Bill Cosby

'''William Henry "Bill" Cosby Jr. '''(born July 12, 1937) is an American actor, comedian, author, television producer, educator, musician and activist. A veteran stand-up performer, he got his start at the hungry i in San Francisco and various other clubs, then landed a starring role in the 1950s action show ''I Spy. He later starred in his own sitcom, The Bill Cosby Show. He was one of the performers on the children's television series The Electric Company during its first two seasons, and created the educational cartoon comedy series Fat Albert and the Cosby Kids, ''about a group of young friends growing up in the city. Cosby also acted in a number of films.

During the 1980s, Cosby produced and starred in one of the decade's defining sitcoms The Cosby Show, which aired for eight season on NBC from 1984 to 1992. It was the number one show in America five straight years (1985-1989). The sitcom highlighted the experiences of growth of an affluent African-American family. He also produced A Different World, which became second to The Cosby Show in ratings. He starred in the CBS sitcom Cosby from 1996 to 2000 and hosted a revival of Kids Say the Darndest Things also on CBS also on CBS for two season.

In 2002, scholar Molefi Kete Asante included him in his book The 100 Greatest African Americans.

In 1976, Cosby earned a Doctor of Education degree from the University of Massachusetts Amherest. His dissertation discussed the use of Fat Albert and the Cosby Kids as a teaching tool in elementary schools.

Early Life
Cosby was born in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. He is one of four sons born to Anna Pearl (nee Hite), a maid, and William Hnery Cosby Sr., who served as a sailor in the U.S. Navy. During his childhood. Cosby's father was away in the U.S. armed forces and spent several years fighting in World War II. As a student, he described himself as a class clown. Cosby was the captain of of both the baseball team and the track and field team at Mary Channing Wister Public School in Philadelphia, as well as continuing his devotion to playing sports. He went on to Central High School, an academically challenging magnet school, but his full schedule of playing football, basketball, baseball, and running track made it hard for him. In addition, Cosby was working before school and after school, selling produce, shining shoes and stocking shelves at a supermarket to help out the family. He transferred to Germantown High School, but failed the tenth grade. Instead of repeating, he got a job as an apprentice at a shoe repair shop, which he liked, but could not see himself doing the rest of his life. Subsequently, he joined the Navy, serving at the Marine Corps Base Quantico, Virginia, Naval Station Argentina, Newfoundland and at the Bethesda Naval Hospital in Maryland.

While serving in the Navy as a Hospital Corpsman for four years, Cosby worked in physical therapy with some seriously injured Korean War casualties, which helped him discover what was important to him. Then he immerdiately realized the need for an education, and finished his equivalency diploma via correspondence courses. He then won a track and field scholarship to Philadelphia's Temple University in 1961-1962 and studied physical education while running track and playing fullback on the football team.

As Cosby progressed through his undergraduate studies, he continued to hone his talent for humor, joking with fellow enlistees in the service and then with college friends. When he began bartending at the Cellar, a club in Philadelphia, to earn money, he became fully aware of his ability to make people laugh. He worked his customers and his tips increase. then ventured onto the stage.

Stand-Up Career
Cosby left Temple to persue a career in comedy, though he would return to college studies in the 1970s. He lined up gigs at the clubs in Philadelphia and soon was off to New York City, where he appeared at The Gaslight Cafe starting in 1962. He lined up dates in Chicago, Las Vegas, San Francisco, Washington, D.C. and elsewhere. He received national exposure on NBC's The Tonight Show in the summer of 1963 which led him to a recording contract with Warner Bros. Records, who released his debut album LP Bill Cosby is a Very Funny Fellow...Right!, the first of a series of popular comedy albums in 1964.

While many comics were using the growing freedom of that decade to explore controversial, sometimes risque. 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; as he argued, "A white person listens to my act and he laughs and he thinks, 'Yeah, that's the way I see it too.' Okay. He's white. I'm Negro. And we both see things the same way. That must mean that we are alike. Right? So I figure this way I'm doing as much for good race relations as the next guy."

Cosby remains an actively touring stand-up comedian, performing at theaters throughout the United States.

Acting Career
I Spy  In 1965, when he was cast alongside Robert Culp in the I Spy espionage adventure series, Cosby became the first African-American co-star in a dramatic television series, and NBC became the first to present a series so cast. At first, Cosby and NBC executives were concerned that some affiliates might be unwilling to carry the series. At the beginning of the 1965 season, three of the four stations declined the show; they were in Georgia, Florida and Alabama. Viewers were taken with the show's exotic locales and the authentic chemistry between the stars. and it became one of the ratings hits of that television season. I Spy finished among the twenty most-watched shows of that year, and Cosby would be honored with three consecutive Emmy Awards for Outstanding Lead Actor in a Drama Series.

