Comedian, writer, and television producer, born in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, USA. Rather than repeat the tenth grade, he left school and joined the navy. While attending Temple University on an athletic scholarship, he appeared at New York's Gaslight Cafe (1962), where his comic routines were so successful that he left college to pursue a career in entertainment. In 1965 he became the first African-American actor to star in a weekly television dramatic series, I Spy (19658), winning two Emmys as an undercover Central Intelligence Agency agent. Later series were The Bill Cosby Show (196971), The New Bill Cosby Show (19723), and Fat Albert and the Cosby Kids (197284). His interest in children and education led him to earn MA and EdD degrees at the University of Massachusetts and to incorporate many of his ideas and ideals in his work. As obstetrician Cliff Huxtable in The Cosby Show (19841992), he projected a new image of middle-class African-American families, and the programme was one of the most popular and lucrative in television history. His gentle, wry clowning appealed to both children and adults, leading to a series of successful TV commercials, comedy records, and books, and making him one of the wealthiest people in the history of the American entertainment industry. Only his films failed to be money-makers. In later years he has become a generous contributor to various causes and institutions, particularly Atlanta's Spelman College, and is often seen at track-and-field meets for amateur athletes, to which he also contributes. In 2003 he was honoured with the Bob Hope Humanitarian Award.
| Bill Cosby | |
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Bill Cosby |
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| Birth name | William Henry Cosby, Jr |
| Born |
July 12, 1937 (age 69) Philadelphia, Pennsylvania |
| Height | 6'1" |
| Spouse(s) | Camille |
William Henry "Bill" Cosby, Jr., Ed.D. (born July 12, 1937) is an American actor, comedian, television producer, and activist. from the University of Massachusetts for his doctoral thesis on Fat Albert and the Cosby Kids, an educational children's cartoon series he created.
Background
Bill Cosby is one of the United States' most popular and admired entertainers, known for his wit and warmth both onstage and off. He later starred in his own series, The Bill Cosby Show, in the early 1970s, was one of the major characters on the children's television show The Electric Company for its first two seasons, and created the humorous educational cartoon series Fat Albert and the Cosby Kids, about a group of young friends growing up in the city. Cosby also acted in numerous films, although none has received the acclaim of his television work.During the 1980s, Cosby produced and starred in what is considered one of the decade's defining cultural sitcoms, The Cosby Show, which aired from 1984 to 1992. While some argued that The Cosby Show ignored the issues of racial inequity still prevalent in society, many agreed that it showcased positive role models. The late 1990s brought trouble for Cosby, first in early 1997 with the death of his only son, Ennis, who was shot to death on a Los Angeles freeway in a random act of violence. Also that year, he was dragged into a court case that involved a young woman who was charged with extortion in claiming that he was her biological father - a shocking accusation that Cosby denied. Cosby admitted to having a one-time affair with the woman's mother.
Despite these personal setbacks, Cosby did not slow down at all in the 1990s, starring in Cosby, which first aired in 1996, and hosting Kids Say the Darndest Things, which began in 1998, as well as making more movies. Cosby's net worth is estimated at upwards $500 million.Additional trouble surrounded the comedian's personal life around 2005. In November, 2006 Cosby settled a civil lawsuit with a Canadian woman who said the comedian drugged and sexually assaulted her at his home. The woman who was in her 30's worked at Philadelphia's Temple University and befriended the 69-year-old Cosby, an alumnus and benefactor of the school. She claimed Cosby assaulted her in 2004 after giving her sleeping pills, saying she woke up and found her bra undone and her clothes in disarray, and recalled having her genitals and breasts played with. Cosby's lawyers said the comedian gave her Benadryl after she complained of headaches and denied the charges.
Biography
Early life and success
In school, Cosby was bright and athletic, the captain of the baseball and track teams at Mary Channing Wister Elementary School in Philadelphia, PA as well as class president. At Fitz-Simmons Junior High, Cosby began acting in plays as well as continuing his devotion to playing sports. In addition, Cosby was working before and after school, selling produce, shining shoes, and stocking shelves at a supermarket to help out the family.
While serving in the Navy medical corps four years, Cosby worked in physical therapy with some seriously injured Korean War casualties, which helped him discover what was important to him.
Cosby left Temple as a sophomore to pursue a career in comedy. Cosby's career took off quickly, and he lined up dates in Chicago, Las Vegas, San Francisco, and Washington DC, among others. Cosby's Ed.D dissertation was entitled, "AN INTEGRATION OF THE VISUAL MEDIA VIA 'FAT ALBERT AND THE COSBY KIDS' INTO THE ELEMENTARY SCHOOL CURRICULUM AS A TEACHING AID AND VEHICLE TO ACHIEVE INCREASED LEARNING".
