'Young Sheldon' producer recalls Elon Musk's TV cameos – 'He wasn't great' | Exclusive
'Young Sheldon' producer recalls Elon Musk's TV cameos – 'He wasn't great' | Exclusive
Bryan Alexander, USA TODAYSun, October 18, 2026 at 2:00 PM UTC
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"The Big Bang Theory" and "Young Sheldon" creators offer surprising takes on Elon Musk's onscreen cameos in exclusive revelations from a new book.
The following assessment doesn't require a degree in rocket science: SpaceX CEO Elon Musk should never quit his day job to pursue an acting career.
Jessica Radloff's new book, "Young Sheldon: The (Juicier-Than-Meemaw's-Brisket) Inside Story of the Hit Comedy" (out Oct. 20), offers a revealing dissection of Musk's cameo appearances on "The Big Bang Theory" and its spinoff, "Young Sheldon," from the show creators who worked with the pre-DOGE billionaire on the memorable appearances.
Steve Holland, the "Big Bang Theory" showrunner and "Young Sheldon" executive producer, recalls Musk's 2015 appearance on the original CBS comedy in the Thanksgiving episode, "The Platonic Permutation." The episode featured Simon Helberg's fan-boy aerospace engineer Howard Wolowitz encountering the dishwashing-glove-clad billionaire at a soup kitchen. Of the two appearances, this required several lines of dialogue.
"He wasn't great as an actor," Holland says in an USA TODAY exclusive excerpt of the book, wisely avoiding the term "bad actor," which could take on a whole new meaning.
Holland laughs when recalling one direction to Musk: "There was a moment where he said words out of order and we said, 'Actually, this is the line,' and when he said it in the right order and it got a laugh, he said, 'Oh, so it matters what order you say them in.' You could see it sort of click."
Holland says the brief appearance was otherwise uneventful, with no hint of the controversies that would later surround the controversial future head of President Trump's Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE).
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"It was a small interaction and he was perfectly easy to work with and was game to make fun of himself," Holland says, adding, "Maybe less surprisingly now than then, but he liked being on camera." (Another observation not needing an advanced degree).
Frequent Trump critic Chuck Lorre, who co-created both CBS comedies, recalls an equally agreeable Musk during his brief but hilarious appearance in the 2017 "Young Sheldon" Season 1 episode, "A Patch, a Modem, and a Zantac."
The scene features Musk furtively studying a notebook containing rocket-landing ideas developed by 10-year-old genius Sheldon Cooper (Iain Armitage), then hastily stuffing the notebook into a desk drawer before meeting with a CNN reporter. The joke of course is that Musk has secretly appropriated the boy's groundbreaking ideas.
"He was an entirely different guy than the guy we now see in the news," Lorre says in Radloff's book. "He couldn't have been sweeter about that guest spot on 'Young Sheldon.' And the premise was he stole the technology of landing a rocket booster from a ten-year-old boy in Texas – and he signed on to do that! There was something very childlike about him coming to play and do make-believe."
Lorre adds that "it was really a fond memory, although somewhat at odds with our more recent memories." He doesn't dwell on this, adding, "Moving on."
Musk doesn't figure in Lorre's own dishy memoir, "Sitcom," released Oct. 13.
This article originally appeared on USA TODAY: 'Young Sheldon' producer recalls Elon Musk's TV cameos – 'He wasn't great' | Exclusive
Source: “AOL Entertainment”
