Jim Parsons: I would not have been able to handle fame if I was younger
The Big Bang Theory actor was in his 30s when he was thrust into the spotlight.
Jim Parsons has said he would not have been able to handle the fame that The Big Bang Theory thrust on him if it had happened when he was younger.
The actor was 33 when he became a global star as Sheldon Cooper in the hit sitcom.
He told David Tennant Does A Podcast With… “I still consider that as a real blessing for me that my trajectory happened the way it did.
“Time-wise, I mean, I wouldn’t have been able to handle it. I was a late bloomer in some ways.
“Not that I was ever irresponsible… I wasn’t a tragic case, but I wouldn’t have known how to compute all this kind of stuff at all.
“Even just being on set in that pressured environment, or I would have made it very pressured for myself. I know I would have. I wouldn’t know what to do, never mind any public recognition.
“Dear God. The amount of things I know I got to do in life that no-one cared about… Normal doesn’t always matter anymore, it seems to me.
“Things get taken out of context. One old image and suddenly you find you’re explaining the whole reason you’re allowed to walk the earth.”
During his time on the show, Parsons came out as gay, after a role in the adaptation of Larry Kramer’s play The Normal Heart, and said it was dealing with press attention that had deterred him before.
He said: “That was my last hurdle with coming out. The press. I knew that ‘you’ll be a gay actor from here on out’.”
“And now, looking back, not only has it not been a bad thing for me, it’s been the opposite and a great thing for me, it’s not untrue, but also I don’t mind.”
David Tennant Does A Podcast With… is on Apple, Spotify and all podcast providers.
