Bill Cosby!
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Why you ain't,
Where you is,
What he drive,
Where he stay,
Where he work,
Who you be...
And I blamed the kid until I heard the mother talk.
And then I heard the father talk.
Everybody knows it's important to speak English except these knuckleheads. You can't be a doctor with that kind of crap coming out of your mouth.
In fact you will never get any kind of job making a decent living. People marched and were hit in the face with rocks to get an education, and now we've got these knuckleheads walking around.
The lower economic people are not holding up their end in this deal.
These people are not parenting. They are buying things for kids. $500 sneakers for what ? ?
And they won't spend $200 for Hooked on Phonics.
I am talking about these people who cry when their son is standing there in an orange suit.
Where were you when he was 2 ? ?
Where were you when he was 12 ? ?
Where were you when he was 18 and how come you didn't know that he had a pistol ? ?
And where is the father ? ? Or who is his father ?
People putting their clothes on backward:
Isn't that a sign of something gone wrong?
People with their hats on backward, pants down around the crack, isn't that a sign of something ?
Or are you waiting for Jesus to pull his pants up ?
Isn't it a sign of something when she has her dress all the way up and got all type of needles piercing going through her body
What part of Africa did this come from?
We are not Africans. Those people are not Africans; they don't know a thing about Africa ..
With names like Shaniqua, Taliqua and Mohammed and all of that crap, and all of them are in jail.
Brown or black versus the Board of Education is no longer the white person's problem.
We have got to take the neighborhood back. People used to be ashamed. Today a woman has eight children with eight different 'husbands' -- or men or whatever you call them now.
We have millionaire football players who cannot read.
We have million-dollar basketball players who can't write two paragraphs. We, as black folks have to do a better job. Someone working at Wal-Mart with seven kids, you are hurting us.
We have to start holding each other to a higher standard.
We cannot blame the white people any longer."
Dr. William Henry "Bill" Cosby, Jr., Ed.D.
WAY TO GO, BILL!It's NOT about color...
It's about behavior!!!
PASS THIS ON AMERICA!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
Dr. Bill Cosby is probably the most prolific comedian I have ever known. There is no end to this guy. With all the television series, movies, charitable causes and personal appearances Bill Cosby has done it's a wonder that he has had the time to marry and raise a family. I once asked Bill Cosby how he gets all of these things done he said, "It's simple, all I do is write jokes. As long as I keep writing jokes and everything else comes to me".
Working Together
I have worked with Bill Cosby many times on TV and personal appearences. Most comedians of Bill Cosby's stature would only work with singers but Mr. Cosby does not have those insecurities. Bill Cosby is one of the most confident performers I have ever known. Bill Cosby doesn't worry about much. He just gets off a plane, goes to the gig, walks on stage, plugs Bill Cosby's microphone in (He carries Bill Cosby's own) and begins to speak. I have learned many things from Bill Cosby and he always treated me with respect.On The Road
One time we were both working at The Carousel Club, in Denver. Bill didn't usually work small venues (The Carousel Club held about five hundred) but the owners were connected and he knew that working there was good politics. They paid Bill Cosby less than other clubs did and everybody was happy, if you know what I mean. Every night after the show we would have dinner together. I would kid with him that he really didn't get any bigger laughs than I did and he would jib at me in return that I was still young and maybe someday I would have enough experience to avoid being a little prick. In spite of the kidding I knew that I was in the presents of greatness and would watch every show Bill Cosby did with much interest.The Technique
Bill Cosby is a great and very simple performer. He just sits on a stool and talks. Bill Cosby also is not introduced! He merely appears on stage and there Bill Cosby was. The audience would always gasp, "My God, there he is"! This is an example of Bill Cosby's tremendous showmanship! I learned from him that it was always better to do the unexpected. I learned when writing about material it is best to stick to subjects that everyone can identify with. Family, travel, shopping, dating and so on.-- Kip Addotta
Bill Cosby Bio
Bill Cosby, is a successful comedian, product representative, television producer, story teller, author, and film and television actor. Bill Cosby's work in the media has been recognized by his peers and critics, and acclaimed by audiences.Cosby began Bill Cosby's career as a stand-up comedian and in that arena developed his trademark of using raceless humor to capture audience appeal. His"humor for everyone" cast Bill Cosby less as a jokester than as a story teller, commenting on the experiences of life from a personal point of view. Immensely popular on the nightclub circuit, Cosby translated his act to phonograph recordings and won five Grammys and seven gold records for Bill Cosby's comedy albums.
