as a younger version of Robert Wagner’s
Number Two.
Now he’s playing Ricky Gervais’s screenwriter rival Brad Kessler in The Invention Of Lying. And because his character
lives in a world where everyone tells the truth, he gets to stab people in the back from the front. We sat down in Toronto during
the Film Festival.
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Brad Kessler feels a lot like the sleazy record exec you played in Wayne’s World, but now you get to be openly loathsome.
Exactly. It literally is a deconstruction of that character. The key element is when he says to Ricky, “You threaten me and I
don’t know why, and I hate things I’m threatened by.”
That’s a great thing for this sort of cinema archetype to do. It made me love him. I’d like to do a TV series and play Brad.
He would be genius, every week.
How much fun is it to come in and do these key supporting roles, like Jeff Megall in Thank You For Smoking or Number Two
in the Austin Powers sequels?
I’m a baseball fan, and I like when the slugger comes out. He doesn’t play the whole game, he’s not in the outfield, you don’t
get to watch him standing around and stretching. He comes up, comes to bat, and if he pulls it off, he hits a walk-off grand
slam, raises his hands and goes back to the dugout. That’s the goal.
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Whether you pull it off or not, one never knows. But when I watch Glengarry Glen Ross, with all those amazing actors, at
the end of the day the only one I really give a shit about is Alec Baldwin, who’s onscreen for three minutes, kills it and goes
home.
Now that you have the cushion of a regular TV gig, are you specifically seeking out those roles?
Well, it’s hard, because I do have a schedule on Brothers & Sisters. I commuted to Boston while I did this. There was no
weekend, I was just working. Everything I do has to fit around a schedule, and if it isn’t something really interesting – because
it’s going to be exhausting – it’s really easy to not do it.
A couple of your 80s movies, About Last Night... and St. Elmo’s Fire, have just come out on Blu-ray, and I was
surprised how well they’ve held up.
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Isn’t it interesting? In those days, we were like, “Yeah, these are great, I like ’em,” but I wanted to be in Woody Allen’s
Manhattan. When you look back on it? Fuckin’ St. Elmo’s Fire, compared to today, is Manhattan. Those movies
were pandering teenage movies, in their time. Now, you compare them to a pandering teenage movie of today, and they’re
The Magnificent Ambersons.
LOWE STILL LOOKING
FOR MOVIE ROLES
By Nick Patch
The Canadian Press, WinnipegSun.com
September 29, 2009
TORONTO — Some actors find that a hit TV show can be as much a curse as a blessing ~~ there are the long hours, the busy
shooting schedules that preclude working on other projects and the occasionally career-killing typecasting that can befall
an actor who has played an especially memorable character.
But Rob Lowe says he’s been around long enough to appreciate the success of his drama, Brothers & Sisters, which aired
its fourth season premiere over the weekend.
“I’m always happy for something that I’m working hard on to be as accepted and loved as this show is,” Lowe told The Canadian
Press in a recent interview. “I know how hard it is to have something that people take into their heart, like they do Brothers
& Sisters. So I love it.”
“That said, I need to have other areas as well.”
Even if it means working around the clock.
Lowe took on a role in the new Ricky Gervais-directed comedy The Invention of Lying, which opens Friday. It meant
commuting between Los Angeles, where Brothers & Sisters is shot, to Boston, where Gervais’s film was being made.
“It was pretty arduous,” said Lowe, slouched in an armchair in a tight blue sweater and a pair of jeans. “At that point, with
that kind of schedule, you’re just working. There’s no such thing as a weekend. You’re just working, but it’s good. You sleep
on the plane.”
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Rob with Ricky Gervais
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“I was pretty beat when I got done, but it was worth it. And I like being able to sneak something in while I’m doing Brothers
& Sisters. Particularly something this different. Playing (Robert) McCallister, who I play on Brothers & Sisters, on a Monday, and
then to play this guy on a Thursday, is pretty great.”
The Invention of Lying takes place in an alternate universe where people are only capable of telling the truth ~~ except
Ricky Gervais’s character, Mark Bellison, a down-on-his-luck screenwriter whose fortunes turn when he learns he’s the only person
in the world who can lie.
