Rob Lowe: 'Too pretty' to play Drew Peterson?

Lifetime TV just cast the chiseled Lowe as the bloated, baggy-eyed former cop accused of murdering two of his wives. Really?

Rob Lowe and Drew Peterson
(Image credit: CORBIS, Getty Images)

On the face of it, Parks and Recreation star Rob Lowe is a curious choice to play Drew Peterson, the former police sergeant charged with killing his third and fourth wives, but he'll do just that in an upcoming Lifetime TV movie called The Drew Peterson Story aka Ladykiller. Physically, the two are quite different — the graying Peterson, 10 years older, doesn't exactly share Lowe's chiseled jaw and "piercing" blue eyes. (Not that Peterson is flattered — he was lobbying for Denzel Washington to take the role.) Can the typically sunny Lowe tap into the dark complexities of this alleged criminal, or is he "too pretty to play ugly"?

The casting isn't realistic: "I'm not saying that an actor can't ugly up to play a role," says Curt Wagner at the Chicago Tribune, "but this news is ridiculous." It's too hard to imagine that the "forever sexy" Rob Lowe would gain weight for a "cheesy" Lifetime movie. "If Lowe pulls this off, someone deserves an Emmy."

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