Over the past several weeks, 77-year-old Bill Cosby's reputation has changed from sweater-wearing, lovable and legendary stand-up comedian to something a bit darker.
After comic Hannibal Buress brought to light past rape accusations against the former star of 'The Cosby Show,' a media frenzy began. To what exact incidents were Hannibal referring, and what's transpired since?
Here's a timeline to give you a better idea:
January 2005: Andrea Constand, a former staffer for Temple University's basketball team (Cosby's alma mater), comes forward, claiming Cosby drugged and assaulted her a year before at his house in suburban Philadelphia. She says the actor served as her mentor and gained her trust before the eventual attack.
Constand reports the incident, but declines to press criminal charges due to a lack of evidence.
February 2005: California lawyer Tamara Green alleges that in the 1970s, Cosby gave her pills to weaken her motor skills and then assaulted her.
'I thought, you know, after all these years, it's the same M.O.,' Green told 'Today Show' host Matt Lauer. 'I decided that if there were only two us, one a long time ago and one right now, then that's two too many.'
Cosby denies both allegations.
November 2006: Constand, the first accuser, files a civil suit against Cosby but it's settled outside of court. Thirteen other women come forward with similar allegations, all prepared to serve as Jane Doe witnesses in Constand's case, but they never get the chance.
December 2006: Two of those women are Barbara Bowman, an aspiring actress from Denver, and model Beth Ferrier. Both say Cosby served as a mentor to them, and detail their experiences in People Magazine.
October 2014: Fast forward eight years, when at a Philadelphia stand-up show, Hannibal Buress calls Cosby a rapist on stage.
'You're a rapist,' Buress says in the 2-minute long video. 'If you didn't know about it, trust me. You leave here and Google 'Bill Cosby rape.' It's not funny. That sh** has more results than Hannibal Buress.'
Cosby's allegations were already mildly well-known, but the video went viral, and suddenly, word of the comic's troubled past hit the mainstream.
Buress told Howard Stern he'd performed the same bit on and off for six months, but the fact that it was captured on video was perhaps what enabled it to go viral.
Nov. 10, 2014: The Cosby allegations spread like wildfire, and leave it to his PR to fan the flames. Cosby's media team rolls out a campaign to meme the comedian. Perhaps a strategy to get people back on his side, it backfires.
The responses result in images of Cosby paired with such captions as 'My two favorite things: Jell-O Pudding and Rape' and 'Stare directly at the sweater. You are now getting very sleepy.'
Nov. 13, 2014: Barbara Bowman -- one of the Jane Does from earlier -- gets 2 million views with her Washington Post article, 'Bill Cosby Raped Me, Why Did it Take 30 Years for People To Believe My Story.'
Nov. 15, 2014: During an NPR interview about his recent donation of African American art in Washington D.C., Cosby was asked about the rape allegations. He shook his head and kept completely silent.
Nov. 16, 2014: Cosby's lawyer issues a blanket denial statement on the performer's website, saying, 'Over the last several weeks, decade-old, discredited allegations against Mr. Cosby have resurfaced. The fact that they are being repeated does not make them true.'
The post has since been taken down.
His attorney releases a new statement saying that Cosby's denials do not refer to accuser Constand. The statement, issued by lawyers for Cosby and Constand, said the differences were 'resolved to the mutual satisfaction' of both parties.
Nov. 16, 2014: Cosby cancels appearances on 'The Late Show with David Letterman' and 'The Queen Latifah Show,' which was 'postponed at his request.' He does keep a date to perform stand-up in Eerie, Pennsylvania, not mentioning the controversy.
Nov. 18, 2014: Joan Tarshis becomes the fifth woman to come forward with allegations against Cosby. She claims when she was a 19-year-old writer, Cosby invited her to help him come up with material for his comedy act.
'His M.O. is the same,' she said. 'He works with people, he gets you into a position where you think you're going to work with him, and then he drugs you and rapes you.'
Whether or not the frenzy will die down is still to be determined, but we'll keep this post updated as the story continues to unfold.
Posted by Unknown on Tuesday, November 18, 2014 - Rating: 4.5
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