During the run of the series, Cosby continued to do stand-up comedy performances and recorded a half-dozen record albums for Warner Bros. Records. He also began to dabble in singing, recording Silver Throat: Bill Cosby Sings in 1967, which provided him with a singleo f his recording of ''"Li'l Ole Man". ''He would record several more musical albums into the early 1970s, but he continued to record primarily stand-up comedy work.

In June 1968, Billboard reported that Bill Cosby had turned down a five-year, US$3.5 million contract renewal offer and would leave the label in August that year to record for his own record label.

Tetragammaton Records was a division of Campbell, Silver, Cosby (CSC) Corporation, the Los Angeles based production company founded by Cosby, his manager Roy Silver and filmmaker Bruce Post Campbell. It produced films as well as records, including Cosby's television specials, the Fat Albert cartoon special and series of several motion pictures. CSC hired industry veteran Artie Mogull as President of the label and Tetragammaton was fairly active during 1968 to 1969 (it's most successful signing was British rock band Deep Purple) but it quickly went into the red and ceased trading during 1970.

Fat Albert, The Bill Cosby Show, and the 1970s
Cosby pursued a variety of additional television projects and appeared as a regular guest host on The Tonight Show and as a star of an annual special for NBC. He returned with another series in 1969, The Bill Cosby Show, a situtation comedy that ran fir two seasons. Cosby played a physical education teacher at a Los Angeles High School. While only a modest critical success, the show was a ratings hit, finishing eleventh in its first season. Cosby was lauded for using some previously unknown African-American performers such as Lillian Randolph, Moms Mabley and Rex Ingram as characters. According to commentary on the season 1 DVD's for the show, Cosby was at odds with NBC over his refusal to include a laugh track in the show (he felt that viewers had the ability to find humor for themselves when watching a TV show). He was originally contracted with NBC to do the show for two seasons, and he believes the show was not renewed afterwards for that reason.

After The Bill Cosby Show left the air, Cosby returned to his education. He began graduate work at the University of Massachusetts Amherst. For the PBS series The Electric Company, Cosby recorded several segments teaching reading skills to young children.

in 1972, Cosby received an MA from the University of Massachusetts Amherst and was also back in prime time with a variety series, ''The New Bill Cosby Show. ''However, this time he met with poor ratings. amd the show only lasted for one season. More successful was a saturday morning show, Fat Albert and the Cosby Kids, hosted by Cosby amd based on his own childhood. That series ran from 1972 to 1979, and as The New Fat Albert Show in 1979 and The Adventures of Fat Albert and the Cosby Kids in 1984. Some schools used the program as a teaching tool, and Cobsy himself wrote a dissertation on it, "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", as partially fulfillment of obtaining his 1976 doctorate in education, also from the University of Massachusetts. Subsequently, Temple University, where Cosby had begun but never finished his undergraduate studies, would grant him his bachelor's degree on the basis of "life experience".

Also during the 1970s, Cosby and other African-American actors, including Sidney Poitier, joined forces to make some successful comedy films that countered the violent "blaxplotation" films of that 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. Mother, Jugs & Speed (1976) co-starring Raquel Welch and Harvey Keitel; A Piece of the Action (1977), with Poitier, and California Suite (1978), a compliaton of four Neil Simon plays, were all panned. In addition, Cos (1976) an hour-log variety show featuring puppets, sketches abd musical numbers, was cancelled within the year. Cosby was also a regular on childen's public television programs starting in the 1970s, hosting the "Picture Pages" segments that lasted into the early 1980s.

The Cosby Show and the 1980s
Cosby's greatest television success came in September 1984 with the debut of ''The Cosby Show. ''The program aired weekly on NBC and went on to become the highest ranking primetime sitcom of all-time. For Cosby, the new situation comedy was a response to the increasingl violent and vulgar fare that the networks usually offered. Cosby is an advocate for humor that is family-oriented. He insisted on and received total creative control of the series, and he was involved in every aspect of the series. The show had paralleles to Cosby's actual family life: and 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 tis portrayal of an intelligent, affluent, African-American Family.

