Rob Lowe isn’t holding back when it comes to lamenting Hollywood’s lack of steamy sex scenes – and the irony isn’t lost on his fans or insiders, who have branded him “brazen beyond belief”.
RadarOnline.com can reveal the 59-year-old actor, best known for The West Wing and Parks and Recreation, went all-in on how times have changed during a chat with Sex and the City’s Kristin Davis, 59, on his “Literally!” podcast
Lowe declared: “Nobody has sex scenes in movies anymore,” in what many are now calling a shockingly bold statement considering his own infamous history with sex tapes.
In 1988, just as he was reaching peak fame, a sex tape surfaced showing Lowe with two young women – one of whom was later revealed to be just 16.
The tape, recorded during the Democratic National Convention, became one of Hollywood’s biggest scandals and sent Lowe into damage control mode, forcing him to retreat from the spotlight and seek rehab for alcohol addiction.
Despite the controversy, Lowe managed an astonishing comeback, reinventing himself as a clean-cut leading man in TV dramas and comedies and even taking gags about the tape on the chin in his infamous Comedy Central Roast.
Despite the fallout, he’s seemingly nostalgic for the very thing that almost ended his career.
Speaking about Hollywood’s changing attitudes toward on-screen intimacy, Lowe reminisced about his 1988 erotic thriller Masquerade, claiming the studio distanced itself from the film because it was “too sexy”.
He said, seemingly baffled by how much the industry has changed: “They’re like, ‘It’s so brave. She’s so brave.’ (This actress is) brave because she has a sex scene? Like, that’s brave now. In our day, it was required.”
Lowe did acknowledge one recent exception – A24’s Babygirl, which features steamy, no-holds-barred sex scenes and stars Nicole Kidman, 56, as a CEO embarking on a submissive affair with her 27-year-old intern, played by Harris Dickinson.
Calling the film’s intimate moments “great”, Lowe suggested it’s a rare throwback to a bygone era.
The actor also recalled an old Hollywood “rule” about sex scenes, saying: “There was the page 73 rule. Back in the day, the sex scene was always on page 73. You got a script and were like, ‘Am I going to be naked in this?’ You didn’t have to read the whole script. You just went to page 73 because that middle second act… what do you do? It’s the toughest sledding in storytelling, so they Blue Lagoon it.”
