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Oh, universe was in a hot dance state the nearly fourteen billion years ago.
Expansion started waiting for the years began to cool. The atros began to Julie Andrew Falls developed tools.
We built a wall of the Paris fu sciencestly.
Started with a Big Bang.
All right, everybody you know it well? It aired for twelve seasons September of seven to May of twenty nineteen. We're talking to him about The Big Bang Theory.
Yeah.
Well, he's the co creator of the hit television comedy The Big Bang Theory. It's about young scientists in Southern California. As if I needed to tell any of the world knows. And now he wants to help young scientists in Southern California even more than he had earlier.
Yeah, he does through his family foundation. Chuck Luri, the TV writer, director, producer, is pledging twenty four point five million to the University of California, Los Angeles to help more low income students study science and technology. This adds to a program he began back in twenty fifteen, and this donation will double the number of undergraduate scholarship recipients with financial needs to eighty each year. Tim This is according to UCLA.
Well.
Janet Lauren is Bloomberg News higher education finance reporter. She earlier this month wrote about Lorie's latest donation. She's with us here in the Bloomberg Interactive Brokers studio. Also joining us is Chuck Laurie, who not only co created The Big Bang Theory, but also created or co created and produced Grace under Fire, Sybil Darman, and Greg two and a half Men, just to name a few. Chuck joins us from Los Angeles. Chuck, I do want to start
with you because you've done a lot of philanthropy. You've supported STEM education in public schools before this latest donation. Give us your thinking behind the importance of STEM, especially when it comes to a world where you know we're talking about AI potentially doing a lot of the work for us.
Well, when this all began, AI was not part of the conversation, so I really speak to you how that changes things. But my thinking early on was very simple. We had come to understand from various news reports that children here and in England because they were watching the Big Bang Theory or showing a spike of interest in stemated stem related fields at high school and college levels.
And that was remarkable because that certainly wasn't the original goal for the Big Bang Theory to change the trajectory of a young person's life.
It was happening.
So I have to admit, as Chuck and I talked before, my family and I are huge fans of Young Sheldon. Me I had not watched The Big Bank Theory. We actually was introduced to the characters from Young Sheldon. So I have only maybe watched one episode of The Big
Bang Theory. So all this is new to me. But I do know a lot about college financing, and one thing Chuck had said to me when we spoke earlier about the lack of finances is something he understood extremely well because he did not finish college and carried around student loans of two thousand dollars for fifteen years.
So he understands after fifteen years that two thousand was about eight or no. Wow.
Yes, that's the principle of accrude interest. But that's a good detail that a lot of people out there thinking about college they don't think about. And what I found remarkableut this program is not only does it fun college, but it gives mentorship, which is something that is hard
to get through college without. Could you talk a little bit about why that it was important and why is it important for you to see, you know, kids college graduate college in a reasonable amount of time, such as four years, and how difficult that can be.
Well, one of the original goals that I had, for better or worse, was to keep things local so that I could participate and and local for us here in Los Angeles was u c l A. And that was absolutely aided by the fact that our science consultant on the Big Bang theory, doctor David Salzburg, was a professor of physics at u c l A. And so we already had entree to the university through David and and
wanting to participate and give back. It seemed it made sense to do so by focusing on young people who were pursuing or wanted to pursue a stem field and at UCLA, and also because it was local because it was UCLA because of David, the mentorship process was also part of this. We weren't just handing out money and saying good luck for a lot of the kids. They were the first generation in their families to get a college education, and so they're being thrown into a thrown onto a speeding train.
You know, right out of the gate mentorship is important.
Now the information about the scholarship says there's opportunities for graduate school funding. We all know how expensive medical school could be. Can you talk about was that important to you to continue students onto this trajectory?
Not initially. This thing grew over a period of almost ten years now, and when we realized that the success rate we were having with the kids going through under graduate programs UH was phenomenal, and and that's when we decided to expand the program into graduate school. And again we were initially trying to keep the graduate school in in in the UH, in the California system so that we could again stay stay close to it and participate well.
And I am curious to check you know, you guys really worked hard to get the science right on the show, right. I mean that was obviously a priority. Talking to David did Well talk to us about being in that environment for you and maybe how that also shaped your thinking about where you wanted to commit money towards to help others, you know, pursue potentially you know, degrees in the STEM world.
It begins with the show. The show is about UH, a group of somewhat alienated, disenfranchised geniuses and UH, you know, struggling to make their way in the world, but clinging to one another as a community, basically almost a family unit in the way they treated one another, both good and bad. And so it made sense from the beginning that we we we we focus on STEM UH and
UH for a couple of very practical reasons. One is the likelihood that you graduate in one of these fields you can get employed, saying can't be said with a with a B A. And in the humanities or communication, I think I lost you guys think.
About our liberal arts degrees.
Exactly disappointed, I, you know, very practically, I wanted to. I wanted the program to also, you know, help help young people who are going through you know, the journey of education to end with employability. Yeah, and and UH that may have been a little bit, but it seemed it seemed like, Uh, wouldn't it be great to graduate without debt and have a job for you Yeah?
Right, Yes, yes, yes, and yes right. What did you study drugs? No, I'm not sure I have a follow up. No, what did you really academically?
I may have had a it's a dim memory. I was talking about a long time ago. There was also rock and roll and girl, but there was it was. I think I might have been a political science major. I don't know if I ever mentioned it to anybody, but yeah, no, also a degree also, as they used to say, that degree and a token could get you right on the subway.
We want to get back to our guest with us, as Chuck Laurie, TV writer, director and producer The Big Bang Theory, Young Sheldon, two and a half men, So.
