Killing Kennedy: Rob Lowe to play assassinated American President JFK in 50th anniversary movie

Actor Rob Lowe visits the White House earlier this year (Getty Images)

American actor Rob Lowe will portray slain American President John F. Kennedy in a television movie.

Killing Kennedy, based on a book by TV news commentator Bill O'Reilly and author Martin Dugard, will take the form of a "factual drama" and will premiere on National Geographic TV channel later this year to coincide with the 50th anniversary of Kennedy's assassination, the network said.

Kennedy was shot by Lee Harvey Oswald on 22 November 1963 in Dallas as the president's motorcade made its way through the Texas city.

Lowe, 49, who rose to prominence in the 1980s as an actor in such films as The Outsiders and St. Elmo's Fire, will star alongside Mona Lisa Smile actress Ginnifer Goodwin, who will play first lady Jacqueline Kennedy.

Gossip Girl star Michelle Trachtenberg will portray Oswald's Soviet-born wife, Marina Oswald. It will be the first Russian-speaking role for the American actress, who is fluent in the language.

The actor who will portray Oswald will be cast within the next two weeks, a network spokeswoman said.

In April, Lowe narrated the network's documentary miniseries The '80s: The Decade that Made Us.

O'Reilly and Dugard's Killing Kennedy: The End of Camelot was published in 2012.

The National Geographic Channel is jointly owned by the National Geographic Society and News Corp-owned Fox.

Reuters