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Bob Newhart on 'Big Bang Theory': The actor will guest star in May

Bob Newhart will guest star on 'The Big Bang Theory' as a children's TV host named Professor Proton. Bob Newhart will appear on 'The Big Bang Theory' on May 2.

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Ron P. Jaffe/CBS
'The Big Bang Theory' stars Jim Parsons (r.) and Simon Helberg (r.).
  • By Molly Driscoll Staff Writer

Former TV star Bob Newhart will appear in a guest role on the popular CBS comedy “The Big Bang Theory,” according to a report by the website TVLine.

Newhart will portray Professor Proton, a TV science personality who hosted a children’s show. “Bang” characters Sheldon (Jim Parsons) and Leonard (Johnny Galecki) were big fans of the show, according to producers Bill Prady and Steven Molaro, and when Sheldon discovers the professor can be hired to appear at events, he books Newhart’s character to come to their apartment. 

“We're really excited about it,” Molaro said during the show’s PaleyFest panel, according to NBC.

Newhart will appear on the May 2 episode of the CBS comedy.

The last time the actor appeared on television was 2005, when he had a guest-starring role on the ABC dramedy “Desperate Housewives.” Newhart is best-known for the TV shows “The Bob Newhart Show,” which aired from 1972 to 1978 and focused on Newhart as a psychologist living in Chicago, and “Newhart,” which ran from 1982 to 1990 and featured the actor as the owner of an inn in Vermont with an eccentric staff. “Newhart” went down in television history after it aired its series finale in which Newhart woke up in bed and looked over to see actress Suzanne Pleshette, who played the actor’s wife on “The Bob Newhart Show,” and Newhart described a dream he had had to her in which he ran an inn in Vermont.

More recently, Newhart appeared in the 2003 Will Ferrell comedy “Elf” and the 2011 comedy “Horrible Bosses.”

“The Big Bang Theory” is currently airing its sixth season, with its seventh season already having been renewed, and centers on a group of scientists and their respective girlfriends and wives. New episodes regularly win the night for ratings for the show’s network, CBS.

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