Bill Cosby Tickets

Bill Cosby is one the best known and loved comedians in history. Cosby has always delivered great, clean family comedy that wonderfully touches on so many hilarious shared experiences we can all relate to, and his material on families has always wonderfully hit the mark.

Cosby’s Rise to Glory

Bill Cosby is from Philadelphia. Growing up, Cosby was the class clown, and although he dropped out at the tenth grade to join the Navy, he eventually put a value on education, finishing high school through a correspondence course, and going on to Temple University, where he was a star athlete in college.

Cosby was working his way through college as a bartender, and he noticed that when he made his customers laugh, his tips increased. This led to Cosby leaving college to become a comedian (Cosby finally got his Doctorate of Education from the University of Massachusetts in 1976; his dissertation was about educating children with the Fat Albert show).

Tickling and Teaching

Cosby performed stand-up in small clubs before moving up to The Ed Sullivan Show and The Tonight Show. Cosby released his first comedy album in 1964, then he met comedy legend Carl Reiner, whose son, Rob Reiner, would recite one of his favorite Cosby comedy routines to his father word for word.

Carl Reiner introduced Cosby to television producer Sheldon Leonard, who hired Cosby to co-star on the show I Spy with Robert Culp. Since I Spy, there have been a lot of buddy comedies with a Caucasian actor and an African American actor working together, but the first time it was done was with I Spy. Cosby won three Emmys for I Spy, and he continued to perform stand-up.

Cosby then went on to The Bill Cosby Show in 1969, and appeared on the first two seasons of the children’s show The Electric Company. He tried another TV program, The New Bill Cosby Show, before Fat Albert, which debuted in 1972. Cosby would open the show by telling the audience, “This is Bill Cosby coming at ya with music and fun, and if you’re not careful, you may learn something before it’s done.”

Observing the Family, Hilariously

Cosby usually draws from his own family and life experiences for his comedy, and the wildly successful Fat Albert drew on his young adulthood and his high school friends, and with his most successful TV venture, The Cosby Show, he drew from his own family.

Once it debuted in 1984, The Cosby Show was an incredible success with 70 million viewers, and it was the #1 show on TV for six years in a row. Cosby was voted #1 TV Dad by TV Guide, and when Cosby went back to performing stand-up on the road, he broke a 53 year attendance record for Radio City Music Hall.

Once The Cosby Show bowed out in 1992, Cosby went back to TV in 1996 with Cosby, and Kids Say the Darndest Things.

Among the many awards and accolades Cosby has been rewarded with include a Kennedy Center Honor in 1998, The Presidential Medal of Freedom in 2002, The Mark Twain Prize For American Humor in 2009, as well as nine Grammy awards for his comedy and children’s albums. Cosby is also the author of eleven books.