Rob Lowe Hints At Unrevealed ‘West Wing’ Horror Stories: “They Would Make Your Hair Stand Up

Rob Lowe revealed that his experience working on The West Wing went south by his Season 4 exit.

Speaking to hosts Penn Badgley, Nava Kavelin and Sophie Ansari on Stitcher Studios’ Podcrushed podcast, Lowe shared that he “felt very undervalued.”

“Whenever I talk to actors who complain about, you know, their relationships on their shows, it happens,” he began, acknowledging that “it happens in any workplace.”

He continued, “You could be in an environment where people sandbag you, want to see you fail, don’t appreciate you, whatever it is, and whenever I share my stories, people are like, ‘I will never share my own stories again,’” eliciting gasps from the three hosts as he described that “they would make your hair stand up.”

“And there’s some of them I wrote,” he added. “I shared some of them in my book, but I purposely didn’t share half of the other ones because it would make the people involved look so bad that I didn’t want to do it to them.”

According to Entertainment Weekly, his character Sam Seaborn, the idealistic and witty Deputy Communications Director, was written out of the series in Season 4, as according to a statement by Lowe at the time, it became “increasingly clear, for quite a while, that there was no longer a place for Sam Seaborn.”

The political drama aired on NBC for seven seasons from 1999 until 2006. Lowe ended up reprising his role in the final season, and on A West Wing Special To Benefit When We All Vote, which hit Max in 2020.

While he “did not have a good experience,” he repeatedly “tried to make it work,” but ultimately decided to exit the series after learning something through watching his kids grow up.

“What happened was my kids were getting to a certain age where I could see them having first girlfriends or friends and being in a relationship that was abusive and taking it,” he said. “She’s the popular girl, everybody likes her, she’s beautiful, it must be great,” things which Lowe said resembled what people would gush to him about making The West Wing.

“It’s so popular, it’s so amazing, it must be amazing, but I know what it’s like and if I couldn’t walk away from it, then how could I empower my kids to walk away from it?” he asked.

“Oh, wow,” Badgley responded. “I like that you could connect that dot at that moment. That’s really important.”

“I walked away from the most popular girl at school, but I also knew that it was a super unhealthy relationship, and it was the best thing I ever did,” Lowe noted.

The West Wing is streaming on Max.