TV names matter. Are you a Carrie or Samantha? A Rachel or Monica? A Buffy or Willow? You get the idea. But Sex and the City creators kept us on tenterhooks throughout the near-entirety of the series, keeping Mr Big’s first name firmly under wraps.
Of course, the big reveal (sorry), was revealed in the last episode, when Carrie was seen on the phone to ‘John’. But the HBO show’s producers have said they came up with the idea at the eleventh hour…
‘In the last episode, in the last moment, I realised [I had] to say Mr. Big's name and I just [mimes typing on a keyboard] “John,”’ executive producer Michael Patrick King told Entertainment Weekly. ‘And then I told all the writers and they were like, “What the hell?” And I was like, “We have to say his name because now he's real!”’
So why the name John? ‘If I wanted to give him a name, I wanted to give him the most generic, American, most generic, almost pilgrim name,’ Michael added. ‘There's no spin, it's just John.’
His ‘generic’ real-name stands in stark contrast to his nickname then. SATC author Candice Bushnell told New York Magazine in 2004: 'I called him Mr. Big because he was like a big man on campus,' she says. 'He was one of those New York guys with a big personality — you just notice him as soon as he walks in the room.’
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