THERE ARE TWO types of people in this world. People who can tolerate The Big Bang Theory, and those who can’t.
For those who can’t hack it, it’s the most irritating, un-amusing and uncomfortable TV viewing imaginable. Horrible dialogue. Canned laughter after every single line. Yet, the show is entering season thirteen and star Jim Parsons makes $900,000 per episode (and that’s after a $100,000 pay-cut he took).
Jim Parsons isn’t even a household name. At best, people know him as the guy who plays Sheldon. Yet, he has accumulated a fortune of $80 million from starring in this show. Jim’s co-stars are also making similarly absurd figures thanks to The Big Bang Theory.
It turns out that all of the money in the world couldn’t attract Macaulay Culkin to a job on this show. In an interview with Joe Rogan, Culkin revealed that he turned down multiple offers to star in the show.
They pursued me for The Big Bang Theory and I said “Nooooo.”
Culkin explained:
The pitch was, “Alright, these two astrophysicist nerds and a pretty girl lives with them. Yoinks!” That was the pitch. I was like, “Yeah, I’m cool. Thanks.”
Macaulay pointed out that he’s well aware of the money he could have made but that he doesn’t think it would ever be worth it.
I’d have hundreds of millions of dollars right now if I did that gig. At the same time, I’d be bashing my head against the wall.
Later on in his Joe Rogan interview, Macaulay revealed that he’s not as into Home Alone as the rest of us are. He described the film as “background radiation at Christmastime” and said that people are always asking him to watch it with them, which he finds “flattering and creepy”.
