Almost a decade after he settled out of court with a woman who made similar accusations, several women have come forward with allegations of various degrees of sexual assault against veteran actor and stand-up, Bill Cosby.
Cosby, 77, has been accused by more than a dozen alleged victims of drugging and assaulting them. One woman, at the time (in 1969) a teenage aspiring comedy scriptwriter, claimed she came to before the actor raped her and attempted to discourage him by claiming to have an infection. Cosby, in the accusers words “just found another orifice to use”.
The same woman says she had no idea she had been drugged until, on another occasion, she accepted a drink mixed by Cosby after a show. “The next thing I remember was waking up in his bed back at the [hotel], naked. I remember thinking ‘You old s***, I guess you got me this time, but it’s the last time you’ll ever see me,’” she says.
The Washington Post published a first-person article online last week by a former actress who said that he had drugged and raped her in the mid-1980s when she was seventeen.
A high profile alleged victim has also accused Cosby of rape. Model Janice Dickinson, seen most recently in this country on Celebrity Big Brother, claims she was drugged and raped by him in 1982.
Cosby first appeared on British TV as the first Black actor in a regular starring role, alongside Robert Culp in the tongue-in-cheek weekly espionage drama ‘I Spy’ in the 1960s. But he is best known as patriarch obstetrician Dr Cliff Huxtable in ‘The Cosby Show’. The actor, who has been married to the same woman for fifty years, has so far remained tight lipped about the most recent allegations except for a denial issued through his lawyers. The one interviewer who has managed to question the star was met with a simple shake of his head in response.
Though he currently faces no legal action over the allegations, Cosby is nonetheless on trial in the court of public opinion. He has cancelled several public appearances, including a spot on the David Letterman Show on CBS.
The streaming service Netflix has shelved plans to broadcast a stand-up comedy special, Bill Cosby 77, on November 28, while NBC – the network that originally broadcast ‘The Cosby Show’ – is developing a new family sitcom for 2015, with Cosby in the starring role. The future of that project has to now be in doubt.