Much of the material from the pilot and the first season of The Cosby Show was taken from his video Bill Cosby: Himself, originally released in 1983. The series was an immediate successm debuting near the top of the ratings and staying there for msot of its run. The Cosby Show is one of only three American programs that have been #1 in the Nielsen ratings for at least five consecutive seasons, along with All in the Family and ''American Idol. People magazine called the show "revolutionary", and Newsday ''concurred that it was a "real breakthrough".

In 1987, Cobsy attempted to return to film with the spy spoof ''Leonard Part 6. ''Although Cosby himself wrote the story, he realized during production that the film was not going to be what he wanted the public denounced it, warning audiences to stay away.

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 revival of the classic Groucho Marx game show You Bet Your Life (1992-1993) along with the TV movie I Spy Returns (1994) and The Cosby Mysteries (1994). In the mid-1990s, he appeared as a detective in black-and-white-file-noir-themed commercials for Turner Classic Movies. He also made apperances in three more films, Ghost Dad (1990), The Meteor Man (1994) and Jack (1996); in addition to being interviewed in Spkie Lee's 4 Little Girls (1997), a documentary about the racist bombing of a Birmingham, Alabama church in 1963.

Also in 1996, he started up a new sitcom for CBS, Cosby, again co-staring Phylicia Rashad, his on-screen wife on ''The Cosby Show. ''Cosby co-produced the show for Carsey-Werner Productions. The show itself was based on the British program ''One Foot in the Grave. ''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. Madeline Khan co-starred as Rashad's goofy business partner Pauline. Cosby was hired by CBS to be the official spokesman of the WWJ-TV during an advertising campaign from 1995 to 1998. In addition, Cosby in 1998 became host of ''Kids Say the Darndest Things. After four seasons, Cosby ''was cancelled. The last episode aired on April 28, 2000. Kids Say the Darndest Things was also cancelled in the same year. Cosby continued to work with CBS through a development deal and other projects.

A series for preschoolers, Little Bill, made its debut on Nickelodeon in 1999. The network renewed the popular program in November of 2000. In 2001, Cosby's agenda included the publication of a new book, as well as delivering the commencement addresses at Morris Brown College, Ohio State University and at Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute. Also that year, he signed a deal with 20th Century Fox to develop a live-action feature film centering on the popular Fat Albert character from his 1970s cartoon series. Fat Albert was released in theaters in December of 2004. In May 2007, he spoke at the Commencement of High Point University.

In the summer of 2009, Cosby hosted a comedy gala at Montreal's Just for Laughs comedy festival, the world's largest.

Bill Cosby in Advertising
American comedian Bill Cosby has been used often as a spokesperson in advertising, predating his first sitcom role. Chronologically, he has appeared on behalf of White Owl Cigars, Jell-O pudding and gelatin, Coca-Cola (including New Coke), Texas Instruments, E.F. Hutton & Co., Kodak and the 1990 United States Census. As of 2002, the record for the longest continuous celebrity spokesperson for a product was said to be Cosby with ''Jell-O. ''In 2011, he was the first winner of the President's Award for Contributions to Advertising, from the Advertising Hall of Fame.

One of the first black people to appear in the United States as a spokesperson, he is noted for crossover appeal in an industry that was "afraid of the dark". In spite of contradicting soft drink pitches and endorsing a disgraced financial company, he was considered very believable. In the 1980s, studies found Cosby the "most familiar" and "most persuasive" spokesperson, and the comedian himself noted that his contracts had made him financially set for life.

Socioeconic Views
In May 2004, after receiving an award at the celebration of the 50th Anniversary commemoration of the Brown v. Board of Education ruling, the U.S, Supreme Court's decision that outlawed school racial segregation, Cosby made public remarks critical of African Americans who put higher priorities on sports, fashion, and "acting hard" than on education, self-respect and self-improvement, pleading for African-American families to educate their children on the many different aspects of American culture.

In the "Pound Cake" speech, Cosby, who holds a doctorate in education, asked that African-American parents teach their children better morals at a younger age. Cosby told the Washington Times, "Parenting needs to come to the forefront. If you need help and you don't know how to parent, we want to be able to reach out and touch." (DeBose, Brian). Richard Leiby of The Washington Post reported, "Bill Cosby was anything but politically correct in his remarks Monday night at a Constitution Hall bash commemorating the 50th anniversary of the Brown v. Board of Education decision."

Cosby again came under sharp criticism and was again largely unapologetic for his stance when he made similar remarks during a speech in a July 1 meeting commemorating the anniversary of ''Brown v. Board of Education. ''During that speech, he admonished apathetic blacks for not assisting or concerning themselves with the individuals who are involved with crime or have counter-productive aspirations. He further described those who needed attention as blacks who "had forgotten the sacrifices of those in the Civil Rights Movement." The speech was featured in the documentary 500 Years Later, which set the speech to cartoon visuals.

