Despite being one of the leads on NBC’s Parenthood, Dax Shepard made a surprising revelation about his six-season run on the NBC drama.
“I know I was making among the lowest of all the actors,” Shepard, 50, revealed on the Monday, March 10 episode of his “Armchair Expert” podcast. He made the salary revelation while recalling working with costars to buy presents for the show’s crew. “The amount of emails that would go back and forth to decide whether we were getting this mug or this f—ing … it was impossible,” he quipped.
Parenthood, which ran from 2010 to 2015, followed the lives of the Braverman family as they dealt with familiar drama and everyday ups and downs. Shepard played Crosby, one of the four Braverman siblings, alongside Peter Krause, Lauren Graham and Erika Christensen. The series also starred Craig T. Nelson and Bonnie Bedelia as the family’s patriarch and matriarch, Zeek and Camille Braverman, respectively.
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On the podcast, Shepard noted that prior to working on Parenthood, he “made it a point to find out what everyone was making” on the set of his other projects. “I’d always figure it out. I’d either get in a conversation where I’d get it out of them or I’d back channel through an agent,” he shared. “I would figure it out.”
‘Parenthood’ Cast: Where Are They Now?
However, Shepard decided to abandon the idea while filming Parenthood. “I went into Parenthood going, ‘I’m purposely gonna not find out,’ and I was so happy on the show,” he said before poking fun at his costar Tyree Brown, who played Crosby’s son, Jabbar. “I was like, ‘If I find out Jabbar’s making twice as much as me, how can I enjoy going to work?’”
He added, “That was the first time I ever broke that habit. Boy, was it a blessing.”
While Shepard has fond memories of his time on the series, he’s not interested in bringing the show back to the small screen. “I don’t desire to act at all, but I deeply miss being on Parenthood,” he shared. “And there is a version of that show I would probably do if it were eight episodes or 10 episodes, I could manage my now real job.”
Monday’s podcast served as a mini Parenthood reunion, as Graham, 57, was Shepard’s guest. During the episode, Graham accidentally revealed that actor Carlos Valdes is the father of Mae Whitman’s son, whom she welcomed in August 2024. Whitman, who played Graham’s daughter on Parenthood, had not previously disclosed the identity of her baby’s dad.
“I’m trying to think of the last time [I saw her]. They’re in New York now,” the Gilmore Girls alum said on the podcast. “Carlos, her baby daddy, is on Broadway in Hadestown, which I feel happy to plug because he’s fantastic in it, Carlos Valdes. … He’s really great. And so, they’re in New York for the next while and then she got this job in Ireland. So she’s in Ireland with the baby.”
While announcing the birth of her son last year, Whitman, 36, revealed she named her child after her former Parenthood onscreen sibling, Miles Heizer. “He is the kindest, gentlest, smartest, funniest little beebee and he’s our best friend (pretty much exactly like his namesake Uncle Miles,” she wrote via Instagram at the time. “We are infinitely grateful he chose us as his parents.”
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