Kaley Cuoco is featured on the cover of WWD for June 9, 2021.

Starring on “The Big Bang Theory” made Cuoco one of the most successful actors in Hollywood — her 12-season run made her one of the highest-paid actors in the history of TV, with the cast each bringing in $1 million an episode from seasons eight through 12 — but it also confined her to a very specific type of sitcom audience. She had no idea where she would go next after “Big Bang,” but something told her that if she wanted to pivot, she would have to go out and create it for herself.

Which is exactly what she did with a little show called “The Flight Attendant,” which she discovered browsing the internet one late night and which turned into a hit HBO Max series she starred in, executive produced, and for which she was subsequently nominated for two Golden Globes. Emmys, it’s your move.

“I think people were interested in the fact that I built this from the ground-up, that this was my project from the beginning,” Cuoco says of being seen in a new light since the show came out. “I think that got a lot of people’s attention and they respected that. They accepted the tone, they accepted this new path for me. But I do believe that them hearing my story over the last few years of how I got the book and how I got this thing going, I felt like I earned a lot of, I don’t know, there was this mutual respect between me and other actors and my fans. It was just, it was incredibly nice and I felt like I had this warm welcome into a whole new career that I didn’t even know was there.”

When “The Big Bang Theory” ended in 2019, Cuoco was advised to take the summer off and relax a bit, which was the one thing she knew she did not want to do.

Source: WWD