Not very often, but once in a while, a Hollywood actor offers an evaluation of his own work that others can take seriously. Such was the case recently when Angus T. Jones, the nineteen-year-old actor who stars on the raunchy comedy series Two and a Half Men, told an online Christian publication associated with the Seventh Day Adventist denomination that the show he has appeared on for the past ten years is “filth” and that people should not be watching it.
Said Jones in a video interview with Christopher Hudson of the Forerunner Chronicles: “If you watch Two and a Half Men, please stop watching. I’m on Two and a Half Men. I don’t want to be on it. Please stop watching it. Please stop filling your head with filth.” Jones added that “people say it’s just entertainment…. Do some research on the effects of television and your brain, and I promise you you’ll have a decision to make…. It’s bad news.”
Jones, who at $350,000 per episode is considered among highest-paid child stars in television history, has been on Two and a Half Men since the age of nine, playing the son of an angst-filled single dad played by Jon Cryer and the nephew of a carousing, drunken character played by notorious Hollywood “bad boy” Charlie Sheen. The story line for most of the show’s ten-year run revolved around the ongoing sexual escapades of Sheen’s character (with Cryer’s immoral behavior playing a supporting role). Sheen’s high-profile feud last year with the show’s producers led to his termination from the series, with his character being killed off and replaced by another less-than-admirable Hollywood playboy, Ashton Kutcher — whose character’s lecherous behavior rivals Sheen’s.
Jones’ change of heart over his appearance on the show came as the result of his conversion to Christianity earlier this year. “You cannot be a true God-fearing person and be on a television show like that,” Jones said in the interview. “I know I can’t. I’m not OK with what I’m learning, what the Bible says, and being on that television show.”
The teen actor recalled that while he was raised going to Christian schools, things began to change when he took the part of “Jake” on the CBS sit-com. By the time his high-school years rolled around, he was experimenting with drugs, and his lifestyle became a reflection of the Hollywood atmosphere he was in. “I was living for myself … being a typical celebrity,” he said. His decision to give his life to Christ came about after a conversation with a friend, during which he realized that “God is the reason” for his existence. “I just feel like I accepted God in my life,” he explained.
As for his frank evaluation of the show he has appeared on for most of his adolescence, Jones explained that “people don’t like to think about how deceptive the enemy is,” referring to Satan. “He’s been doing this for a lot longer than any of us have been around. So, there’s no playing around. There’s no playing around when it comes to eternity.” He added that “if I am doing any harm, I don’t want to be here. I don’t want to be contributing to the enemy’s plan.”
Since the video interview, at least one Hollywood outlet has targeted interviewer Christopher Hudson, who has produced the Forerunner Chronicles media outreach for a number of years, and who told TheBlaze.com that he also travels extensively to speak about his faith. Shortly after the interview with Jones, the Hollywood gossip website TMZ.com published a piece on Hudson, describing him as “Homophobic” and “Anti-Obama.”
While the Christian video producer has been critical of Obama and his stance on same-sex marriage, to call him “anti-Obama” and “homophobic” would be a stretch, he told TheBlaze. With regards to the president’s promotion of homosexual marriage, Hudson said that as Christians “we need to be concerned. History notes that when established governments begin to make provisions for sin … it usually has historically been the precursor of the demise of that nation.”
Contrary to what some publications reported, “Hudson said that he is not a spiritual guide to Jones and that the two merely met through associates and decided to sit down for an interview last week,” reported TheBlaze. Hudson emphasized that “I’m not Angus’ spiritual adviser,” but the two are simply “brothers in Jesus Christ.”
As for the spiritual conversion of the Two and a Half Men actor, Hudson told TheBlaze that “Jesus Christ has the opportunity to be lifted up through a young man like Angus, who in the eyes of many people has it all. But Angus is telling people that to have it all is to have Jesus Christ.”
In a followup to Jones’ widely reported interview with Hudson, the Los Angeles Times noted that on November 28 Jones released a statement offering an apology “if my remarks reflect me showing indifference to and disrespect of my colleagues and a lack of appreciation of the extraordinary opportunity of which I have been blessed. I never intended that.”
While refusing to address the content of the interview, Jones said that “without qualification” he was grateful for the opportunity and had “the highest regard and respect for all of the wonderful people on Two and Half Men with whom I have worked and over the past ten years who have become an extension of my family.”
He added that the show’s producer Chuck Lorre, and others both at Warner Brother and CBS, “are responsible for what has been one of the most significant experiences in my life to date. I thank them for the opportunity they have given and continue to give me and the help and guidance I have and expect to continue to receive from them.”
Jones’ interview with Hudson was apparently not the first time he has suggested that he was troubled by his role on Two and a Half Men. During an October interview with Christianity Today Jones said that he knew he was on the show “for a reason, but at the same time I have this strange twist of being a hypocrite: a paid hypocrite. Even though it’s my job to be an actor, I have given my life to God.”
Photo of Angus Jones: AP Images
