What's The Real Reason Sara Gilbert Left "The Big Bang Theory?"

The official excuse is the writers' couldn't write for her character. That's total BS. Her episodes were very funny, among the best the show ever did. It's not only a lame excuse, it's an old one. It's the same one "The Andy Griffith Show" used for dropping Elinor Donahue after the first season (any guy in his right mind would take Ellie over Helen Crump).

So, what's the real reason? Was CBS afraid to feature her on a hit show after she "came out." The same thing happened to Sheila James (Zelda in "The Many Loves of Dobie Gillis) but in her case she didn't "come out" until years later but the network was apparently worried any way. In fairness, maybe the producers thought Leslie would not be credible as a hot-to-trot brainiac ("come for the breasts; stay for the brains") when the actress playing her was an out of the closet lesbian.

Maybe they wanted to have Leonard finally end up with Penny, which meant Leslie, Raj's sister and Dr. Stephanie had to disappear but even so, Leslie was a much funnier foil for Sheldon than "Bawwy Kwipke."

And then, of course, there's always money. The four original cast members are holding out now. Did Gilbert want too much? Or did the producers want to make some cuts for the coming season and somebody was out?

Leslie is missed. Whatever the reason was, they should bring her back.

I never really cared for Leslie. I think Priya is better.

R

FredLeonard said:

The official excuse is the writers' couldn't write for her character. That's total BS. Her episodes were very funny, among the best the show ever did. It's not only a lame excuse, it's an old one. It's the same one "The Andy Griffith Show" used for dropping Elinor Donahue after the first season (any guy in his right mind would take Ellie over Helen Crump).

So, what's the real reason? Was CBS afraid to feature her on a hit show after she "came out." The same thing happened to Sheila James (Zelda in "The Many Loves of Dobie Gillis) but in her case she didn't "come out" until years later but the network was apparently worried any way. In fairness, maybe the producers thought Leslie would not be credible as a hot-to-trot brainiac ("come for the breasts; stay for the brains") when the actress playing her was an out of the closet lesbian.

Maybe they wanted to have Leonard finally end up with Penny, which meant Leslie, Raj's sister and Dr. Stephanie had to disappear but even so, Leslie was a much funnier foil for Sheldon than "Bawwy Kwipke."

And then, of course, there's always money. The four original cast members are holding out now. Did Gilbert want too much? Or did the producers want to make some cuts for the coming season and somebody was out?

Leslie is missed. Whatever the reason was, they should bring her back.

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I don't have an answer to your question, but I agree about Elinor Donahue. I had read that the reason they let her go was that she supposedly had "no chemistry" with Griffith, but I recently saw a couple of the Donahue episodes, and I though their chemistry was fine - their relationship was very sweet, very unlike Crump, who was always kind of a scold.

I doubt Gilbert's sexual prefererence had anything to do with her departure, given that Jim Parsons is openly gay.

I don't think that anyone intended for Sara Gilbert's character to be long-term. She never got billing at the beginning of the show. The whole thrust of the show is that these nerdy guys live across the hall from a hot blonde. Just as with Priya, Leslie was only intended to be a diversion for Leonard before he gets back together with Penny.

I don't think Gilbert's sexuality had anything to do with it. Even though it was a few years later, Jim Parsons' coming out barely registered a ripple. It was in like the tenth paragraph of a NY Times profile that Parsons' partner was mentioned.

The reason wasn't that the writers couldn't write for her character, but she and the writers agreed, they couldn't keep up the high quality of writing. And that is true for most shows.

Look at the Brit-coms. Part of the reason they are funnier is the seasons are so short, there is very little filler material. Or look at "I Love Lucy." A lot of high quality scripts, well...not really. A lot of the episodes were take word for word from old radio scripts of "My Favorite Husband."

So you see high quality was easier to achieve back then when they had such back logs to choose from. To be fair, the writers on "My Favorite Husband" were the same as "I Love Lucy," and as much as I loved the ILL cast I found the cast of MFH to be their equal.

