Arts & Entertainment

True Crime Movie Filmed in Rossmoor Airs Tonight

The Drew Peterson story starring Rob Lowe and filmed in Rossmoor will air on My Lifetime today and tomorrow.

If the abrupt departure of both the Lakers and the Clippers from the NBA playoffs this week left you wanting for reasons to scream at the TV, don’t worry: My Lifetime has come to the rescue.

Today at 10 p.m. and Thursday at 2 a.m., the network will air its true-crime dram Untouchable about cop turned accused wife-killer Drew Peterson, which was filmed in Rossmoor. You can cheer for the familiar shots of tree lined Rossmoor streets while jeering at the menacing star played by Rob Lowe.

 As noted on the Rossmoor Community Services District website:

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Hollywood has found Rossmoor and given it a starring role on the small screen in recent years, including Lifetime Television movies like “Untouchable: The Drew Peterson Story”  starring Rob Lowe and Kaley Cuoco and Ashton Kutcher’s television production of the short-lived game show “Opportunity Knocks”, to name a few. One of the reasons location managers have chosen to film in Rossmoor is the backdrop of uncommon 1950’s-style homes, which line every street. This suburbanscape is more reminiscent of a block in Chicago, rather than the O.C.—minus the weather of course.

Lowe, painstakingly made up as Peterson, filmed portions of the My Lifetime movie in Rossmoor last summer. During the filming in Rossmoor a dozen or so trailers—likely housing equipment, actors and crew— were parked at Weaver Elementary, as were fake police cars for the city of Bolingbrook, Ill., where the alleged-Peterson murders took place.

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Peterson, who awaits trial for the alleged murder of his third wife Kathleen Savio, attempted to halt the film’s production, reported the Chicago Tribune. According to the newspaper, Peterson’s attorneys called the movie a jury-prejudicing "character assassination" and threatened legal action if filming did not halt while it was shooting in Rossmoor. Needless to say, the filming continued.

Peterson gained national notoriety shortly after his fourth wife Stacy Peterson disappeared in 2007. While she has never been found, her disappearance cast suspicion upon Drew Peterson, prompting an investigation to be reopened into his third wife’s death, which was initially classified as an accidental bathtub drowning. Throughout the investigation, Drew Peterson captivated and incensed many by granting numerous interviews and appearing on national television confident and jovial as police searched for his missing wife and closed in upon him as a suspect.

Peterson was indicted in 2009 in the Kathleen Savio case. On a side note, Untouchable is based on a book written by a Patch staffer Joseph Hosey called Fatal Vows: The Tragic Wives of Sergeant Drew Peterson.

My Lifetime’s Untouchable trailer is featured to the right. Be warned: it contains profanity.


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