The Big Bang Theory

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The Big Bang Theory
Title card for The Big Bang Theory
Also known as	TBBT
Format	Sitcom
Created by	Chuck Lorre Bill Prady
Directed by	James Burrows (pilot) Mark Cendrowski
Starring	Johnny Galecki Jim Parsons Kaley Cuoco Simon Helberg Kunal Nayyar Sara Gilbert
Opening theme	"Big Bang Theory Theme"[1] by Barenaked Ladies
Country of origin	United States
Language(s)	English
No. of seasons	2
No. of episodes	40 (List of episodes)
Production
Executive producer(s)	Chuck Lorre Bill Prady Lee Aronsohn
Producer(s)	Steve Molaro Mike Collier Faye Oshima Belyeu
Editor(s)	Peter Chakos
Camera setup	Multi-camera
Running time	21 minutes (without commercials)
Broadcast
Original channel	CBS
Picture format	480i (SDTV), 1080i (HDTV)
Original run	September 24, 2007 – present
External links
Official website

The Big Bang Theory is an American situation comedy created and executive produced by Chuck Lorre and Bill Prady, which premiered on CBS on September 24, 2007.^[2]

It concerns two male Caltech prodigies in their twenties, one an experimental physicist (Leonard) and the other a theoretical physicist (Sheldon), who live across the hall from an attractive blonde waitress with show-biz aspirations (Penny).

Leonard and Sheldon's geekiness and intellect are contrasted with Penny's social skills and common sense for comedic effect. Two equally geeky friends of theirs, Howard and Rajesh, are also main characters. The show is produced by Warner Bros. Television and Chuck Lorre Productions.^[3][4] The Big Bang Theory was recently picked up for a third and fourth season by CBS.^[5] The Big Bang Theory will change timeslots for its third season and will now air at 9:30 EST following fellow-Chuck Lorre-produced Two and a Half Men starting Monday, September, 21, 2009.^[6]

Contents 1 Main cast 2 Episodes 3 Production history 4 Opening Theme 5 Season synopses 6 DVD releases 7 Ratings 7.1 U.S. standard ratings 7.2 Seasonal ratings 7.3 UK distribution and ratings 8 International broadcast 9 References 10 External links

[edit] Main cast

• Johnny Galecki as Leonard Hofstadter, Ph.D - He has a younger brother named Michael, a mother named Beverly, and an unnamed father and sister. Leonard is an experimental physicist with an IQ of 173 who received his Ph.D. when he was 24 years old. He shares an apartment with colleague and friend Sheldon Cooper. He is the straight man of the series. The writers have toyed with a romance between him and neighbor Penny, with their unresolved sexual tension being a major force for drama.

• Jim Parsons as Sheldon Cooper, Ph.D. - Originally from East Texas, he was a child prodigy, starting college at the age of 11, right after completing the 5th grade. As a theoretical physicist, he possesses a master's degree, two Ph.D.s, and an IQ of 187. He also has a twin sister named Missy, a mother named Mary, and another unnamed sister. He exhibits strict adherence to routine, a lack of understanding of irony, sarcasm and humor, and a complete lack of humility; these tics are the main sources of his character's humor, not to mention the center of a number of episodes. He shares an apartment with Leonard Hofstadter.

• Kaley Cuoco as Penny - She is Sheldon and Leonard's friend, who lives across the hall from them. She is a waitress at the local Cheesecake Factory and also an aspiring actress. She has a father named Bob and unnamed brother, sister and mother. She was raised on a farm in Nebraska and is largely oblivious to those matters which interest her nerd roommates, which is exploited for humor. She also has a largely contentious friendship with Sheldon, and the two characters are often allowed to simply bounce off each other for comedic effect.

• Simon Helberg as Howard Wolowitz, M.Eng.^[7] - He works as an engineer and lives with his mother; they are both Jewish. Howard, unlike Sheldon, Leonard, and Raj, does not have a Ph.D. However, he likes pointing out that he has a master's degree in Engineering from MIT. He provides outrageous pick-up lines and fancies himself a ladies man, with suitably unimpressed reactions from Penny; however, he has shown some success with other women.

• Kunal Nayyar as Rajesh Koothrappali, Ph.D. - Rajesh, who originally comes from India, works as a Particle Astrophysicist at Caltech. He is normally very shy in front of females and cannot speak in front of them; because the show's scenes often involve Penny, his paucity of dialogue has led to him occasionally being overlooked by the rest of the cast, who evidently forget he is there. The only known cure to his chronic shyness is alcohol or experimental pharmaceuticals. He is also quick to perceive racism. His parents, thus far unnamed, are seen via webcam; his father is a gynaecologist and drives a Bentley, facts that are often pointed out to him, when he claims that he was raised in poverty in India.

