Raegan Revord has captivated audiences’ hearts with her delightful portrayal of Missy Cooper in the Young Sheldon series. Playing the titular character’s twin sister, she has perfectly complemented Sheldon’s eccentric genius traits, adding depth to the story. Given that she cemented herself as one of the fan-favorite characters in the show, it was far from an easy journey.
Since the show was set in East Texas, almost everyone spoke Southern accents. This was something that the actress had to work on, which she learned by watching Laurie Metcalf from The Big Bang Theory.
Raegan Revord Learnt a Texan Accent from The Big Bang Theory Star Laurie Metcalf
The Big Bang Theory was a wildly successful show which starred Jim Parsons as the older Sheldon Cooper. After its immense success, CBS brought its spin-off, Young Sheldon, exploring the childhood of the titular character with Parsons taking on the narrative role.
The show delves deep into Sheldon’s challenges and triumphs in a world that often doesn’t understand him. Raegan Revord played the role of Missy Cooper, the twin sibling of Iain Armitage‘s child prodigy character.
Parsons has already explained in the narrative that he avoided sounding like a Texan due to embarrassment, which reflected on why Armitage’s character doesn’t speak with a Southern drawl. Since adult Sheldon had minimal traces of Texan accent, The Big Bang Theory spin-off focused on maintaining continuity with the character’s established speech pattern.
However, Missy had a noticeable Texan accent in the original series, so Raegan Revord, who played the younger version in the spin-off had to have an accent. As per Bello Magazine, the actress learnt her accent from the TBBT actress, Laurie Metcalf, who played Mary Cooper, the mother of older Sheldon and Missy in the original series.
Given that the young star was 9 at the time, it would have been a hectic task for her to nail the accent, yet she delivered an impeccable performance, instead of focusing much on how she sounded.
Raegan Revord Reflected on Her Young Sheldon Audition
The now 16-year-old actress in the same interview reflected on her audition for the CBS sitcom, which she booked at quite a tender age. Recounting her experience, she revealed that her audition happened during pilot season, making it quite a busy time.
However, she was immediately drawn to her character upon reading the script. She added that the role “really made me laugh and I knew she’d be a lot of fun to play.”
While admitting that she hadn’t watched Courtney Henggeler’s show, she was well aware of its popularity and recognized that the spin-off prequel was a special project. She further delved into the audition process which felt prolonged as she had to attend several rounds of auditions, and “every time there would be less girls auditioning.”
It was clear that the audition process was quite competitive, which was natural since the original show was a big hit among audiences. She said,
I originally wasn’t asked to have an accent for Missy and towards the end they sent over videos of Ms. Laurie Metcalf in the Big Bang so I could hear her accent and they were like can you come in tomorrow and read all these scenes with an accent.”
She continued,
It got a little stressful. At the end I was testing with a really good friend of mine which was nice because we were really encouraging to each other and goofing off. It was way more fun having a friend there in the end.
The show eventually turned out to be a “big classroom“ for the actress, who loved collaborating with other cast members. She is also genuinely impressed with her character, and we love her too, all thanks to Revord’s impressive portrayal.
Young Sheldon is available to stream on Paramount Plus.
