With Bill Cosby releasing his long-gestating, socially conscious rap album The Cosnarati : State of Emergency today (which he doesn't actually rap or sing on, but rather "oversaw"), we started thinking about what a comic genius the Cos is...and what a madman he's been along the way. For every Grammy-winning album or television breakthrough, Cosby has left in his wake plenty of plain ol' crazy. (We won't even get into his tirades of recent years where he's gone after BET.) So to prove that a rap album isn't the most bizarre idea to pop in the head of America's Favorite Dad, here are 10 other insane things Cosby's done.
10. He let himself be upstaged by a musical pen for 10 years
When most of us think of Picture Pages , we remember that kickass theme song, that amazing musical pen, and the fact that none of us ever had actual Picture Page books at home. As the host for these segments, Cosby played second banana to a pen he felt compelled to name "Mortimer Ichabod Marker," and told some bizarre, rambling stories while trying to teach basic concepts. Most of the time Cos wore a T-shirt with his own face on it, as if to say, " I'm the real 'draw' here! I'm making a joke there, you see..."
9. He recorded an ill-advised cover of "Sgt. Pepper's"
He may be responsible for some of the most hilarious comedy albums of all time and won a shelf full of Grammys (hell, the man won a Grammy for an entire album devoted to telling kids not to do drugs), but when it came to musical efforts, Cosby was all over the map, and not in a cool Indiana Jones way. A trained jazz musician, Cosby would oftentimes improvise in the studio and just put the shit on wax. Hence LPs like 1968's truly bonkers Bill Cosby Sings Hooray for the Salvation Army Band and this version of "Sgt. Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band." The maker of this video clip took some liberties with sound effects, but most of this recording is just pure Cos ambling off to his own strawberry field.
8. He wore those sweaters
We would never begrudge a man for bucking trends and having his own sense of style, but when your style involves nothing but sweaters that look like something a yak would throw up on your chest, it's time to clean out the closet. Seriously, Fat Albert and all the friggin' Cosby Kids looked like Project Runway finalists compared to what Cliff Huxtable trotted out every week. Little-known fact: Staring at a Cosby sweater too long is more dangerous than looking directly into the sun.
7. He made this TV show
In between the end of The Cosby Show in 1992 and the kickoff of the forgettable Cosby sitcom in 1996, the Cos was a lost man. How else to explain the single-season dramatic series The Cosby Mysteries ? And by "dramatic" we mean it had a pulse that was only faintly stronger than Matlock or Murder, She Wrote . Once again, Cos named a series after himself and played a character whose name wasn't even remotely close to Cosby. Why not just call it This Is My Detective Show, Right? and be done with it?
6. He made this movie
To say Cosby has a "spotty" film career is being generous. For every hilarious pairing with Sidney Poitier, there was a Mother, Jugs and Speed waiting just around the corner. But none of those missteps were as bad as Leonard Part 6 , a spy spoof that Cosby wrote, produced and starred in while on a break from filming the far-more-entertaining adventures of Cliff Huxtable. Seriously, we'll take an episode revolving around Cliff making a hoagie over Leonard fighting carnivorous lobsters or riding an ostrich off the roof of a building any day.
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