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The First Season of The Cosby Show arrives on DVD August 2nd, 2005... Pre-order now!
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The Cosby Show
Premiered: September 20, 1984; Final Episode: September 17, 1992; Network: NBC
Stars: Bill Cosby as Dr. Cliff (Heathcliff) Huxtable and Phylicia Ayers Allen (later Rashad) as his wife, Clair. Their children were played by Lisa Bonet as Denise, Tempestt Bledsoe as Vanessa, Malcolm-Jamal Warner as Theo (Theodore), Keshia Knight Pulliam as Rudy and Sabrina LeBeauf as Sondra.
Also appearing: Earle Hyman as Cliff's father (Russell) and Clairce Taylor as Cliff's mother (Anna).
Click Here to preorder Season One of The Cosby Show on DVD!
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(A limited number of VHS copies of the old Columbia House TV Greats Cosby Show Collection are available on amazon.com from individual sellers. Click here to check availability of The Cosby Show on VHS video.)
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" I just hope they get out of the house before we die."
- Cliff Huxtable
Perhaps the most popular primetime series of the 1980s, The Cosby Show went on the air at a time when few quality sitcoms were being broadcast. Many industry analysts go so far as to say that The Cosby Show single-handedly rescued both the genre and the NBC television network from extinction. And as NBC's ratings rose throughout the 80's, the other networks tried to copy its success with a slew of comedies that revolved around traditional families.
Modeled in large part on Cosby's own life, The Cosby Show avoided racial stereotypes and featured two working professionals, an obstetricain, Dr. Cliff Huxtable, and his wife, Clair, an attorney. But it was really their family that was at the heart of the show. The Huxtable family, just like Cosby's own, was made up of five children, four daughters and a son. (Lisa Bonet as Denise, Tempestt Bledsoe as Vanessa, Malcolm-Jamal Warner as Theo a.ka. Theodore, Keshia Knight Pullman as Rudy and Sabrina LeBeauf as Sondra.) For the first few weeks of the series, however, we only met four children. The eldest daughter, Sondra, was not introduced until the fifth episode.)
The Cosby Show put a fresh spin on the tired old formula of the family sitcom. Each week, Cliff and Clair would hold court in their Brooklyn brownstone as their kids suffered through various crises and coming of age adventures, much as families did in the sitcoms of the 1960s. Somehow, everything always turned out all right: the kids learned valuable life lessons and the viewers at home spent a pleasant half hour wondering why their family couldn't be more like the Huxtables.
The Cosby Show was successful simply because it was incredibly funny, smart and sassy. America loved watching Bill Cosby and his talented ensemble cast each week because the show was cleverly written and well performed. A lot of the credit for this goes to Cosby himself, as he was intimately involved in most aspects of the production and it is he who infused the show with its warm family values.
The fact that this TV family was African American was obvious, but always incidental. Although the show never directly addressed the issue of race, it's interesting to note that the show was originally rejected by ABC. Many say they passed because they felt audiences were not ready for a comedy that depicted a happy, stable middle-class black family. NBC itself ordered only six episodes initially and waited till after the phemonenal ratings success of the show to commit to a full season.
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During its run, The Cosby Show received several Emmys, including three for Bill Cosby as Best Actor .
The Cosby Show will soon be available on home video from Carsey-Werner and their distribution partner, UrbanWorks Entertainment (a.k.a. Ventura Entertainment), which will also distribute The Cosby Show spin-off, A Different World, beginning in January, 2006.
The First Season of The Cosby Show arrives on DVD August 2nd, 2005!
Preorder now and save 30%.
If you're looking to buy The Cosby Show from Columbia House TV Greats, we're sorry to say that the TV Greats DVD Club purchase program has been discontinued... but the good news is that you can now buy full season sets of "The Cosby Show" more affordably than you could through Columbia House TV Greats. Each boxed set will contain all the epiosdes from each of the nine seasons at an attractive "street price" of around $35.00. Through the TV Greats program, subscribers would pay $19.95 for each 6 epiosdes.
If you're interfested in learning more about the defunct Columbia House TV Greats program and why it's no longer around, click here. To join the "regular" Columbia House DVD Club, where you can buy both movies and TV shows at discounted prices, usually at least 30% off, click here. (Note: The Cosby Show boxed sets will be available through the Columbia House DVD Club, but not as a discounted introductory selection.)
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THE COSBY SHOW names, characters, and all related indicia, ™ and © 1992 The Carsey-Werner Company, LLC. All rights reserved.
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