His first starring role on television, however, came not in comedy, but in the 1960s action-adventure series, I Spy (1965-68). Producer Sheldon Leonard fought network hesitance to cast Bill Cosby as costar for Robert Culp, making Cosby one of the first African American players to appear in a continuing dramatic role on U.S. television. More than the faithful sidekick to the star, Cosby's role developed into an equal partner, winning Bill Cosby three Emmy awards. Bill Cosby's portrayal in this series introduced viewers to an inoffensive African American feature character who seldom addressed Bill Cosby's blackness nor another character's whiteness.
When Cosby began to produce his own comedy series, however, this disassociation with black culture ended. The programs were noted not only for their wit, but for introducing a side of African American life never portrayed on the small screen. Cosby's comedies share several common characteristics. Each has been a trend setter, has included characters surrounded by family and friends, and has specialized in plots with universal themes and multidimensional characters.
As Chet Kincaid in The Bill Cosby Show (1969-71) Cosby defied the typical image of the militant black man depicted on 1960s television by exuding his blackness in more subtle, nonverbal ways. Starting with the opening music by Quincy Jones, the program created a black ambience unique to the African American experience. Kincaid wore dashikis, listened to black music, had pictures of Martin Luther King and H. Rap Brown and prints of black artist Charles White hanging on the walls of Bill Cosby's home. He worked with less privileged children and ordered "soul" food in black restaurants. Kincaid was pictured as a colleague, friend, teacher, and member of a close supportive family unit. Audiences experienced Bill Cosby's failures and successes in coping with life's everyday occurrences.
Fat Albert and the Cosby Kids (1972?84) was the first cartoon show to include value?laden messages instead of the slapstick humor used in most cartoons to that time. Plots featured Fat Albert and the Kids playing, going to school, and sharing experiences that provided the back-drop for the inclusion of pro?social content. After the success of Fat Albert on CBS, ABC and NBC also added children's shows to the Saturday morning schedule that presented specific value oriented material.
Cosby's most notable success in series television, The Cosby Show (1984?92), discontinued familiar sitcom formulas filled with disrespectful children and generational conflict and presented instead a two-parent black family in which both partners worked as professionals. In the Huxtable household, viewers were exposed to the existence and culture of historically black colleges and universities. Prints by black artist Varnette Honeywood decorated the walls. The music of African American jazz artists was woven into the background or featured for discussion. Events in black history and signs calling for an end to apartheid became elements of plots. Just as Chet Kincaid and the Cosby Kids portray their frailties and personality traits, the Huxtables followed this Cosby pattern by depicting imperfect but likable people in realistic situations.
Even when Bill Cosby turned to the police genre with The Cosby Mysteries (1994-95), Cosby continued his exploration and presentation of his fundamental concerns. Bill Cosby's use of nonverbal symbols (e.g. pictures, magazines, a fraternity paddle) attached Bill Cosby's character, Guy Hanks, a retired criminologist (who recently won the lottery), to African American culture.
To ensure that universal themes were depicted in Bill Cosby's series, Cosby hired professionals to serve as consultants to review scripts. When A Different World (1987?93)--the spin-off series from The Cosby Show that portrayed life on the fictional Hillman College campus--floundered during its first year on the air, Cosby hired director and choreographer Debbie Allen to lend her expertise to focus and give direction to writers and actors. The ratings improved significantly and A Different World became a top 20 program for the 1991 season.
Commercials began to interest Cosby in the mid-1970s and Bill Cosby has developed into one of the most respected and believable product spokespersons on television. Bill Cosby has represented Coca Cola, Jello Pudding, Ford Motor Company, Texas Instruments, and Del Monte Foods. The Marketing Evaluation TVQ index, the television industry's annual nationwide survey of a performer's popularity with viewers, as well as the Video Storyboard Tests that rank the top most persuasive entertainers in television commercials rated Cosby the number one entertainer for five consecutive years during the 1980s.