• Sara Gilbert as Leslie Winkle, Ph.D. (recurring since season 1)^[8][9] - She is an experimental physicist who occasionally sleeps with both Howard and Leonard during the show's airing. She does not get on well with Sheldon and frequently mocks him. She was promoted to main cast during the second season, but demoted again once the writers realized they could not produce quality material for her for every episode^[10].

[edit] Episodes

Season	Episodes	Original Airing
1	17	September 24, 2007 - May 19, 2008
2	23	September 22, 2008 - May 11, 2009
3	TBA	September 21, 2009 - May 2010

[edit] Production history

The show's initial pilot, developed for the 2006-2007 television season, was substantially different from its current form. Only Jim Parsons and Johnny Galecki were in the cast, and their across-the-hall neighbor (now played by Kaley Cuoco) was a much meaner character. The show was not picked up, but the creators were given an opportunity to revise the show, bringing in the remaining leading cast and retooling the show to its current format.^[11]

The second pilot of The Big Bang Theory was directed by James Burrows, who did not continue with the show. This reworked pilot led to a 13-episode order by CBS on May 14, 2007.^[12] Prior to its airing on CBS, the pilot episode was distributed on iTunes free of charge. The show premiered September 24, 2007, and was picked-up for a full 22-episode season on October 19, 2007.^[13]

Production on the show was halted on November 6, 2007 due to the 2007–2008 Writers Guild of America strike, returning on March 17, 2008 in an earlier time slot^[14] and with nine new episodes.^[15][16] After the strike's end, the show was picked up for a second season airing in the 2008-2009 season, premiering in the same time slot on September 22, 2008.^[17] With increasing ratings, the show received a two-year renewal through the 2010-11 season.^[18][19]

David Saltzberg, a professor of physics and astronomy at the University of California, Los Angeles, checks scripts and provides dialogue, math equations and diagrams used as props.^[20] According to executive producer/co-creator Bill Prady, "We're working on giving Sheldon an actual problem that he's going to be working on throughout the [first] season so there's actual progress to the boards ... We worked hard to get all the science right."^[21]

[edit] Opening Theme

Barenaked Ladies wrote and recorded the theme song, which describes developments the universe has undergone since the dawn of time. On October 9, 2007, a full-length (1 minute and 45 seconds) version of the song was released.^[22]

[edit] Season synopses

In Season One physicists Leonard and Sheldon get their lives shaken up when an attractive young woman named Penny moves in to the apartment across from theirs. Leonard begins to develop a love for Penny, while she puts up with his friends: Sheldon Cooper, who has a combination of obsessive–compulsive disorder and neurosis; Howard Wolowitz, a sex-crazed maniac; and Rajesh, who will not speak to her, as he is too shy to talk to girls. Throughout the season: Sheldon loses his job for insulting his new boss, finds his ego bruised by a child prodigy, and finds himself unable to bear being part of a lie that Leonard has told—always attacking the world with a relentless need to assert his supremacy; Rajesh learns that he can talk to girls when he's drunk; and Penny and Leonard go out (in the final episode).

Season Two begins to deal with character development, including Sheldon becoming more and more obsessive, with a characteristic lack of understanding of irony and sarcasm reminiscent of Asperger syndrome. Leonard and Penny's relationship takes a turn for the nasty when they break up, but quickly is resolved and progresses into a stronger friendship than before. In the season finale Penny hints at her true feelings for Leonard. Meanwhile Howard's character remains similar to that of season one. Rajesh manages to briefly apologize to Penny without having consumed alcohol.

[edit] DVD releases

DVD Name	Release dates			Ep #	Additional Information
	Region 1	Region 2	Region 4
The Complete First Season	September 2, 2008	January 12, 2009	June 3, 2009	17	The three disc box set includes all 17 episodes. The only extra feature is an 18 minute short entitled Quantum Mechanics of The Big Bang Theory: Series Cast and Creators on Why It’s Cool to Be a Geek. Running Time: 374 minutes.
The Complete Second Season	September 15, 2009[23]	October 19, 2009	TBA	23	TBA

[edit] Ratings

[edit] U.S. standard ratings

In the following summary, "rating" is the percentage of all households with televisions that tuned to the show, and "share" is the percentage of all televisions in use at that time that are tuned in. "18-49" is the percentage of all adults aged 18–49 tuned into the show. "Viewers" is the number of viewers, in millions, watching at the time. "Rank" is how well the show did compared to other TV shows aired that week.