Lowe plays Brad Kessler, a smarmy co-worker of Bellison’s and his hated nemesis. He said he couldn’t turn down the opportunity
to work with Gervais.
“It’s funny, there’s something about guys like Ricky, Mike Myers, Lorne Michaels, Jason Reitman ~~ a lot of them are Canadians,
interestingly enough, a lot of them from Toronto ~~ who clearly see something in me that they are simpatico with,” Lowe said.
“I have no earthly idea what it is, but I’m glad they do, because whenever I hook up with them we have really, really good results.”
While Lowe acknowledges that Brothers & Sisters has “eaten up a lot of clock for me,” he says he still plans on pursuing
another film role before the year is up.
“I’m reading one in particular that’s sort of similar in its tone to this movie,” he said. “If you look at Thank You For Smoking
and this (movie), there’s a certain style that I really like to be a part of and a certain group of people I like to be a part of,
and I’m going to try to find something like that for this year.”
“But it’s a big year for Brothers & Sisters, and it’s an important year for the show, so that’s what we’ve been focusing on.”
ROB LOWE PLAYS FOR LAUGHS
IN THE INVENTION OF LYING
Straight.com
By Ian Caddell
September 24, 2009
TORONTO -- At 45, Rob Lowe is not just another pretty face. He’s a survivor of 30 years in show business. That said, Lowe is
still leading with his looks. In fact, he is still playing men whose success is directly linked to their outer beauty. In
The Invention of Lying, he takes on the role of a screenwriter who lives in a parallel universe where no one has ever lied.
It’s also a land where people mate with those with similar traits. Rob (Lowe) assumes that he will marry Jennifer (Jennifer Garner),
the most beautiful woman he knows. She assumes the same thing but admits to being attracted to a homely man, Mark (Ricky Gervais),
who will do whatever it takes to sweep her off her feet, including lying to her. The movie opens in Vancouver on October 2, 2009.
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Rob with Tina Fey
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In the mid 1980s Lowe was a member of the “brat pack”, a group of young actors who starred in movies that were targeted at people
their own age. He got his break in 1983 as a member of The Outsiders cast, which also included Tom Cruise, Matt Dillon,
and the late Patrick Swayze. By 1986, he was a genuine movie star. In a Toronto hotel, he says that although he is surprised
that he is still working regularly, he always felt that he would be a better actor in his 40s.
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“It’s really extraordinary to have lasted this long,” he says. “But I was optimistic when I was that age and making those movies.
All I really wanted to be was 40, because you are at your height in terms of your performing powers and the parts have more weight
and gravitas. My heroes were always older actors like Paul Newman. But I am glad I am still working. It is exciting because it
isn’t an easy thing to accomplish.”
Lowe’s career started going off the rails at the 1988 Democratic National Convention, when he made a notorious sex tape with two
girls, one of whom was underage. Ironically, he got his second big break in 1999 when he was cast as Sam Seaborn, counsel to the
Democratic American president in TV’s The West Wing. The show led to starring roles in the short-lived series The Lyon’s
Den and dr. vegas and, more recently, to a recurring role as a U.S. senator in Brothers & Sisters. He says that
although movies were the best place to find meaty roles when he started out, he now sees television as being a better place to
find good parts.
“When I started out, the movie business was very different than it is now,” Lowe says. “In fact, it is different than it was five
years ago because big studios don’t make that midlevel, midbudget, dialogue-driven movie anymore. That is ceded to television.
When I am working with [Brothers & Sisters costar] Calista Flockhart, we have scenes that would have only been in a movie
25 years ago.”
When he does take time off from television to make movies, he usually chooses comedies like The Invention of Lying, Thank
You for Smoking, and the three Austin Powers movies. He says comedies offer challenges and collaborators that keep him
interested in the business.
