Bill Cosby: from TV hero to fallen US cultural icon
Los Angeles — A celebrity’s fall from grace is always ugly, but that of Bill Cosby — a once beloved comedian who broke through racial barriers to broadcast a successful black family into white living rooms — is a true gut punch to America. The Cosby name alone once evoked so much — a treasured father figure, a seemingly model citizen and comic with a gentle, self-deprecating style and playful voice that would go from deep to screeching in search of a laugh. But accusations from around 60 women, many of them formerly aspiring actresses and models, that he was a calculating, serial sexual predator who plied victims with sedatives and alcohol to bed them have left his career and reputation in tatters. On Monday the 79-year-old, Emmy-winning actor and Grammy-winning stand-up comedian goes on trial in Pennsylvania for aggravated indecent assault, accused of drugging and then assaulting a woman at his home in 2004. Dozens and dozens of accusers have alleged that the entertainer exploited ...
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