“When you leave here, Google ‘Bill Cosby, rape,’” the guy in the grainy video says. You know the clip we’We’re talking about. It’s Hannibal Buress, a stand-up working out material in the middle of a set in 2014. The bit starts with him talking about Cosby’s smugness, how he was telling Buress’ generation of Black men to pull up their pants. It ends with the young comic calling out the actor/comedian/educator/TV-sitcom king for being a rapist. “That shit is upsetting if you didn’t know about it, trust me… It’s not funny. That shit has more results than ‘Hannibal Buress.’”
It was definitely upsetting if you didn’t know about it. Although many people are aware of it, These were aware of those allegations, from industry folks who’d heard rumors to the fact that Cosby was sued 2005Andrea Constand, an employee at Temple University who claimed that Constand drugged and assaulted Constand. A host of other women were willing to come forward and testify that they’d experienced something similar; the case was later settled for an undisclosed amount. This was so contrary to our idea of Bill Cosby: The sweater-wearing and pudding-pitching moral authority who refused curse on stage. The charming guy behind The Cosby ShowHe helped to break down barriers for African American performers and advised children not to use drugs. You already know this: “America’s dad.” So many of us couldn’t believe the description of him as a serial sexual predator. (“Us”(Key word: None of this made sense.
It wasn’t until that snippet of another comic’s act, captured on a cell phone and dumped on to the internet, that folks began to pay attention. We found something quite disturbing. Then, more voices spoke up. The voices kept coming in more and more.
W. Kamau Bell’s We must talk about cosby. a four-part, four-hour docuseries that premiered at the Sundance Film Festival this afternoon, isn’t trying to convict Cosby. That was taken care of by a juryEven if these convictions were ultimately overturned on a technicality, they are still valid. It assumes you have opinions on the subject of Cosby’s guilt, whether you somehow believe he’s innocent of these accusations or now simply consider him to be, to quote Boston Globe editor Renée Graham, “a rapist who had a TV show once.” He knows that people — former Cosbyphiles, fellow comics, actors who’ve worked with Cosby, journalists, pundits, 99.999 percent of the Black community — have been trying to process the profound schism we experienced regarding what we saw in this massive cultural figure and what we now know about him. He noted that these conversations had been part of his introduction to the screening. “been happening behind closed doors. I think we have to have them out in front of everybody [now].”
Bell finds this deep dive into the good and the bad, as well as the ugly, to be a great way to see the whole picture. Extremely ugly of Cosby’s past is personal. He says that he was raised on Fat Albert “Picture Pages,”He was inspired by Cosby’s comic and used his experience to make him stand up. Like a lot of fans, he’s still trying to reconcile the love he had for this man versus the monster described by dozens and dozens of women. But Bell also knows the necessity of hashing all of this out in public, because the Cosby story isn’t just about one celebrity abusing his power and betraying his public. It’s also about not listening to women who speak out, or empowering survivors to speak out without the “blaming and shaming” game. It involves power dynamics and inability to see beyond a carefully constructed persona, even when contradictory evidence begins piling up and knocking down that facade. It’s asking you to face up to the way we’ve all tried to hold two opposing ideas at once: that someone who did so much for so many could harm so many others for so long.
Each of the four chapters revolves around an era of Cosby’s fame. There’s the first flush of fame, when Cosby’s appearance on Jack Paar’s show and his gigs in Playboy clubs broke ceilings, and his casting on I SpyTelevision’s representation of Black people has changed. Part Two focuses on the Seventies. Cosby is an established comedian and uses his clout for a special on Black History and the lack of education regarding slavery in 1969. The footage of this forgotten primetime civics class still feels like a hard slap), and establishes himself as a kid-friendly teacher. Part Three is theCosby ShowThe final part dives into his post era and supernova stardom.“Pound Cake”Rebranding of speech to refer to the speaking, walking, lecturing, and listening conscience of the Black community.
Two things tie these chapters together: Bell’s desire to give interviewees a platform to discuss all of this openly, including a number of survivors who talk about their experiences in graphic detail; and how the harmless, nice guy we see on stages and screens bumps up against what’s happening behind the scenes. Comedians like Godfrey, who’d warm up audiences for Cosby’s show, and Cosby co-stars like Michael Jai White and Doug E. Doug talk about the influence he had on them while acknowledging some dodgy stuff allegedly happening on sets. Columbia professors are critics.New YorkerJelani Cobb talks about his cultural clout, and his work in HBCUs. “while it’s tempting to think this is a Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde situation, there’s a compelling case that it’s all Mr. Hyde.” Actors such as Lili Bernard, models such as Eden Tirl and Lise-Lotte Lublin, cocktail waitresses, tennis pros, former Playboy bunnies and a host of other women describe being invited to visit Cosby’s dressing room, or listening to him say he can offer them mentorship, and suddenly finding themself dizzy, drugged and unable to stop America’s dad from doing whatever he wants with them.
Through all this is what one interviewee calls “the thread”. “breadcrumbs pointing to his guilty conscience,”He made a creepy joke about aphrodisiac BBQ sauce. The Cosby Show or a bit about downers on a 1974 antidrug record for kids that mentions avoiding pills that people tell you will make you feel good — tHe same line he used on women that he drugged. Don’t even get us started about the Sixties routine on “Spanish Fly” that he trotted out again on Larry King’s show in the Nineties. The fact that it seemed so pithy, so socially acceptable to laugh about it — that it was the equivalent of boss-chasing-the-secretary-around-the-desk jokes — only underscores how he was able to get away with what’s he been accused of for decades. Bell finishes his interview and then hears that Cosby is out of prison. It makes you feel like the wind has been taken out of your sails.
But We need to talk about the Cosby knows that, in order to reckon with the then and the now of this story, the conversation can’t be swept under the rug. The title gives you the film’s modus operandi in plain sight, and the fact that Bell’s postscreening Q&A included a number of survivors talking about why they needed this forum, and not just “to separate the celebrity from the reality,” speaks volumes. “Honestly, there were times when I was making this that I wanted to quit,”The filmmaker confesses that he was near the end. “I wanted to hold onto my memories of Bill Cosby. But if we really follow the lessons of that Bill Cosby — to be smart, to be moral, to not just be good but to do good — then we can all help create a world that makes this Bill Cosby, and others like him, impossible to happen.”