How Jim Parsons Really Felt About His Pants-Less Scenes On The Big Bang Theory
"The Big Bang Theory" was known for getting their characters down to their skivvies. Penny (Kaley Cuoco) was frequently seen in underwear, whether she was seducing Leonard (Johnny Galecki) or simply trying on a bridesmaid dress, while Amy (Mayim Bialik) lingered a little too long with the camera. In fact, in the Season 10 episode "The Cohabitation Experimentation," Leonard and Penny celebrate Sheldon (Jim Parsons) moving out by having a dance party in their underwear.
While featuring characters with their pants off is a staple of comedy, it's not always distributed fairly. In a 2012 interview for IGN with "Scrubs" creator Bill Lawrence, he admitted that he had a rule on set that female and male nudity on the show would be balanced, and for every time a female character was seen in underwear, a male character would be seen in the same state of undress. But the fact that it needed a rule just goes to show how frequently such inequality exists in a television series. In fact, in an interview on Dax Shepard's podcast, "Armchair Expert," Cuoco revealed that she suspected, after she and Galecki broke up in real life, the creators of the show may have increased the number of sex scenes between their two characters just to mess with the actors.
Jim Parsons was one of the actors frequently caught with his pants down, as Sheldon, in his tighty-whities, offered bottomless depths to be mined for humor. So what did this particular "Big Bang" star think of having to drop trou so often?
He's fine with it
In the book "The Big Bang Theory: The Definitive, Inside Story of the Epic Hit Series" by Jessica Radloff, Jim Parsons explains that he isn't particularly bothered to be without pants. "I couldn't have cared less not to be in pants," Parsons explained. "Now, if they had asked me to be shirtless, that would have made me more uncomfortable. But I had never had an issue with my legs ... There is something that takes over in my performer's brain when I am onstage, where I am capable of saying and doing things that I would never say or do ten minutes after I leave the stage. Never! And the pants fall in there, if you get my meaning."
There were several instances of Sheldon losing his pants, but perhaps none more memorable than in "The Pants Alternative" when Sheldon gets drunk to conquer his fear of public speaking so he can give a speech to accept an award, only for a drunken Dr. Cooper to shed his pants on stage. According to Variety, that episode was the first of four episodes to win Jim Parsons an Emmy award for playing Sheldon, so maybe there's some wisdom to Sheldon taking his pants off after all.