Georgetown University sociology professor Michael Eric Dyson wrote a book in 2005 entitled ''Is Bill Cosby Right or Is the Black Middle Class Out of Touch? ''in the book, Dyson wrote that Cosby was overlooking larger social factors that reinforce poverty and associated crime; factors such as: deteriorating schools, stagnating wages, dramatic shifts in the economy, offshoring and downsizing, chronic underemployment, and job and capital flight. Dyson suggested that Cosby's comments "betray classist, elitist viewpoints rooted in generational warfare."

Cornel West defended Cosby and his remarks, by saying "he's speaking out of the great compassion and trying to get on the right track, 'cause we've got some brothers and sisters who are not doing the right things, just like in times in our own lives, we don't do the right thing... He is trying to speak honestly and freely and lovingly, and I think that's a very positive thing."

In a 2008 Interview, Cosby mentioned Atlanta, Georgia; Chicago, Illinois; Detroit, Michigan; Oakland, California; Philadelphia, Pennsylvania; and Springfield, Massachusetts, among the cities where crime was high and young African-American men were being murdered and jailed in disproportionate numbers. Cosby stood his ground against criticism and affirmed that African-American parents were continuing to fail to inculcate proper standards of moral behavior. Cosby still lectures to black communities (usually at churches) about his frustrations with certain problems prevalent in underpriviledged urban communities, such as: illegal drugs; teenage pregnancy; Black Entertainment Television; High-School dropouts; anti-intellectualism; gangsta rap; vulgarity; thievery; offensive clothing; vanity; parental alienation; single-parenting; and failing to live up to the ideals of Frederick Douglas, Martin Luther King Jr. and African-Americans who preceded Generation X.

Humanitarian Causes
Cosby has become an active member of ''The Jazz Foundation of America. ''Cosby became involved with the foundation in 2004. For several years, he has been a featured host for its annual benefits, A Great Night in Harlem, at the Apollo Theater in New York City.

Personal Life
Cosby met his future wife, Camille Olivia Hanks, while he was performing stand-up in Washington D.C., in the early 1960s, and she was a student at the University of Maryland. They married on January 25, 1964, and had five children: daughters: Erika Renee (b. 1965), Erinn Chalene (b. 1966), Ensa Camille (b. 1973), and Evin Harrah (b. 1976) and son Ennis William (born 1969; died 1997). Their son Ennis was shot dead while chaging a flat tire on the side of Interstate 405 in Los Angeles on January 16, 1997. Cosby maintains homes in Shelburne, Massachusetts and Cheltenham, Pennsylvania.

Cosby has hosted the Los Angeles Playboy Jazz Festival since 1979. An avid musician, he's best known as a drummer although he can be seen playing bass guitar with Jerry Lewis and Sammy Davis Jr. on Hugh Hefner's 1970s talk show. His story "The Regular Way" was featured in Playboy's December 1968 issue.

Cosby is an active alumnus supporter of his alma mater, Temple University, and, in particular, its men's basketball team, whose games Cosby frequently attends. He is a member of the Omega Psi Phi fraternity. He was initiated in the fraternity's Beta Alpha Alpha graduate chapter in White Plains, New York, in 1988.

Cosby also attends many public events, such as: the 100th Millrose Squre Garden in New York City on February 2, 2007. His love for track and field athletics has also been shown with his long-time sponsorship and on-track work with the Penn Relays. For many years, Cosby has been known to work the finish line at Franklin Field and congratulate athletes.

During the 2009 NFL Draft, he celebrated the draft with former Texas Longhorn wide receiver Quan Cosby as a means of support, even though the two are not related.

Lawsuits
In July 1997, Cosby testified that he made private statements to Shawn Upshaw, a woman who had briefly been his lover in Las Vegas during the early 1970s. Upshaw later told Cosby that her daughter, Autumn Jackson, was his daughter too, but he denied it. Cosby said he gave Upshaw a total of about $100,000 because he did not want to publicly reveal the affair. 22 year old Autumn Jackson was sentenced to 26 months in jail for trying to extort $40 million from Cosby.

In August 2006, Cosby settled a lawsuit against him by a Canadian woman who claimed that he had attacked her in his Philadelphia home in 2004. The woman claimed she had been sexually assaulted after being given pills when she had complained of feeling stressed. Cosby categorically denied the assertions.

Link
Official Website