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The Navigator

Comic's real life makes us yearn for sitcom's safety

By RICK GERSHMAN
Published February 9, 2007

I wish it was 1985 again.

Back then, Bill Cosby played the world's greatest father on The Cosby Show. Dr. Cliff Huxtable, while professional and firm, was funny and caring and strong.

It was a different world, a time when sweet, young Lisa Bonet had not yet hooked up with Lenny Kravitz off-screen and Mickey Rourke - and by the way, ick - on screen.

That's when Tempestt Bledsoe was still one of the 12 television "personalities" who didn't have a talk show.

And when Malcolm-Jamal Warner ... um ... I'm sorry, I can't think of a single interesting thing to say about Malcolm-Jamal Warner.

Regardless, like millions of other viewers, I grew up on Cosby's sitcom, which was delightful, at least most of the time. It seems a little hokey in retrospect, but what doesn't?

In the '80s, Cosby could do no wrong. He had the most popular show on television.

It wasn't just funny. It also was important culturally, presenting one of very few media representations of a sound, happy upper-class African-American family.

But a lot has happened in recent years. And with Cosby performing at Ruth Eckerd Hall on Saturday, I have to wonder: Can we ever think of him the way we did back then?

When your bread and butter is opening up your life to the world, what happens when that life turns out to be a lot more complicated - darker, even - than we ever expected?

Cosby turns 70 this year. My earliest memories are of him on The Electric Company and Fat Albert. I loved him. I learned from him.

Back then, I just knew he was funny.

I didn't know he was the man credited with breaking comedy's color barrier in the early 1960s, opening up unprecedented opportunities for black comics.

I didn't know he was the first black actor to play a lead role in an American dramatic TV series, I Spy.

I did know he earned a doctorate in education. And I knew he worked hard to inspire excellence in all men and women, regardless of race.

In 1997, his son Ennis, whose childhood we all knew well through his father's routines, was shot to death while changing a tire on a Los Angeles freeway.

It was a devastating loss for the ultimate family man. The nation mourned.

A few months later, a 22-year-old woman came forward claiming Cosby was her father. He acknowledged having slept with her mother and said he provided the girl money until she was 18, though he denied paternity.

In 2004, Cosby courted controversy by contending that too many African-American kids were being poorly raised by parents. He called for greater personal responsibility, particularly from black men.

A year later, the comedian was answering allegations that he had drugged and sexually assaulted a female friend in Pennsylvania in January 2004.

Prosecutors declined to file charges, but the woman filed a lawsuit.

Her attorneys filed a claim indicating that at least 10 other women were willing to testify about "prior similar sexual assaults and/or drugging incidents" they alleged Cosby perpetrated.

At least three women gave media interviews.

Cosby settled the lawsuit three months ago. We won't know the terms.

I don't think I want to know.

He'll take the stage Saturday, and he'll be funny. He's always funny.

But after all this, will we still want to laugh?

I wish I did.

I wish it was 1985 again.

I wonder if Bill Cosby does, too.

Rick Gershman can be reached at rgershman@sptimes.com or 226-3431. Comment on this column at his Times blog, www.sptimes.com/blogs/tampaarts.

If you go

Bill Cosby

The comedian performs at 5 and 8 p.m. Saturday, Ruth Eckerd Hall, 1111 N McMullen-Booth Road, Clearwater. Tickets $39-$60. Call 727 791-7400.

[Last modified February 8, 2007, 08:04:34]