While many comics were using the growing freedom of that decade to explore controversial, sometimes risqué material, Cosby was making his reputation with humorous recollections of his childhood. Many Americans wondered about the absence of race as a topic in Cosby's stories. As Cosby's success grew he had to defend his choice of material regularly;
I Spy
In 1965, Cosby achieved a first for African-Americans when he costarred with Robert Culp in I Spy, an adventure show that reflected cold-war America's seemingly endless appetite for James Bond-style espionage fantasies. But Cosby's presence as the first black star of a dramatic television series made I Spy unique; Cosby and NBC executives were concerned that some affiliates might be unwilling to carry the series. I Spy finished among the twenty most-watched shows that year, and Cosby was honored with an Emmy award for outstanding actor in a dramatic series, as he would be again for the next two consecutive years.
Yet throughout the series' three-year run Cosby was repeatedly confronted with the question of race. Cosby was relieved when the series ended, enabling him to concentrate on his family (he and wife Camille had two daughters by this time) and to return to live performing.
The Bill Cosby Show and the 1970s
He still pursued a variety of television projects: as a regular guest host on The Tonight Show and the star of an annual special for NBC. He returned with another series in 1969, The Bill Cosby Show, a situation comedy that ran for two seasons. Cosby played a physical education teacher at a Los Angeles high school (he had actually majored in physical education at Temple University);
After The Bill Cosby Show left the air Cosby returned to his education, actively pursuing an advanced degree in education from the University of Massachusetts. In 1972, he was back in prime time, with a variety series, The New Bill Cosby Show, but this time he met with poor ratings, and the show lasted only a season. More successful was a Saturday morning show, Fat Albert and the Cosby Kids, hosted by Cosby and based on his own childhood, running from 1972 to 1979, then from 1979 to 1984 as The New Fat Albert and the Cosby Kids. Some schools used the program as a teaching tool, and Cosby himself wrote his thesis on it in order to obtain his doctorate in Education in 1977.
Also during the 1970s, Cosby and other African American actors, including Sidney Poitier, joined forces to make some successful comedy films which countered the violent "blaxploitation" films of the era. Uptown Saturday Night (1974) and Let's Do It Again (1975) were generally praised, but much of Cosby's film work has fallen flat. Cosby was also regular on children public programs starting in the 70's hosting the "Picture Pages" segments which lasted into the early 80s.
The Cosby Show and the 1980s
Cosby's greatest television success came in 1984 with the debut of The Cosby Show. For Cosby the new situation comedy was a response to the increasingly violent fare the networks usually offered. Cosby insisted on and got total creative control of the series, and he was involved in every aspect of the series. Not surprisingly, the show had parallels to Cosby's actual family life: like the characters Cliff and Claire Huxtable, Cosby and his wife Camille were college educated, financially successful, and had five children. Essentially a throwback to the wholesome family situation comedy, The Cosby Show was unprecedented in its portrayal of an intelligent, affluent, nonstereotypical African-American family.
Much of the material from the pilot and first season of The Cosby Show was taken from his then popular video Bill Cosby: Himself, released in 1983. Cosby's formula for success, as had been the case throughout his career, was to appeal to the common humanity of his audience rather than to the racial differences that might divide it.
In 1987, Cosby attempted to return to the big screen with the spy spoof Leonard Part 6. Unfortunately, Cosby realised during production that the film was not going to be what he wanted and publicly denounced it, warning audiences to stay away on talk shows.
In the 1990s and 2000s
After The Cosby Show went off the air in 1992, Cosby embarked on a number of other projects, including a - notably scripted - revival of the classic Groucho Marx gameshow You Bet Your Life (1992-1993) along with the ill-fated series I Spy Returns (1994) and The Cosby Mysteries (1994). Also in 1996, he started up a new show for CBS, Cosby, again costarring Phylicia Rashad, his onscreen wife on The Cosby Show (early on she replaced Telma Hopkins). Cosby co-produced the show for Carsey-Werner Productions. The show was based on a cynical British program called One Foot in the Grave, but Cosby lightened the humor. It centered on Cosby as Hilton Lucas, an iconoclastic senior citizen who tries to find a new job after being "downsized," and in the meantime, gets on his wife's nerves. In addition, Cosby in 1998 became the host of Kids Say the Darndest Things. Cosby continued to work with CBS through a development deal and other projects. In 2001, at an age when many give serious consideration to retirement, Cosby's agenda included the publication of a new book, as well as delivering the commencement addresses at Morris Brown College and at Ohio State University.
