Rob Lowe’s smartest career move occurred the day he stopped taking himself seriously.
His comedic breakthrough role as a Beverly Hills plastic surgeon with a permanent squint in the HBO movie “Behind the Candelabra” made it impossible to think he was the same actor who — a dozen years earlier — was a politically earnest Aaron Sorkin mouthpiece as Deputy Chief of Staff Sam Seaborn on “The West Wing.”
“Comedy looks easy,” says Lowe who has developed his flair for self-mockery on “Parks and Recreation” and more recently, those hilarious DirectTV commercials. “And that’s what’s great about it. But it’s surprisingly complex.”
Fortunately, you can’t see any of the effort in his new series, “The Grinder,” premiering Tuesday night. Lowe reaches new heights of sublime silliness as Dean Sanderson Jr., a self-absorbed actor at loose ends who confounds his family back in Boise by deciding he should join the family law firm … because he once played a lawyer on TV.
“As an actor you pick up a lot of stuff, collect skills and this obviously puts you in a position to do the job,” says executive producer Jarrad Paul in elaborating on the premise.
Part of the comedy comes from the contrast between Dean and his younger brother, Stewart (Fred Savage) — an actual lawyer — as they argue cases in a courtroom. Guess which one the jury likes better? “Stewart feels like the only sane person left on Earth,” says Savage. “Dean, because he doesn’t know what law is, thinks it’s what you see in the movies. Big speeches, evidence discovered in the nick of time. Stewart’s a good lawyer. Practices actual law. Not law as written by Hollywood.”
Lowe was developing projects for other networks when the “Grinder” script found its way into his hands. “It was a beautiful, smart, hilarious mix of brotherhood stories, family stories, and fatherhood stories that everyone can relate to and just brilliant satire about today’s fame industry and the television industry,” Lowe says.
To that effect, the producers will find ways to bring Dean’s TV past into the plot. In an episode scheduled for Thanksgiving, Timothy Olyphant (“Justified”) will play a frenemy from Dean’s past. Other guest stars include Christina Applegate, Jason Alexander and Natalie Morales (“Parks and Recreation”) as a love interest for Dean — a Boise woman completely unimpressed by his celebrity.
“She’s one of the only people in the world who doesn’t respond to Dean’s charms, which intrigues him all the more,” says executive producer Andrew Mogel.
Both “Grinder” stars have had their fair share of fame — and, in Lowe’s case, infamy — and the show adroitly mines the actors’ back stories. After his childhood success with “The Wonder Years,” Savage went to Stanford University and began a successful career as a TV director. Getting back into the acting groove has tested Savage’s mettle. “I’m not 100 percent settled yet,” he says. “I’d be lying if I said it wasn’t an adjustment.”
As for Lowe, his life has been an open book for so long (in fact, he’s written two), the part fits him like a satin glove.
“Dean is someone who seems to have it all, but what he really wants is to have a life. It’s a theme I’m well versed in,” he says. “I’ve searched for a life outside the business. That was my own journey.”
