Rob Lowe

Rob Lowe plays Sam Seaborn, the deputy communications director in The West Wing. Sam is an accomplished speechwriter who can be much less assured when life does not follow a well-constructed argument. Lowe makes the earnestness appealing, then finds the comedy in Sam being surprised that good intentions have not settled the matter.

Lowe became a familiar film actor in the 1980s through The Outsiders, St. Elmo's Fire and About Last Night. The West Wing gave him a sustained dramatic role with room for the verbal and physical comedy that became even more prominent in his later television work.

As Chris Traeger in Parks and Recreation, he takes enthusiasm to extraordinary lengths. He also plays actor Dean Sanderson in The Grinder, Father Jude in You, Me and the Apocalypse and Eddie Nero in Californication. His other leading roles include Owen Strand in 9-1-1: Lone Star.

Sam is less exaggerated than several of those characters. Lowe makes him a good fit for an ensemble in which intelligence is common but social ease is distributed much less evenly. He can deliver the polished passage and then make the awkward conversation afterwards just as enjoyable.