An animated cartoon by Justin Roiland called House of Cosbys, about a Bill Cosby fan who creates a cloning machine to clone a series of Cosbys, each with a different personality, first aired on the internet television channel Channel 101, and was the first of Channel 101's programmes to spend three consecutive months at number 1. The cartoon ran four episodes before being cancelled upon the receipt by Roiland and Channel 101's site administrator Dan Harmon of a cease and desist letter from Bill Cosby's attorney in June 2005. As a result of the cease and desist letter, an "unofficial" fifth episode was created by a different contributor comprising a vulgar and scathing attack on Bill Cosby and his attorney.
Personal life
Cosby met his wife Camille while he was performing stand-up in Washington D.C., in the early 1960s, and she was a student at the University of Maryland. Around the same time, fans were startled when a 22-year-old woman, Autumn Jackson, tried to extort $40 million from Cosby, claiming he was her biological father. Cosby received an Honorary Degree in 2003 presented by President William Harjo LoneFight from the Sisseton Wahpeton College on the Lake Traverse Reservation for his contributions to minority education. Cosby received an Honorary Doctorate from West Chester University of Pennsylvania during the 2003 graduation ceremony. Cosby received an Honorary Doctorate from Baylor University (September 4, 2003 "Spirit Rally"). Cosby was also a speaker at the school's 60th anniversary concert in 2005. Cosby has been critical of what he sees as the African-American community's acceptance of fatherless single parent households, high crime rates, and high illiteracy rates. Board of Education ruling, the U.S. Supreme Court's decision that outlawed school segregation (Wu, Frank H.), Cosby made public remarks critical of those Blacks who put higher priorities on sports, fashion, and "acting hard" than on education, self-respect, and self-improvement.
In "Pound Cake," Cosby, whose doctorate degree is in education, asked that African American parents begin teaching their children better morals at a younger age. (see main article) Cosby told reporters of the Washington Times, "Parenting needs to come to the forefront. The media was not very accepting of the speech, with Richard Leiby of the Washington Post saying, "Bill Cosby was anything but politically correct in his remarks Monday night at a Constitution Hall bash commemorating the 50th anniversary of the Brown vs. However, Dallas Morning News writer James Ragland was among a number of respected black columnists who heavily praised Cosby's comments, remarking that "maybe more of us [African-Americans] should be eating whatever Mr. Cosby is putting in his Jell-O."
Cosby again came under sharp criticism, and again he was largely unapologetic for his stance when he made similar remarks during a speech in a July 1 Rainbow Coalition meeting commemorating the anniversary of Brown v.
Cosby and jazz
Since his youth in 1950s Philadelphia, Cosby has been a fan and supporter of jazz music. He hosted at his home the 1981 wedding of jazz innovator Miles Davis and actress Cicely Tyson, and on The Cosby Show he wrote the fathers of both Cliff Huxtable and his wife to be aged jazz musicians.
Albums
Bill Cosby Is a Very Funny Fellow, Right! (1963) I Started Out as a Child (1964) Why Is There Air? (1965) Wonderfulness (1966) Silver Throat: Bill Cosby Sings (1967) Revenge (1967) To Russell, My Brother, Whom I Slept With (1968) 200 M.P.H. (1968) Bill Cosby Sings Hooray for the Salvation Army Band! (1968) 8:15 12:15 (1969) It's True! the Bunions Bradford Funeral Marching Band (1971) Bill Cosby Talks to Kids About Drugs (1971) Inside the Mind of Bill Cosby (1972) Fat Albert (1973) Bill Cosby Is Not Himself These Days (1976) Disco Bill (1977) My Father Confused Me... What Must I Do? (1977) Bill's Best Friend (1978) Bill Cosby: Himself (1983) Those of You With or Without Children, You'll Understand (1986) Cosby and the Kids (1986) Bill Cosby: 49 (1987) Where You Lay Your Head (1990) My Appreciation (1991) Oh, Baby (1991) At His Best (1994) Hello Friend: To Ennis, With Love (1997) 20th Century Masters: The Millennium Collection: The Best of Bill Cosby (2001) The Bill Cosby Collection (2004) The House of Blue's Cosby (2006)Books
Cosby is one of a growing number of celebrity authors. Like Bob Newhart and Brian Regan, Cosby rarely uses profanity in his act The Cosbys are donors to Spelman College. Cosby took his future wife Camille on dates to Ben's Chili Bowl, a casual restaurant in Washington, D.C., in the early 1960s. He returned in 1985 to hold a press conference following the success of the Cosby Show and remains a regular patron when visiting D.C. Cosby applied for a cease and desist order for the channel 101 parody House of Cosbys. Cosby has shown an appreciation for the hit series Pokemon. Cosby has been depicted on Aaron McGruder's Adult Swim show "The Boondocks" as a perpetually rambling person who was kidnapped by Ed Wuncler III and Gin Rummy (though they returned him ten minutes later). Cosby has been parodied several times on shows such as The Simpsons and Family Guy. Bill Cosby has recently appeared on Beef The Series.
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