We Need to Talk About Cosby

Cosby strikes gold with The Cosby Show, a genre-defining family sitcom and monument to Black excellence. Throughout the eighties and nineties, he parlays the affection for his characters into even more affection for him and leverages his growing power inside the entertainment industry to allegedly commit and conceal a multitude of sins. As the beloved sitcom comes to an end, Cosby's persona warps from America's Dad into America's Angry Grandpa. 

After spending the early aughts perched on the high horse of respectability politics, Cosby falls down to Earth. Hannibal Buress tells a joke in Philadelphia, a chorus of survivors speak out, and a culture is ready to listen. There are two trials, a conviction, incarceration, appeal, and, in 2021, an overturned verdict. Now there is a debate to be had about what to do with the art that people loved and the larger systemic problems that the Cosby story lays bare.