LOS ANGELES — When Bill Cosby entered the polling booth in his neighborhood last week, he carried with him photographs of his late parents and Jimmy, the kid brother who died in childhood.
“I pulled out the pictures, pulled the curtain shut. And I said, ‘You guys are gonna vote.’ And they did, on one piece of paper,” Cosby said.
He couldn’t resist delivering a punch line for fellow voters in Shelburne Falls, Mass. — “I yelled out, ‘How do you spell plumber?’ ” — even as he exulted in casting his ballot for the first African-American president.
There’s an argument circulating that “The Cosby Show” laid the groundwork for President-elect Barack Obama by presenting an appealing black family, the Huxtables, to young TV viewers who grew up equipped to thwart stereotypes and barriers.
Writer Alisa Valdes-Rodriguez called her theory “the Huxtable effect,” a counter to the so-called Bradley effect (named for failed black California gubernatorial hopeful Tom Bradley) of possible hidden racism among white voters.
Ask Cosby, 71, his view of the part his 1984-92 NBC sitcom played as political groundbreaker, and the man who looms large as both a comedian and blunt commentator on black America first offers a measured appraisal.
“I was amazed when the young woman’s theory came through,” said Cosby. It sounds plausible, he mused, recalling the show’s immense popularity and the many times that fans said Cliff Huxtable reminded them of their dad — their white dad.
But he chafes at what he calls the “Karl Rovian” interpretation, referring to the Republican strategist’s Election Night comment on Fox News that viewers embraced the Huxtables as “America’s family” and not a black one.
He suggests looking beyond the influence of a TV family to that of a real one: the household in which the future president was raised.
He cites Obama’s account of being woken early to do his homework and his mother’s refusal to brook any complaints. Cosby bows as well to Michelle Obama and her father, who refused special treatment despite multiple sclerosis.
It was Cosby’s firm belief in parental responsibility — and aggravation over ’80s programs — that shaped the creation of “The Cosby Show,” out this week in a box set. At a time when the sitcom genre appeared near death, the few family comedies that aired were especially dismaying.
The idea for a show where “the parents weren’t losing to the kids” was rejected by other networks before NBC executive Brandon Tartikoff bought a revamped version of it, with the original blue-collar family now morphed into affluent professionals.
“The Cosby Show” starred the comedian as a mellow physician who, with his lawyer-wife, Clair (Phylicia Rashad), kept a loving, firm hand on their five children.
Tartikoff knew that Cosby, a recording, movie and TV star (with shows including the 1960s “I Spy,” in which he was the first black star of a drama series), was funny and likable.
“And Tartikoff also said, ‘What I like about this show is dignity. The family has dignity.’ “
