Bill Cosby: I'm going back to stand-up next year
Bill Cosby is planning a stand-up tour next year – despite having more than 60 women testify that he sexually abused him.
The disgraced comic said it would be ‘fun’ to get back on the road and resume his career, seven years after it was derailed by the accusations.
When Cosby appeared on Ohio radio station WGH Talk yesterday, interviewer Scott Spears asked him if he would return to comedy in the coming year.
‘Yes,’ the 85-year-old said.‘When I come out of this, I feel that I will be able to perform and be the Bill Cosby that my audience knows me to be… There is so much fun to be had in this storytelling that I do.’
Cosby was convicted of drugging and assaulting Andrea Constand in his Philadelphia home in a 2018 court case. During his trial, 60 women testified that he sexually assaulted them.
However he was released from jail in 2021 after his conviction was overturned by the Pennsylvania State Supreme Court, who agreed that evidence Cosby had given in a previous civil case Constand brought should not have been used in the criminal case, as the comedian had struck a ‘non-prosecution agreement’ with a district attorney at the time..
However, his legal issues are not over. Five women have filed a sexual assault lawsuit against him and NBC. Cosby’s publicist Andrew Wyatt has said of their claims: ‘This isn’t about justice for victims of alleged sexual assault, it’s all about money."
Earlier this year, the comedian lost a civil trial when a woman claimed she was forced to perform a a sex act on him when she was 16.
Published: 29 Dec 2022