The bizarre Kaley Cuoco cameo you probably missed in Young Sheldon

It’s difficult to make a successful network television show. Turning a successful series into a successful spin-off is even more difficult. The audience has a certain expectation and when it comes time to follow one or two other characters elsewhere, things can get difficult. But CBS has hit a home run with “Young Sheldon,” about young Sheldon Cooper, who grew up in Texas long before the events of “Young Sheldon.”“The Big Bang Theory,” itself one of the most successful sitcoms of the 2000s.

Since “Young Sheldon” is set decades before the events of the series that inspired it, it was difficult to have characters from “The Big Bang Theory” appear. However, the show’s producers managed to invite Kaley Cuoco for a secret cameo during the show’s third season. Cuoco, of course, played Penny for the entire twelve seasons of The Big Bang Theorywho serves as the anchor of the ensemble.

However, when it came time to inject her into Young Sheldon, it was all about Cuoco’s voice and not about actually having her appear on screen. The moment came in the episode “Teenage Soup and a Little Ball of Fib,” in which Sheldon (Iain Armitage) fakes being sick to avoid a swimming test at school. Cuoco ultimately provided the voice of the pool water. In a 2020 interview with TVLineSteve Molaro, co-creator of the series, explained how it all came together:

“That was absolutely Kaley’s voice like pool water. I needed someone to do the voice. I knew I wanted her to be feminine and kind of sexy, and I was like, ‘Well, duh! Kaley is perfect for this.’”

How did Molaro sell this bizarre role to Cuoco? After all, Cuoco has been pretty busy since “Big Bang Theory” went off the air, Dubbing of the title character in “Harley Quinn” and “The Flight Attendant,” among others. Still, it was an easy yes from the actor:

“I said, ‘Hey, I have a weird pitch for you: Sheldon is having a nightmare and he has to go into this pool and he’s talking to the pool water. Do you want to be the voice of the pool water?’ She just laughed and said, ‘Absolutely, I do.'”

Although the role was small and relatively strange, it was still important. Cuoco was the first former Big Bang Theory star to lend his talents to the spin-off, following Jim Parsons, who served as the show’s executive producer in addition to his role as narrator. To complete Young Sheldon, Parsons reprized the role of Sheldon in the final season alongside Mayim Bialik’s Amy. However, aside from that, Cuoco’s dubbing role was a nice touch for fans.

What’s interesting is that CBS didn’t promote Cuoco’s cameo before the episode premiered. Wouldn’t the network have wanted to highlight the return of a Big Bang Theory star to the universe? Maybe, but as Molaro explained in the same interview, everyone involved in the show’s creation agreed that the moment was all the more powerful because it was kept secret:

“Sometimes it seems a bit strange to me when things are over-promoted, and as great as it was, I don’t know if that sort of thing should be in commercials. (Kaley) wanted to keep it a secret (like So if you found out, that was a little Easter egg for you, so we were all on the same page about it.

The series ran for a total of seven seasons, with the seventh season of “Young Sheldon” ending in 2024. Still, the larger Big Bang Theory universe lives on another spin-off in the form of Georgie & Mandy’s First Marriage. Whether Cuoco or any of the other Big Bang Theory stars will appear on this show remains to be seen.

Young Sheldon is now streaming on Netflix and Max. Or you can get the complete series on DVD from Amazon.