For the first time since Young Sheldon’s flash-forward finale capper in 2024, Mayim Bialik graced the small screen as Amy Farrah Fowler, but not the exact Sheldon-loving neuroscientist from The Big Bang Theory. Rather, for an alt-take on the sitcom fave crafted specifically for her anticipated appearance in Stuart Fails to Save the Universe, and in an episode that ended with a elaborately constructed Matrix gag. The HBO Max spinoff is quite unpredictable.
Much like I couldn’t have predicted that Bialik apparently isn’t closest with her more immediate Big Bang Theory family co-stars, and was kind of surprised to hear the cast member that she’s stayed in touch with the most. Speaking with People, Bialik shared:
I guess I’m closest with John Ross Bowie.
I dunno why that both shocks and amuses me as much as it does. Maybe because I can't 100% think about Bowie hanging out with Bialik without my brain adding Kripke's voice and questionable behavior into the real-world scenario. I've enjoyed Bowie in plenty of other roles. I know he's not Barry Kripke. And yet...
Bialik followed up by pointing to Kevin Sussman as another former co-star that she keeps tabs on, and paid him some ultimate compliments in regards to him taking charge for the follow-up comedy and its dimension-hopping storyline. She continued:
I have such respect for Kevin Sussman and the work that we got to do together and just watching how he takes direction and how he so effortlessly has stepped into the role of leading man.
Kevin, Bert, Denise and Kripke certainly aren't the characters that I bet most fans would have predicted to be the leads of a Big Bang Theory spinoff a decade ago. (Okay yeah, Denise didn't join the show until 2018, but you know what I mean.) And I honestly didn't know how much I'd buy Sussman as the emotional anchor of this nutty series, and rewatching Wet Hot American Summer, in which he plays an alien-minded oddball, did not help. But Sussman is indeed nailing it week in and week out.
Bialik continued, and again spoke very highly of Kevin Sussman and John Ross Bowie and their streaming successes.
I worked with Lauren [Lapkus] and Brian [Posehn]’s been on our podcast, so I have other connections. But in terms of the emotional connection, I like being able to reach out to John and to Kevin and to be able to say, ‘I do not have any memory in my career of being this excited for another actor.’
Mayim Bialik has known a lot of other celebs throughout her long career, which began even before she starred as Blossom's hat-loving teen. So for her to feel that level of excitement for Sussman and Bowie is just plain awesome.
Assuming this IS the real Mayim Bialik, and not an alternate version from one of Stuart's jaunts. Check the back of her neck for one of those zapper things.
Mayim Bialik Got To Cross Paths With Melissa Rauch On Stuart
Though each of The Big Bang Theory's cameo-specific stars have appeared in episodes by themselves, without any grouped-up efforts (yet), Mayim Bialik confirmed that she and Melissa Rauch were actually able to make their schedules work so that they could connect behind the scenes of Stuart Fails. As fans will remember, Rauch reprised a particularly devlish version of Bernadette in Episode 3, and it seems like that episode was filmed around the same time as Bialik's. She said:
We were actually able to physically connect on set, me and Melissa. I can’t remember if she was there for a wardrobe fitting and it was my filming day. I don’t remember, but that was really, really special.
Bialik and Rauch previously reconnected on-screen not as their Big Bang characters, but for the latter's NBC comedy Night Court, in which they shared a fun music-and-dance number.
Who will be the next Big Bang Theory vet to show up on Stuart Fails to Save the Universe, and what kind of twisted version will it be of the original character? There's only one good way to find out. Stream new episodes of the Chuck Lorre co-created comedy every Thursday via HBO Max subscription at 9:00 p.m. ET.