[edit] Seasonal ratings

Seasonal ratings based on average total viewers per episode of The Big Bang Theory on CBS:

Season	Timeslot (EDT)	Season Premiere	Season Finale	TV Season	Rank	Viewers (in millions)
1	Monday 8:30 P.M. (September 24 – November 12, 2007) Monday 8:00 P.M. (March 17 – May 19, 2008)	September 24, 2007	May 19, 2008	2007–2008	#59[24]	8.31[24]
2	Monday 8:00 P.M. (September 22, 2008 – May 11, 2009)	September 22, 2008	May 11, 2009	2008–2009	#44	10.14
3	Monday 9:30 P.M.	September 21, 2009	May 2010	2009–2010

[edit] UK distribution and ratings

The show made its UK debut on Channel 4 on February 14, 2008 bringing in an average audience of 1.0 million viewers. The second episode, shown the following week, also received 1.0 million. For the third episode an average of 1.1 million tuned in. The show is also shown as a 'first-look' on Channel 4's digital offshoot E4 the preceding evening, and brings in 400,000 viewers on average. The 5th episode received 880,000 viewers. After the first 5 episodes, the average number of viewers continues to hover around the 1 million mark. Episode 13 was watched by 1.3 million viewers and was the most watched episode.^[25]

In December 2008, Virgin Media made the first nine episodes of the first season available to watch on its TV Choice On Demand service, and the rest of Season 1 was made available in January 2009.

[edit] International broadcast

International Syndication
Albania — Digi+ (since April 19, 2009)
Argentina — Warner Channel (since November, 2007)
Australia — Nine Network (Recently returned)
Belgium — La Une (since August 31, 2008)
Bolivia — Warner Channel (since November, 2007)
Brazil — Warner Channel (since November, 2007)
Bulgaria - Nova Television (since November 5, 2008)
Canada — CTV (2008–present), A (2007–2008)
Chile — Warner Channel (since November, 2007)
Colombia — Warner Channel
Costa Rica — Warner Channel
Cuba — Multivisión
Cyprus - LTV
Czech Republic — Prima COOL (since April 7, 2009)
Denmark — 6'eren (since January, 2009)
Dominican Republic — Warner Channel
Ecuador — Warner Channel
El Salvador — Warner Channel (since November, 2007)
Fiji - Mai TV
Finland — Sub (since September 8, 2008)
France — TPS Star (since October 18, 2008)
France — NRJ 12
Germany — Pro7 (beginning July 11,2009) [26]
Guatemala — Warner Channel
Honduras — Warner Channel
Iceland — Stöð 2 (since August 19, 2008)
India — Zee Cafe
Ireland — RTÉ Two (since July 11, 2008)
Israel — yes stars Comedy (since July, 2008)
Italy — Steel (since January 19, 2008). The show received a lot of criticism due to the poor quality of dubbing, which allegedly "dumbed down" most of the nerdy-geeky jokes. To fix this since episode 9 of season one the dubbing has been changed to a significally better quality one, characterized by a more faithful translation.
Malaysia — ntv7
Mexico — Warner Channel
Netherlands — Veronica (since March 2, 2009)
New Zealand — TV2 (since September 17, 2008)
Norway — TVNorge
Pakistan — Zee Cafe
Panama — Warner Channel
Paraguay — Warner Channel
Peru — Warner Channel (since November, 2007)
Philippines — Jack TV C/S 9
Poland — TVN Siedem (since November 20, 2008) as 'Teoria wielkiego podrywu'
Portugal — SET and RTP2 (since July 14, 2008)
Macedonia — Kanal 5
Slovenia — Kanal A (since February 23, 2009) as Veliki pokovci (The Big Bangers)
South Africa — M-Net
Spain — Antena.neox (since June 12, 2008)
Sweden — Kanal 5
Thailand — True Series (since May 26, 2008)
Trinidad and Tobago — TV6 (since 2008)
Turkey — CNBC-e[27] (since September 9, 2008)
Ukraine - Inter channel
United Kingdom — Channel 4 , E4
Uruguay — Warner Channel
Venezuela — Warner Channel

[edit] References

[edit] External links

Wikiquote has a collection of quotations related to: The Big Bang Theory

• The Big Bang Theory at the Internet Movie Database
• The Big Bang Theory at TV.com
• The Big Bang Theory on CBS.com
• Official Site for The Big Bang Theory on DVD
• The Big Bang Theory at EpGuides.com
• Vanity Cards Archive for The Big Bang Theory

v • d • e The Big Bang Theory Main characters Johnny Galecki (Leonard) · Jim Parsons (Sheldon) · Kaley Cuoco (Penny) · Simon Helberg (Howard) · Kunal Nayyar (Rajesh) Production Episode list · Characters · Chuck Lorre · Bill Prady