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The Bill Cosby Show is an American sitcom television series, that aired for two seasons on NBC‘s Sunday night schedule from 1969 until 1971, under the sponsorship of Procter & Gamble. There were fifty-two episodes made in the series. It marked Bill Cosby‘s first solo foray in television, after his co starring role with Robert Culp in I Spy. The series also marked the first time an African American starred in his or her own eponymous comedy series.
Cosby played the role of Chet Kincaid, a P.E. teacher at a Los Angeles high school, a bachelor, and an average cool guy trying to earn a living and help people out along the way. The show ran for two seasons, 52 episodes in all. While only a modest critical success, the series was nominated for 4 Primetime Emmys.
The Bill Cosby Show was a ratings hit, finishing eleventh in its first season. With the high school as the setting of most episodes, storylines comprise: life lessons, students and fellow teachers, family drama, a coach’s purview, and a few challenging forays, such as a substitute teacher of algebra or English.
The Barbershop
Cosby was lauded for using some infrequently seen classic African American performers, such as Lillian Randolph (as Kincaid’s mother) and Rex Ingram. Well known stars who rarely did television appeared as well, including Henry Fonda and veteran comedians Mantan Moreland and Moms Mabley as Kincaid’s feuding uncle and aunt.
The show’s brass heavy, funky theme song, “Hikky Burr” was written by Cosby and Quincy Jones, with Cosby providing the vocals.
Julia is notable for being the first weekly sitcom to depict an African American woman in a non-stereotypical role. Previous television series featured African American lead characters, but the characters were usually servants. The show starred actress and singer Diahann Carroll, and ran for 86 episodes on NBC from September 17, 1968, to March 23, 1971. The series was produced by Savannah Productions, Inc., Hanncarr Productions, Inc., and 20th Century-Fox Television.
In Julia, Carroll played widowed single mother, Julia Baker (her husband, Army Capt. Baker, an O-1 Bird Dog artillery spotter pilot had been shot down in Vietnam), who was a nurse in a doctor’s office at a large aerospace company. The doctor, Morton Chegley, was played by Lloyd Nolan, and Julia’s romantic interests by Paul Winfield and Fred Williamson. Julia’s son, Corey (Marc Copage) was approximately six to nine years old during the series run. He had barely known his father before he died. Corey’s best friend was Earl J. Waggedorn, whom Corey almost always addressed and referred to precisely by his full name, though other characters (particularly his mother) would refer to him simply as Earl. The Waggedorns lived downstairs in the same apartment building, with father Len (Hank Brandt), mother Marie (Betty Beaird), and two sons, Earl and an infant.
Pilot episode – Mama’s Man
Controversy
Though Julia is now remembered as being groundbreaking, during its run, it was derided by critics for being apolitical and unrealistic. Diahann Carroll sarcastically remarked in 1968: “At the moment we’re presenting the white Negro. And he has very little Negroness.” The Saturday Review’s Robert Lewis Shayon wrote that Julia’s “plush, suburban setting” was “a far, far cry from the bitter realities of Negro life in the urban ghetto, the pit of America’s explosion potential.” Gil Scott-Heron‘s “The Revolution Will Not Be Televised” refers to Julia in the same breath as Bullwinkle, implying that the character was something of a cartoon. Ebony published a somewhat more supportive assessment of the program. “As a slice of Black America, Julia does not explode on the TV screen with the impact of a ghetto riot. It is not that kind of show. Since the networks have had a rash of shows dealing with the nation’s racial problems, the light-hearted Julia provides welcome relief, if, indeed, relief is even acceptable in these troubled times.” The series also came under criticism from African-American viewers for its depiction of a fatherless Black family (albeit due to the father’s death in military service rather than due to paternal abandonment). Excluding a Black male lead, it was argued, “rendered the series safer” and “less likely to grapple with issues that might upset white viewers.”