Forty years have passed since The Cosby Show first aired. The beloved sitcom was once hailed as a groundbreaking sitcom, but in the decades since, it’s been haunted by a string of tragedies and scandals.
Tens of millions of Americans once tuned in to watch the Huxtables, an upper-middle-class Black family living, as they navigated the dynamics of daily family life within their Brooklyn brownstone. The show revolved around Cliff Huxtable, an obstetrician and the family patriarch, his attorney wife, Clair and their five children: Sondra, Denise, Theo, Vanessa and Rudy.
The trailblazing, six-time Emmy winning show debuted in 1984 with the tagline: "In a house full of love, there is always room for more."
The show, 41 years on, could certainly use a bit of love. The TV characters may have bounced back each episode, but the real-life cast has suffered some insurmountable setbacks — some tragic and some scandalous.
Malcolm-Jamal Warner, who played son Theo Huxtable, died at just 54 years old this week after he was swept up by a strong current while swimming off Costa Rica.
Tributes poured in for the adored actor. He starred in other shows as well, such as Malcolm & Eddie and Reed Between the Lines, but his role in The Cosby Show was the most enduring of all and the one that launched his career.
Warner played the pivotal role of Theo, based on Cosby’s real-life son, Ennis.
The third of five children, Theo starts the show as an athletic but academically challenged teen. He endures his father, Cliff’s, frustrations about subpar schoolwork — “I brought you into this world, and I’ll take you out” — before he is later diagnosed with dyslexia.
Theo told his dad that he just wanted to be "regular people,” the phrase Ennis, who struggled with poor grades and dyslexia, told Cosby, the actor told the New York Times in 1992.
Ennis similarly earned his college diploma. He went on to earn his master’s degree in special education at Columbia University’s Teachers College and was studying for his doctorate when his life was tragically cut short. He was shot to death in an attempted robbery in January 1997.
When he heard the tragic news about Warner, Cosby said he couldn’t help but compare the death of his on-screen son to the death of his real-life son.
“It felt the same way," Cosby’s spokesperson told CBS News.
Cosby’s lovable, paternal role in the show earned him the title of “America’s dad” — but years later that title became a cruel joke when Cosby was hit with sexual misconduct allegations dating back decades.
The actor was arrested in 2015 on assault charges. The release of a 2005 deposition involving Andrea Constand in July of that year prodded Pennsylvania authorities to reopen a criminal investigation into the actor.
It detailed a part of Constand’s lawsuit where Cosby confirmed he had acquired Quaaludes to give to women he wanted to be intimate with: a sedative that was a popular party drug that was made illegal more than 30 years prior.
By December 2015, he was formally charged with three counts of aggravated assault against Constand, a director of operations for Temple University's women's basketball team, who accused Cosby of sexually assaulting her in 2004.
During the first trial, Constand testified that Cosby slipped her three pills, dubbed “your friends,” she believed were herbal supplements to help with stress, but instead they caused her to fall asleep. Cosby maintained that he gave her Benadryl and that she consented to sexual relations with the actor.
The case was declared a mistrial, but prosecutors retried the case and brought fourth five other Cosby accusers with similar tales of being drugged and allegedly abused who testified during the trial. Since 1965, there have been 62 alleged victims of sexual assault at the hands of Cosby with women claiming the actor sexually assaulted them as recently as 2008.
During the case, his lawyers revealed through court filings that he had gone blind, suffering from “degenerative eye condition.” One of his attorneys put it bluntly to CNN in 2016: “He can’t write, he can’t read, he can’t draw or drive – he’s blind.”
Cosby was found guilty in April 2018 of three counts of aggravated indecent assault. The judge designated Cosby a “sexually violent predator” and sentenced him to three to 10 years behind bars.
The comedian and actor maintained his innocence in the case, which stemmed from an accusation that he drugged and had sex with a Temple University employee in 2004.
After serving more than two years in prison, in 2021, the Pennsylvania Supreme Court overturned his conviction due to a procedural issue, a decision that allowed him to be released from prison and walk free. Several other women have filed civil suits accusing Cosby of sexual misconduct that allegedly occurred decades earlier. He’s denied all allegations of wrongdoing.
The web of ill-fated Cosby Show alums spreads beyond just the Huxtable family.
Michelle Thomas, who from 1988 to 1990 played Theo’s girlfriend Justine Phillips, also was met with a tragic fate.
After her appearance on The Cosby Show, she won roles on the sitcom Family Matters and the soap opera The Young and the Restless.
In 1997, she was diagnosed with a rare form of stomach cancer. She died less than a year later, at age 30.
Geoffrey Owens, who played eldest daughter Sondra Huxtable’s husband Elvin Tibideaux, admitted that he had been bagging groceries at Trader Joe’s in 2018 after he witnessed someone snapping photos of him on the job.
The encounter prompted him to quit the grocery chain, but he revealed last year to V-103 Atlanta that he has since asked to work there again. He didn’t make clear whether he ever returned to Trader Joe’s. However, he candidly told the radio station: “I still struggle to make a living. I struggle every day to make my ends meet.”
He told “Good Morning America” in 2018 that he didn’t want people to feel “sorry” for him.
“Every job is worthwhile and valuable, and if we have a kind of a rethinking about that because of what’s happened to me, that would be great, but no one should feel sorry for me, either from a positive or a negative perspective. I’ve had a great life, I’ve had a great career, and I’ve had a career that most actors would die for.”
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