Book Review: Stories I Only Tell My Friends, by Rob Lowe

I was never really a much of a Rob Lowe fan during the Brat Pack days.  When I watched The Outsiders I crushed on Matt Dillon and Pony Boy instead.  When I, later on, watched Wayne's World [insert deep confession here] I crushed on Mike Meyers.  I didn't even see most of Rob's big hits because the pretty blue-eyed playboy thing just wasn't the right box office draw for me.

So, when I saw Rob had written a memoir and saw it had even earned rave reviews, I "ehh"ed and kept it on the back burner.  Then I read A Prairie Tale, Melissa Gilbert's life account, including saucy details of their torrid love affair, and I suddenly became curious of the "He Said".

Well turns out he didn't say much... about the couple's romance at least.  In fact, her name is only mentioned twice and only as a timeline device, as in "I was dating Melissa Gilbert at this time."  If you've picked up this book looking for sexual scandal, you've picked up the wrong book.  Some people are into graphic tell-alls, but I actually respected the author for not kissing and telling.  He definitely alludes to his "a different girl, a different night" habits, but is careful not to name names or be seedy or descriptive about it in any way.  Because that's not what the stories he only tells his friends are all about.

The stories he tells his friends, and has now included his reading audience in on, are epic.  In fact, I can see a biopic coming out sometime in his later years.  He has the classic nutty family that's practically a requirement for the best of autobiographical accounts.  A cowboy-seeming dad.  An over-the-cuckoo's-nest mom.  A quack of a doctor stepdad, who brings him and his family from the Midwest out to Malibu.  And, then things are just getting started.

Back home, Rob had already developed a love for community theater.  Being hit over the head, at a young age, with that cosmic hammer---that all thespians seem encounter at some point in life---gave him a drive I wish I had for anything at that age (or any age, for that matter.)  He had already had some insanely coincidental celebrity encounters back in Ohio, while on his quest for learning everything he could about the biz.  So, when lurking around his new California neighborhood, trying to meet friends and find a way to fit in, he was intrigued to come across some kids---looking to be about his age---who were running around town, filming home war and action movies.  These kids?  Oh, just some guys named... Emilio Estevez, Chris and Sean Penn. 

He soon befriends the local guys and works his way into costarring in some of their homemade flicks.  His circle eventually comes to include Charlie Sheen (more interested in becoming a pro-baller at the time), Emilio, the Penns, Holly Robinson and eventually Tom Cruise.

My favorite scenes from the book are the tales of these future Brat-Packers' high school days, running around town (including Rob's first frightening encounter with Martin Sheen, freshly home from a hellish Apocolypse Now shoot), auditioning together and heroically becoming stars together when a chunk of them land parts in Francis Ford Coppola's The Outsiders.  The film, who's the making of, provides even more favorite chapters and the movie set's behind-the-scenes tales could become a tome all their own.

He continues his Hollywood story through sobriety and up unto the present day.  As I was finishing up the last chapters, someone had snuck up beside me and asked what I was reading.  I sheepishly showed her the cover, to which she exclaimed, "Rob Lowe?  I wouldn't think he'd have much to say!" 

To which I replied, "Neither did I."