Last night—after months of allowing his lawyers, family members, and fictional wives to speak for him, demanding that the media be “neutral” by not asking him difficult questions, and maintaining that he “does not intend to dignify” the accusations against him—Bill Cosby made his first public acknowledgment of those charges, dignifying them with a joke in his comedy show. After all, if we can’t laugh at ourselves and our two-dozen allegations of sexual assault, who can we laugh at?
Cosby was performing his second of two shows in London, Ontario when, according to numerous reports, a woman stood up in the front row mid-set. When Cosby asked her where she was going, she replied that she was going to get a drink, then offered to get Cosby one as well. Cosby declined, saying he already a bottle of water. Ever one to seize an opportunity, Cosby then offered this droll riposte, as captured by National Post reporter Richard Warnica:
Some other attendees seem to suspect that the woman was a heckler, or that the exchange—which Cosby initiated—was some kind of set-up. If so, it went over great!
What was definitely not expected, at least to those who haven’t bothered to read the news lately, was the man who twice disrupted Cosby’s show, without Cosby having another zinger ready to go. When that man yelled out, “We don’t love you!” early on, Cosby reportedly replied, “Okay,” then simply carried on with his routine. But later, the same man leapt up and yelled, “You are a rapist!” As captured on video, the audience began to boo, at which point Cosby stood and told them to ignore it, in a scene that could double as a dramatic interpretation of the past two decades or so.
“No, no, stop,” Cosby said, hushing the disquieted crowd. “Shhhh. That’s all right. Patience.”
As it has for him off stage, simply calling for silence and waiting it out worked: Security came and escorted the man to the exit, to grateful applause. Later that man was surrounded by six police officers and, reportedly, detained for failing to show ID.