W. Kamau Bell on 'We Need to Talk About Cosby'

Bullseye with Jesse Thorn

NPR

Society & Culture

4.7 • 2.7K Ratings

🗓️ 25 January 2022

⏱️ 49 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

🧾️ Download transcript

Summary

W. Kamau Bell, a comedian and host, directed a new documentary series. It's called We Need To Talk About Cosby. It's about Bill Cosby – who he is, what he's done, and how we deal with that. It's a complicated, difficult topic. One that intersects with the fabric of the American entertainment system, with race, the justice system, the MeToo movement and so much more. In this conversation we talk with Kamau about the documentary at length. He talks about what Cosby meant to him as a kid and as a comic. He talks about Cosby's pioneering work in civil rights and in television, and about how we struggle to square all that with the person we now know Cosby to be. We Need To Talk About Cosby will be available to watch via Showtime on January 30.

See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for sponsorship and to manage your podcast sponsorship preferences.

NPR Privacy Policy

Transcript

Click on a timestamp to play from that location

0:00.0	Bullseye with Jesse Thorn is a production of MaximumFun.org and is distributed by NPR.
0:10.0	It's Bullseye, I'm Jesse Thorn.
0:21.4	My first guest this week is W. Commao Bell.
0:24.5	He's a longtime friend of our show, he co-hosted it with me once.
0:30.4	Back when I was just out of college, he's a terrific stand-up comic.
0:34.8	He hosts the CNN show United Shades of America, for which he's won several Emmys.
0:40.7	And before that, he hosted the very funny late-night talk show, Totally Bias.
0:46.0	All of Commao's work is great.
0:48.2	You should check out all the stuff I just talked about, but we're not going to talk about
0:51.7	any of it today.
0:54.3	And here I want to mention that the interview you're about to hear has extensive discussions
0:59.8	of and some relatively specific descriptions of sexual assault, so please be forewarned.
1:08.2	W. Commao Bell directed a new documentary series.
1:11.7	It's called We Need to Talk About Cosby.
1:15.4	It's just screened at Sundance.
1:17.0	It comes out on Showtime Sunday January 30.
1:21.4	As you might guess, it's about Bill Cosby, who he is, what he's done, and how we deal
1:27.6	with that.
1:29.2	Cosby is one of the most successful TV and stand-up comedy stars of all time.
1:34.8	He's also been accused by more than 60 women of sexual assault.
1:40.2	He was convicted of sexual assault in 2018, though he was released from jail last year
1:45.9	when his conviction was overturned on technical grounds.
	...

Please login to see the full transcript.

Previous episode | Next episode

Disclaimer: The podcast and artwork embedded on this page are from NPR, and are the property of its owner and not affiliated with or endorsed by Tapesearch.

Generated transcripts are the property of NPR and are distributed freely under the Fair Use doctrine. Transcripts generated by Tapesearch are not guaranteed to be accurate.