Before I read Rob Lowe’s GQ interview last week, it honestly never occurred to me that the man still had so many attitude issues. There’s a reason why he kept dropping out of TV shows over the years: he’s a douchebag who believes that he’s too good for the shows. Well, Lowe has a new interview with Vulture about his latest show, The Grinder, which I’m sure he’ll be leaving in two seasons (if the show gets a second season). Before reading these quotes, it’s important to know the premise of the show. Rob Lowe plays an actor on a hacky dramedy called The Grinder, only to quit the fictional show-within-a-show because he feels objectified, so he goes to his brother (Fred Savage), who is a lawyer, and Lowe then tries to impress everyone with his fake-lawyer skills. You can read the full Vulture piece here.

On the title of his new show, The Grinder: “News flash: We’re being funny on purpose. You can all rest easy. I also want to say, in a world of a show called The Leftovers, in a world of a show called Numb Threers [Numb Threers is CBS’s Numb3rs] , whatever the hell that show is called, do you really want to tell me The Grinder is the worst title you’ve ever heard? Really, you wanna go there? ‘Cause I will go there! Numb Threers. The Leftovers. No one wants leftovers! I love the people at HBO, and I love Justin Theroux. Terrible, horrible title! Cold leftovers! They wanna get in my face with Grinder?”

The premise of The Grinder is fine: “I understand where it comes from, but it does make me laugh — the chattering class goes on and on about the lack of original concepts. But then when they are faced with an original concept, they fret over how to sustain it. So you really can’t win. Should it be more banal and generic so you don’t worry about where we go? We can do that if you want.

The objectification of men: “We did a whole sequence of why he left The Grinder. And the reason he left is he felt objectified. People go on and on about the objectification of women, and rightly so. But what about the objectification of men? When was the last time you saw Grey’s Anatomy? So what I love about this show is these wry, insightful looks at contemporary culture in entertainment as seen through the eyes of a regular Idaho family because they have a conduit to it in my character.

He would do anything for a laugh: “Believe me, after the scene we did last night, I know I’ve left all my dignity at the altar of comedy. We did a scene where Jason Alexander, as the creator of the show within the show, wants me to take my shirt off one too many times. And I’m like, “I took my shirt off in the church sequence, I took my shirt off in the jury-deliberation sequence, do you think maybe we can do this Thanksgiving scene without me taking my shirt off?” He’s like, “Man, you’re the Grinder. You’re the sex symbol. Don’t overthink this. Give the people what they want.” And I very slowly and shamefully unbutton my shirt. And then he looks at me and I realize what he wants to see is nipple. It’s a parody of that great Irene Cara scene in Fame, which I’ve never forgotten. There’s nothing funnier than a sad, shameful stripper — when played by a man.

[From Vulture]

I’ll admit it, I did have to stop for a second and really wonder…are TV shows sexually objectifying men these days? Like, is it a rampant problem that needs to be dealt with? And I think the answer is no. Some of the Shondaland shows show beefcake, of course, but I tend to believe the male nudity/shirtlessness on TV today is usually in the context of female nudity. As in, a couple is getting naked together or it’s literally a tit-for-tat within certain scenes. So it’s not that there’s this rampant objectification of men, it’s that there are a handful of shows that objectify men just as much as women have been historically objectified on screen.

Photos courtesy of WENN.