What could have been! Rob Lowe joked about turning down the role of Dr. Derek Shepherd on Grey’s Anatomy on the Monday, March 25, episode of “WTF With Marc Maron.”
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During the chat, Maron asked Lowe if he regularly turns down roles, to which Lowe responded, “Dude, I turned down Grey’s Anatomy … to play McDreamy.” He added, “That probably cost me $70 million dollars!”
The About Last Night actor explained, “But at the end of the day, I watched it when it came out, and when they started calling the handsome doctor ‘McDreamy,’ I said, ‘Yeah, that’s not for me.’”
The role eventually went to Patrick Dempsey, who played the heartthrob for 10 years on the longest-running medical drama from 2005 to 2015.
This isn’t the first time the Lowe has discussed how he turned down the TV role. In his 2011 memoir, Stories I Only Tell My Friends, the sober actor divulged that he was already in talks to star on an upcoming CBS show called Dr. Vegas when he got a call from the ABC producers. “I agreed to meet with the people making Grey’s Anatomy. I had read it and loved it — the writing was crisp, real and very entertaining — and it’s always been a good idea to hear out talented people,” he recalled. “‘We would be thrilled if you would play Dr. Derek Shepherd,’ they said right off the bat. I was torn. Grey’s was a much better script; in fact, there was no comparison.”
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Ultimately, he decided on Dr. Vegas, which also starred Amy Adams: “Year after year after year, all of ABC’s new dramas flopped. CBS was on a hot streak that continues to this day. Although Grey’s was a much better script, I chose Dr. Vegas. The odds were just too stacked.” The CBS show ran for just one month until it was canceled in October 2004.
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Since then, the actor has had plenty of TV success, playing Robert McCallister in ABC’s Brothers & Sisters from 2006 to 2010, before joining hit shows like Showtime’s Californication from 2011 to 2014 and NBC’s Parks & Rec from 2010 to 2015, where he played Chris Traeger.