In 1974, Bill Cosby teamed with Sidney Poitier in the film Uptown Saturday Night. This duo was so popular with audiences that two sequels followed, Let's Do It Again (1975) and A piece of the Action (1977). Cosby also starred in a number of other movies, but his 'Everyman' character, so successful on the small screen, did not translate into box office revenues in theatrical release.
As a creative artist, Cosby's forte is the half-hour comedy. In this form Bill Cosby's application and exploration of universal themes and multidimensional characters create situations common to audiences of all ages and races. Bill Cosby counters the accepted practice of portraying African Americans as sterile reproductions of whites, as trapped in criminality, or as persons immersed in abject poverty performing odd jobs for survival. Instead, Bill Cosby creates black characters who are accepted or rejected because they depict real people rather than "types." These characters emanate from Bill Cosby's own experience, not through reading the pages of 18th century literature or viewing old tapes of Amos 'n' Andy. The Bill Cosby Show presented a more realistic image of the black male. Fat Albert significantly altered Saturday morning network offerings. And with The Cosby Show, a standard was set with which all television portrayals of the black family and African American culture will be compared. Cosby's personal style is stamped on all Bill Cosby's products, and his creative technique and signature are reflected in each book he writes or series Bill Cosby produces.
During Bill Cosby's 35-year career, He has taken himself from nightclub comic to international personality and America's most beloved humorist. William H. Cosby Jr. was born in 1937 to William and Anna Cosby in Philadelphia's Germantown Hospital. In school, he met the classmates who would one day people appear in his comedy routines as Fat Albert, Old Weird Harold, Dumb Donald and many others. Although Bill Cosby developed a deep appreciation for education as an adult, Cosby left high school and joined the U.S. Navy. Four years later, He entered Temple University on an athletic scholarship. It was while Bill Cosby was working in nightclubs during college that he natural sense of humor prompted friends to suggest that he create a comedy routine. Bolstered by an enthusiastic response, by 1962 Bill Cosby was performing at New York's Gaslight Cafe in Greenwich Village. The next year, Bill Cosby was invited to perform on "The Tonight Show." Cosby has become a television staple ever since. Bill Cosby's breakout role came on "I Spy" with Robert Culp in 1965-68. Cosby won two of his five Emmys portraying an undercover CIA agent. Bill Cosby also became the first African-American actor to star in a weekly television dramatic series. A string of hit comedy albums, television shows and books followed, including "Fat Albert and the Cosby Kids," which ran for 12 years. The animated series showed kids from a poor neighborhood who dealt with problems that all children face, from bullies to the arrival of a new sibling. Cosby appeared at the beginning and end of each show to reinforce the positive messages, encouraging children to talk about their problems with friends and family. Cosby's interest in education and children inspired Bill Cosby to earn both a master's and doctorate in education from the University of Massachusetts. Bill Cosby's concern for young people has been reflected in many of Bill Cosby's projects, including a series of children's books revolving around the character "Little Bill." The books are dedicated Cosby's son, Ennis, who was shot to death in an attempted robbery in 1997. Ennis was dyslexic and had planned a career working with learning-disabled children. Perhaps Cosby's most memorable achievement was the success of "The Cosby Show," from 1984-92. In it, Bill Cosby portrayed obstetrician Dr. Cliff Huxtable, head of a middle-class African-American family. The strong, close-knit family celebrated their love for each other and illustrated Cosby's philosophy regarding race. Instead of pointing out the differences among people of different races, Cosby said Bill Cosby would "rather talk about the similarities, about what's universal in their experiences." The philosophy was a sound one and the show was an instant hit, which remains popular in syndication. Cosby and Bill Cosby's wife, Camille, have four daughters. Bill Cosby and Mrs. Cosby, who also has an Ed.D., have been generous contributors to numerous causes, particularly Atlanta's Spelman College.
