Wesley Stenzel
·4-min read
"It's going a little more slowly than I would have liked," the actor said. "But that's a good thing because we're trying to find the right writer and the right story."
Rob Lowe has a lot of ideas for the long-gestating St. Elmo's Fire sequel — and he's sharing them with costar Demi Moore.
The 9-1-1: Lone Star actor said that he's "on a text thread" with the Substance actress in an interview with Kelly Ripa on Let's Talk Off Camera. "She has a pseudonym that she goes by, which I can't say, because then it wouldn't be a pseudonym," Lowe said. "And we're very much in contact now because we are actively trying to do [the] St. Elmo's Fire sequel."
Lowe first discussed the possibility of a sequel to the 1985 coming of age hit in July, following the success of costar Andrew McCarthy's Brats documentary that reunited most of the original movie's cast, including Emilio Estevez, Ally Sheedy, Moore, and Lowe. Lowe said the sequel is currently "moving along," adding, "It's going a little more slowly than I would have liked. But that's a good thing because we're trying to find the right writer and the right story. But all of the actors, everybody is on board. Everybody is excited."
Moore has met with studio personnel to discuss potentially reprising her role as Jules, she told Entertainment Weekly at the Toronto International Film Festival in September.
"I have had a couple of sit-down meetings, and I think it would be great if we can come up with a story that I think holds up," Moore explained. "Because you never want to diminish."
The Parks and Recreation star said that he thinks the original St. Elmo's Fire connected with audiences because of its honesty in depicting the perils of young adulthood. "It was a hit in its time because it spoke to where we all were in our lives," Lowe said. "Will we ever have the kind of deep friendships coming out of college and coming out of our early 20s? Will that last in our lives? Where are we headed now that we're really adults?"
Lowe hopes the St. Elmo's sequel will maintain that honest spirit. "I think now, the theme of St. Elmo's Fire today is that it's never too late for happiness," he said. "Our kids are out of school and maybe some of us have been divorced and maybe somebody has been falling ill — all the things that you deal with as you get to our ages, this is an opportunity to explore those themes with characters that people know and love. And I think as opposed to just a money run, let's just reboot it because people know the title of it. I actually think there's a lot to be said about why we're doing it. And I'm super excited about it. Hopefully we can pull it off."
Related: Rob Lowe recalls people dressing up as his St. Elmo's Fire character for Halloween: 'It was surreal'
The actor also teased what his character, saxophonist Billy Hicks, has been up to since the end of the original film. "As you remember, at the end of St. Elmo's Fire, he got on a bus to New York with his saxophone," he said. "Billy arrived in New York with his saxophone at exactly the moment that saxophones were banned from showing up on every single song. My take is that Billy got there and played the sax solo on Billy Ocean's 'Caribbean Queen.' That was his high water mark. The question is, what became of him after that? I have a couple really, really good pitches about that."
Lowe, who has experienced addiction and is now sober, also said that he hopes to explore substance abuse and sobriety in the sequel. "He clearly was suffering with addiction," he said of his character. "And what became of that? And obviously being 34 years sober now, I have a question: Is Billy sober?"
Related: Demi Moore reveals her single regret over Brat Pack reunion documentary: 'My only wish'
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Listen to the full conversation between Lowe and Ripa above.
Read the original article on Entertainment Weekly.
