Jim Parsons, of The Big Bang Theory, turns 50: the origin of Bazinga

Obsessive, unsociable, extremely intelligent, generous. This was (or is) Sheldon Cooper, the protagonist of the hit series The Big Bang Theorywhich was (or is) played by Jim Parsons, who turned 50 yesterday, March 24th.

Tall, 1.86 m, of English, French, German and Scottish ancestry, Jim played Sheldon in all 280 episodes, this nerdy genius scientist with a brilliant mind but poor social skills, which is the cause of many of the comedic situations of the series.

There were 12 seasons, from 2006 to 2019, with 280 episodes of less than half an hour, and Parsons was the only one in all of them, along with Johnny Galecki (Leonard Hofstadter). It can still be seen on Warner Channel.

Here are things you probably didn’t know about Jim Parsons. His early days, his favorite series, the salaries he received, when he revealed he was gay, his marriage, and why he decided to leave the series, which could not continue without him.

• Jim has been nominated for Outstanding Lead Actor Emmys for six consecutive years (from the 2009 ceremonies to the 2014 ceremonies), winning four times.

• He hasn’t had as much luck when considered by his peers, the artists who vote in the Screen Actors Guild. He was a total of 10 candidates -from 2012 to 2017-, for the ensemble and he, individually, did not get any statuettes.

• Born March 24, 1973 in Houston, Texas, he made his first stage appearance in a school play at age 6. What was your first role? Play a bird. He was a very shy child, he confessed, but that’s what lit the spark for him. Lui studied theater at the University of Houston, San Diego / The Old Globe Theater, graduating in 2001.

• He moved to New York, where he worked in Off-Broadway productions, appeared in television commercials and in an episode of and (2000), before landing a recurring role (well, that was in 7 episodes). Judge Amy in his final two seasons, in 2004 and 2005.

• Does Sheldon have Asperger’s Syndrome? Asperger’s is a type of autism, a developmental disorder on the autism spectrum. Why do many understand that Sheldon has it? Because they have trouble relating to other people, they don’t understand social norms, they tend to fix their attention obsessively on specific topics, they cling to routine, they have interests to which they return repeatedly and constantly.

But Bill Prady, co-creator of the series, has explicitly stated that Sheldon Cooper does not have Asperger’s.

Bazinga

• The word Bazinga, popularized in the series by her character, finds its explanation in the spin-off Young Sheldon. As a boy, Sheldon was very serious, so he goes to a comic book store and buys joke supplies, manufactured by the Bazinga Novelty Company. His motto was If it’s funny, it’s a Bazinga!.

• The real decision, which motivated him not to sign a contract for a new season, he said: is that “he was tired”. But he didn’t know at the time that the series would not be discontinued. “I would have liked to know how he was The Big Bang Theory without Sheldon. Well, that didn’t happen.

• Jim is prone to motion sickness. So traveling by car makes you nauseous.

• He maintains his friendship with two of the co-stars of The Big Bang Theory, Simon Helberg (Howard Woowitz) and Kaley Cuoco (Penny). His favorite character in the series, he said, is Penny.

• He was voted the friendliest in his high school graduating class, Klein Oak High School in Spring, Texas.

• His earliest influence, he says, was comedian and host Johnny Carson, who hosted several Oscar ceremonies.

• He made his Broadway debut in 2011 as Tommy Boatwright in The normal heart.

• He took piano lessons for 14 years.

• It was May 2012 that The New York Times reported that Parsons is gay and had been in a relationship for ten years at the time. When Parsons married Todd Spiewakas of May 2017, they had already been a couple for 14 years.

• His favorite series are The Mary Tyler Moore Show (1970), The company of three (OR Three is a crowd1976), family ties (1982) and The Bill Cosby Show (1984). and love to see lost AND Grey’s Anatomy.

• He received a star on the Hollywood Television Walk of Fame at 6533 Hollywood Boulevard in Hollywood on March 11, 2015.

• She owns a production company, That’s Wonderful Productions, with her husband Todd Spiewak who is a graphic designer and art director. Jim is a producer of the spin-off of The Big Bang Theory, Young Sheldonand so far he has voiced his character, off screen, in all 121 episodes of the 7 seasons.

• He said in 2016 that he would like to play the Joker in a future film Batman. So far, no such luck.

• He paid $8.35 million to buy 4 apartments at 36 Gramercy Park East, New York.

• In his words “As a child I was very fascinated by meteorology. I’ve lived on the Gulf Coast and hurricanes have been there. And that’s the subject I flunked out of college: meteorology.”

• He has two houses, one in Los Angeles and one in New York. “In Los Angeles I live more in the garden, so I enjoy walking my two puppies in New York: one a Maltese and the other a Shih Tzu. I grew up with two different parakeets, one who lived for five years and one who lived for 13 years, so I’ve always been attracted to birds.”

• Don’t look it up on Twitter. She had an account for a few days, “but it turned out she had nothing to say. There are some interesting facts that I could share, but I don’t want to share that part of me,” she said.

• “All of my choices in projects have been based on characters or roles, and financially it’s obvious: as an actor in a TV series, I get a wonderful salary, and that salary is constant, which doesn’t always happen when I’m doing theater. or movie”.

• Well Jim started out by charging, in Season 1, as much as $60,000 for each episode of The Big Bang Theory. If that payout value had held constant over the series’ 280-episode run, it would have grossed $16.8 million. But it ended up charging a lot more.

• Already in the 2010/2011 season it jumped to US$200,000, then US$250,000, US$300,000, US$350,000 and a percentage of the profits. And he raised $10 million a year, between 2014 and 2017, the last three.

Do you know what your next project is? Just by looking at ita comedy written, directed by and starring Ryan O’Connell that follows Elliot, a gay television writer with cerebral palsy, as he struggles to find love and connection in a world that wasn’t made for him…