“There are days when I love it more than ever, and there are also days when I think, ‘I have been doing it for so long, I need
more challenges.’ The illusions are gone. Then you do a movie like this where you do a scene with Tina Fey and Ricky and you
think, ‘These are the two comic geniuses. They are not just performers but auteurs, and they will likely write the history of
comedy for the next 50 years.’ It would be like going back and working with Mike Nichols or Woody Allen in the 1960s. That’s
also how I felt when I worked with Jason Reitman [on Thank You for Smoking] and Mike Myers. That is still thrilling.”
Lowe is also accepting of his plight. He says that although being good-looking might have cost him a job or two along the way,
it wouldn’t be a good idea to complain since it’s unlikely that most people would feel sorry for him.
“It is something I never focused on and it is awfully hard to gain any sympathy from anyone for being too good-looking. There
are a lot of people who would take that mantle on. I think there have been times it helped me and other times when it hurt me,
but you would like to think it evens out.”
THE REINVENTION OF ROB LOWE
Entertainment News Wire
By Angela Dawson
September 24, 2009
TORONTO -- By his own estimate, Rob Lowe spends about 40 percent of his life in front of a camera, so it doesn't hurt that he's
nearly a perfect male specimen, with his cool blue eyes, square jaw, magnificent smile and lean shape. Even Alec Baldwin couldn't
refrain from referencing Lowe's physical attributes at the recent Emmys.
"I would trade this to look like him," the "30 Rock" star quipped after accepting his trophy from the actor.
Being ridiculously good-looking has been Lowe's stock in trade for nearly three decades. After doing a TV series as a teen, Lowe
made his feature debut in Francis Ford Coppola's coming-of-age drama The Outsiders in 1983.
He secured his place as a member of the Brat Pack with roles in St. Elmo's Fire and About Last Night, in which he
romanced Demi Moore. As an adult, he appeared on The West Wing as ladies' man Sam Seaborn for four seasons, and he
currently plays Calista Flockhart's estranged husband on the hit series Brothers and Sisters.
To Lowe, being an actor is about arriving prepared. The theater-trained thespian prides himself on his ability to nail a scene
in one take ~~ provided someone else doesn't mess up.
"My thing is I just want to come in and shellac the ball right on the first pitch," he says sitting in an overstuffed chair in a
Toronto hotel room.
Though primarily known for his dramatic roles, Lowe enjoys doing comedy as well. He co-starred with Mike Myers in Wayne's World
then was tapped by the funnyman to play the younger version of Robert Wagner's Number Two in two of the Austin Powers comedies.
He also took it in the groin for laughs in Tommy Boy.
In The Invention of Lying, he plays Ricky Gervais' rival for Jennifer Garner's attention. Initially, it's no contest
between Gervais' schlubby Mark and Lowe's polished Brad in this world where no one ever lies. Brad is clearly better looking,
smarter and obviously the right genetic match for a beautiful woman like Garner's Anna McDoogles. He's also a jerk. But that
doesn't really matter to Anna, or anyone else. That is, until Anna discovers that beauty is more than skin deep.
Lowe, 45, says it was fun playing Brad, a superficial and self-aggrandizing fellow, who pursues Mark's dream girl merely for
spite. Beneath Brad's handsome and confident exterior, though, he feels threatened by Mark.
"He's scared of Mark for no good reason," says Lowe. "There's a saying I've always liked: Never compare your inside to someone
else's outside, and it's very very true."
Mark's only "imperfection" is that he wears glasses, metaphorically representing his myopic view of love. Lowe's younger son
helped him pick out the Clark Kent-like frames, which he says completes the character's slick look.
"He's the genetic lotto winner but he's got bad eyes," he observes of Brad. "This was my sort of subversive touch."
The actor modeled Brad after characters played by Robert Duvall and Robert De Niro. "I sort of wanted him to be The Great
SantiniThis Boy's Life " he says, smiling. He also referenced famed college basketball coach Adolph Rupp,
known as a perfectionist and a taskmaster to his players.
Lowe had fun working with his co-stars, particularly Gervais, who also co-wrote and co-directed the comedy. The only problem was
Gervais' propensity to cut up and break character at the slightest provocation.