I look at TBBT and while I was surprised how much I like Mayim Bleach's character (Which I thought I wouldn't like but I was wrong), she isn't in a high quality episode every time. Or her part of the episode isn't high quality all the time.

Gilbert was striving for the high quality all the time. She was of the mind, if I can't be in a top notch episode all the time, I'd rather do less of them or none at all.

Similarly Ann Morgan Guilbert, who played Millie, in the Dick Van Dyke show was never even officially a regular, semi-regular or reoccurring character. She said toward the end of the first season, Carl Reiner offered her a contract and she turned it down. She said, she was of the opinion if they had to pay her all the time, they would use her more, in less quality, just because she was on payroll. So she got paid per appearance on the show. She wanted to be at home with her daughter and do other projects.

I liked Sarah Gilbert's character on TBBT, she was one of the few "smart" people that could stand up to Sheldon successfully. (Oddly enough normal people like Sheldon's mum and twin sister have no trouble putting Sheldon in his place quickly).

It would have hard for Gilbert to claim she held out for "quality" considering "Bad Teacher" is a POS and she allowed herself to be terribly miscast.

Gregg. said:

I don't think that anyone intended for Sara Gilbert's character to be long-term. She never got billing at the beginning of the show.

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She was cast as a full-time cast member (although she might have had a "7 in 13" contract) at the beginning of Season 2,and is credited last after the 5 stars on the episodes she appeared in.

I doubt it has anything to do with Sexuality, Jim Parsons is openly gay yet they can write for him, and Chuck Lorre appears to be open minded on the topic

Jim Parsons being gay is not really in conflict with the character he plays. For all we know - heck, for all he knows - Sheldon might be gay (if he ever actually stopped to think about sex for a few minutes). It would explain a lot about his relationship with Amy.

Leslie, on the other hand, was straight and hot to trot. For her to declare herself exclusively gay (not even bi, which would have worked with her character) and to add she decided she was gay after making out with the show's star, puts sort of a damper on her character.

FredLeonard said:

Jim Parsons being gay is not really in conflict with the character he plays. For all we know - heck, for all he knows - Sheldon might be gay (if he ever actually stopped to think about sex for a few minutes). It would explain a lot about his relationship with Amy.

Leslie, on the other hand, was straight and hot to trot. For her to declare herself exclusively gay (not even bi, which would have worked with her character) and to add she decided she was gay after making out with the show's star, puts sort of a damper on her character.

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It shouldn't. That kind of attitude is ironic, considering these people are ACTORS. That means they pretend to be other people that they are not. I don't recall that anybody had a problem with Neil Patrick Harris playing a womanizer on How I Met Your Mother. Harris is one of the most openly gay (not bi, as far as I know) actors in Hollywood.

LKellerIII said:

It shouldn't. That kind of attitude is ironic, considering these people are ACTORS. That means they pretend to be other people that they are not. I don't recall that anybody had a problem with Neil Patrick Harris playing a womanizer on How I Met Your Mother. Harris is one of the most openly gay (not bi, as far as I know) actors in Hollywood.

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It all depends. Various groups protest someone not in their group playing someone who is (e.g., Jonathan Pryce in "Miss Saigon" or Fred Armisen as Obama on SNL). Doogie Howser can get away with playing Barney because Barney acts so gay, except for the gender of those he chases. But I don't know the real rationale for dropping Gilbert. I'm just raising a possibility.

If it had come out that Jerry Seinfeld had been gay, I don't know that "Seinfeld" would have worked. George or Kramer, OK, but not Jerry. Elaine? No, I don't think so.

Now, Jane Lynch can pull it off for the straight characters she's played but not everybody and every character.

Didn't her involvement with The Talk on CBS weigh in on her leaving T.B.B.T.?

No, she left about four years before "The Talk." And she signed for a regular role in another sitcom, "Bad Teacher," this year (while still doing "The Talk").