CELEBRITY
Rob Lowe Says His Audition For Kevin Bacon’s Role In ‘Footloose’ Left Him On A Stretcher
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Rob Lowe says his audition for the lead role of Ren McCormack in 1984’s Footloose, which ultimately went to Kevin Bacon, left him leaving the soundstage on a stretcher.
During an appearance on the Six Degrees With Kevin Bacon podcast, Lowe, 59, revealed his audition experience with the star himself.
It’s a dance audition apparently. Dance, Lowe joked to Bacon, 65.
I think it was to a Styx song of all things. And the end of the dance was a knee slide across the floor, Lowe said. And I hit my knees and slide across the floor into a lineup of [former Paramount Pictures CEO] Sherry Lansing, [screenwriter] Dean Pitchford, [producer] Craig Zadan. The director, Herbert Ross, was also there for his audition, Lowe said.
And my knee explodes, Lowe revealed. Explodes! Pop. And they take me out of the soundstage on a stretcher.
Craig Zadan and the producers, who were friends of mine and were very pro-me doing this movie go up to me and go, ‘Hey man, it’s cool. At the end of the day, we really decided, we’re just going to hire a dancer for the part,’ Lowe recalled.
But they didn’t hire a dancer. A week later they hire you, Lowe told Bacon. He remembered thinking, ‘Goddamn these guys! That’s a real actor!’
Well, that is a great Hollywood story, Bacon said.
Before Bacon got the Footloose role that launched him to superstardom, he moved to New York City in 1976 to pursue theater. He appeared on Broadway with still-unknown Sean Penn and Val Kilmer in Slab Boys, then landed his breakthrough role in Barry Levinson’s Diner alongside Steve Guttenberg and Mickey Rourke.
TMX contributed to this article.