"One of an actor's most important qualities is having concentration ~~ Ricky, admittedly, doesn't have that yet," deadpans Lowe.
Of course, it wasn't easy keeping a straight face during some of the scenes with Gervais, a former stand-up comic, but Lowe
prides himself on being able stay in character. "I don't break up and you can't make me laugh," he insists. "The best in the
business have tried."
Signing up for The Invention of Lying required some juggling for Lowe, who was still shooting the third season of Brothers
and Sisters in Los Angeles while the movie was in production in Lowell, Mass.
"It was a grind commuting across the country, but it was worth it," he says.
The Invention of Lying marks Lowe's first feature film in four years. (He previously co-starred in the Jason Reitman
satire, Thank You for Smoking.) Lowe makes little distinction between acting for the small screen and making movies.
"If I felt like I wasn't getting the experience of acting or if I felt like people weren't seeing my work, I'd be unhappy," he says.
"Whether it's a movie or TV doesn't really enter into it."
He has completed the first six episodes of the fourth season of Brothers and Sisters, in which he plays a U.S. Senator who
is separated from his wife (Flockhart). The new season premieres on September 27, 2009 on ABC.
"It was satisfying to play the dissolution of a marriage last year," he says of the family drama's third season. His character
is trying to resolve his marital problems this season, he reveals.
"That's the stuff I like playing," he says, referring to relationship themes that audiences can identify with. "That's what I did
in movies like St. Elmo's Fire and About Last Night".
Lowe claims to know where the series is going and how it will eventually end. Knowing where his character is headed is partly
what convinced him to join the cast a few years ago.
"It gives you great comfort," he says of knowing the show's direction. "It would be really difficult to be in one of those shows
where you don't. I wouldn't do well with that."
Though notoriously wild when he was young and single, Lowe appears to be a happily married family guy. He wed make-up artist
Sheryl Berkoff 18 years ago. He speaks fondly of his boys, Matthew and John, who are 16 and 14, respectively.
"I see them turning to me as every adolescent male does to their dad," he says, smiling. "From birth to about 4 (years of age),
it was intensive, then it was sort of cruise control, and now it's back to being intensive. I've realized I've got to be engaged
and on the ball because they're having new experiences every day. My goal is to help guide them."
The Charlottesville, Virginia native eventually would like to return to the theater, where he started out as a youngster.
He says his proudest moment as an actor was appearing in Aaron Sorkin's staged version of A Few Good Men on London's West
End a few years ago.
"I loved it, even the exhaustion and boredom you eventually face when you do 150 performances," he says.
But as a husband and father, he has to pay the bills. And stage acting doesn't meet his current financial requirements.
"When my kids are out of the house, that's when I'll return to the stage, because that's what I love," he reveals. "I started in
theater as a baby, and I'll end it there as an old man."
"I'll be doing Uncle Vanya,'" he quips.
ROB LOWE REMEMBERS
PATRICK SWAYZE AT
TORONTO INTERNATIONAL FILM FESTIVAL
TheInsider.com
September 15, 2009
Rob Lowe remembered his friend and co-star Patrick Swayze on Monday night at the Toronto Film Festival.
The actor told ET, "Patrick lived a thousand lifetimes in one life. He played my brother twice, in The Outsiders
when I was 17, and then in Youngblood, so tonight I feel like I lost a
brother tonight."
Rob remembers Patrick Swayze
at the Toronto International Film Festival
Rob walked the red carpet along with Jennifer Garner, Ricky Gervais, and more celebs for the premiere of their new comedy,
The Invention of Lying.
Gervais co-wrote and co-directed the film, which tells the story of a writer who invents the world's first lie. He confessed
to ET, "The only time I ever lie is when someone invites me to something and I can't be bothered to go, so I say 'I'm working'
or 'No, I'm doing some work, a soup kitchen tonight.' 'No, I'm visiting the orphanage, so I can't come to your party.'"
Lowe adds, "My experience is most actors who are good, are horrible liars because what we do is bring truth to things."
The Invention of Lying hits theaters on October 2.
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