It was 2014 when comedian Hannibal Burruss made a joke that unearthed nearly five decades worth of sexual assault allegations against cultural icon Bill Cosby. Since then, the nation has grappled with the discordant realities that Cosby was both a talented, groundbreaking entertainer and an alleged serial rapist.
Comedian, host and documentarian W. Kamau Bell explores these realities in a five-part documentary We Need To Talk About Cosby, currently streaming on Showtime. Bell sought to tell this story once Cosby has been convicted of indecent aggravated assault against Andrea Constand and sentenced to 3-10 years in prison for the 2004 incident in 2018. But in the middle of filming, in June 2021, Bell and his team learned that Cosby’s conviction was overturned and he was released.
“It was one of the most surreal experiences of my life,” Bell told ESSENCE. “I immediately felt all this sorrow for the survivors. Because none of us saw it coming.”
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