Much more time for the interview.
I know he's out there in la and in our studio is Janet Lauren Bloomberg News higher Education finance reporter. So a couple of things we want to get to, but I do want to ask you about it really stung me what you said. And Jahna put in her story where she wrote about your donation to UCLA that you carried a student learn of about two thousand for fifteen years, and you said it it grew to eight thousand.
The cost of education and this idea of you know, kids coming out of school and not having any debt, that's increasingly becoming a thing of the way past. I don't know any thoughts about it as you try to help others who are pursuing education in STEM fields and just thinking about kind of a younger generation, how we do it better, because it just feels like it's getting out of control and not getting better.
I don't have an answer to that. I just know that when State of New York caught up with me, they didn't catch up with me. I was very young and naiven.
I don't think I understood my Social Security number was a target. But you know, I spent probably eight or nine years sending the State of New York fifty dollars a month, and that's how I got out from under it.
But I know, I don't have a solution for this situation other than what we're doing, which is especially you know, seeking out kids that are not only exceptionally talented in their scholastic efforts, but high financial need, backgrounds, underrepresented kids, and where the money can be puts a good use in allowing them to get that STEM education and walk out of UCLA with no debt. Is that seems like a goal worth pursuing major gift.
Yeah, Hey, hey, Chuck, I want to take a step back and just ask you about your broader philanthropy, because this is just one part of it, the big bank theory, UCLA scholars. You've got the Venice Family Clinic, Chuck, Lori Rose Avenue Health and Wellness Center. You're working on some stuff when it comes to food banks and other healthcare related causes, a trust for public land as well in
the greening of schoolyards. Just give us your philosophy when it comes to this type of work, this type of philanthropy, like where do you see the biggest needs?
Well, it began very personally for me. I was very ill when I was a young man, desperately ill. I did not know about free clinics. I did not know where to go. I certainly had no insurance medical insurance, and I was It was a very frightening several years, and I was very fortunate that I managed to recover.
But but that's that stays with you.
If you can't afford to see a doctor and you need a doctor, that's a fear that I don't wish on anyone. And so that the philanthropy efforts began back in the nineties for me with Venice Family Clinic, which I wish I had actually known about when I was in my early twenties, but the idea that you could see a doctor without having any money in your pocket, I thought it was something I wanted to participate in.
So I've been involved with the Venice Family Clinic for I don't know twenty five twenty six years, and that's expanded to other healthcare opportunities, and so that began, and then and then the STEM. The STEM efforts, as I said before, began really by accident when we found out that inexplicably or explicably the Big Bank theory was encouraging young people to pursue STEM research STEM fields.
Uh and uh.
So the thought was really quite simple, maybe we can help. Yeah, I mean, the original goal in making that show was to make people laugh. It was not to change again to change the trajectory of a young man or.
Young woman's life.
But it was doing that. So as long as it was doing that, let's participate. And that's how the scholarship started.
Well, young Sheldon has really made us laugh.
By the way, I love I absolutely love that you're watching Young Sheldon and you haven't watched The Big Bank.
It's amazing.
It's like it's like a gate but it could be a gateway into the original show that it's spun off from.
But he's a great character, and so is doctor Sturgis. I love Doctor.
Surge Wally Sean.
We've been so blessed with some of the casting at Begley, and while it was Sean, it's been a terrific experience.
And the university president that depiction seems entirely realistic to me, Well, how did you decide to pivot into young Sheldon? And you know he finished college in what three years? And the idea of going to East Texas Tech, And how did that all come about? Because it is it is a sort of a realistic path or a young genius like that.
Well, the backstory of Sheldon on The Big Bang Theory was that he graduated college at fourteen or thirteen or fourteen I forget exactly, and then went to cal Tech
to do postgraduate work. And so we had already laid in, you know, the backstory for Sheldon's journey graduating graduating high school at the age of al eleven and and uh, you know, in a in an East Texas town where they simply did not have the wherewithal to deal with a genius of that of that of that size, and East Texas Tech we invented in order to in order to keep him, you know, to keep him look so we can do the show and uh, and for have him ripping through that university as well on his way
to cal Tech and and ultimately as we did.
If you watch The Big.
Bang Theory, he does win a Nobel Prize in the in the final up, we.
Definitely get it. We're gonna work Chuck on Janet because she's got it. If she likes young Sheldon, she's gonna love The Big Bang Theory. She's got it like the it's like.
It is different and the seed that the absolute genius of that cast let. Jim Parsons playing Sheldon at a later age, it's it's we had. We had twelve years of absolute fun making that show.
Just get a minute left? Do you have a favorite moment in time considering all that you've worked on and created or co created or what? Have you? Just got about forty five seconds left here?
Wow, that's a macro question I know.
Sorry, I'm a member kind of gal.
It's kind of hard to pull a favorite moment. There certainly have been moments that that have stuck with me.
No.
One of the I'm not Rather than specifically answer that question, what I've loved about The Big Bang Theory h and I guess you know we're talking mostly about young Sheldon is and I think why it was attractive to young people, Yeah, if you felt this enfranchised, if you felt you're on the outside looking in, which a lot of people do, and you don't have to be a mensa participant or a genius to feel that way. The show represented community,
is represented, like minded souls helping one another. Maybe that's what was at practice to kids watch it.
I think that's a great way to finish up. Listen, thank you, and it's a great thought. Thank you so much, so appreciate it. Be well, Chuck Lori, TV writer, director, producer, co creator The Big Bang Theory, and of course our Janet Lauren.
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