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Rob Lowe Reveals Why He Left ‘Brothers & Sisters’, ‘The West Wing’

By Niki Cruz
Published on: 05:31 PST, Sep 23, 2015

Rob Lowe is finally opening up about his departure from The West Wing and the ABC show Brothers & Sisters. Both shows suffered some major PR problems on the heels of Lowe’s departure, and now the actor is finally talking about what led to him leaving both shows.

Ahead of his new show The Grinder, Rob Lowe sat down with GQ to discuss the shows he left behind prematurely.

In terms of leaving Brothers & Sisters, he said that he left because they simply ran out of stories to tell.

Lowe told GQ, “I left Brothers & Sisters when they ran out of storytelling runway.’ I mean, there are so many family dinners you can do. I eventually had to go to them and say, ‘Look, I don’t do spatula work. I don’t do scenes with oven mitts. If you’re looking for that, you’ve got the wrong guy. I’m not doing scenes about casseroles. It’s not happening.'”

According to E! Online, when the news of Lowe’s departure was announced, a source told the site a similar story that the actor was leaving because he felt like the show was underutilizing him.

So what about the critically acclaimed show The West Wing? That was less than amicable. According to Lowe, he left due to a salary dispute.

Lowe explained, “In the end, I could have lived with the fact that everyone on the show had gotten a raise but me—if I felt that we really knew what the story lines were going to be. It’s all good in the hood. I mean, I’m so blessed to have been part of something great. The last thing anybody wants to hear is that John Lennon hated Paul McCartney. They just want to hear ‘Hey Jude.'”

His last departure from a television series was Amy Poehler’s underdog sitcom Parks & Recreation, which saw Lowe and series regular Rashida Jones pack up. He didn’t address that departure with GQ, but at the time he left, Lowe joked with David Letterman that he was leaving the show because Amy Poehler was “a p***k.” Later on, it was revealed that he had only signed on for a six-episode arc that stretched into 88 episodes, so fans guessed it was time for him to leave. That said, he and Jones did come back on the show as it took its final bow.

[Photo by Rob Kim / Getty Images]

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