W.Kamau: Last News

The Television Academy have revealed the recipients of its 17th Television Academy Honors. The recipients include four non-scripted series and three scripted series.

Director W. Kamau Bell, executive producer Katie A. King and editor Jennifer Brooks joined Deadline’s Contenders Television: The Nominees award-season event to discuss working on the Showtime docuseries We Need To Talk About Cosby, and navigating triggering material.

Comedian-host-director W. Kamau Bell claims a Black Carrot Top could never exist.

Addie Morfoot ContributorW. Kamau Bell expected Bill Cosby to respond to the four-part Showtime docuseries that Bell has produced about the pioneering but now disgraced entertainer. But Bell was surprised by how Cosby chose to comment following the Jan.

“We Need to Talk About Cosby” series, which documents his rise and fall from the limelight.The scathing four-part Showtime docuseries from filmmaker W. Kamau Bell is set to debut on Jan. 30.

For decades, Bill Cosby was widely known as an icon in the comedy world, but also as "America's dad." The persona largely came from his famed roles in television shows like "The Cosby Show," which saw him play a wholesome and loving father and husband.  Furthermore, he was seen as a pioneer for Black comedians and actors, having been the first Black actor to star in a weekly drama series ("I Spy") and the first Black person to win an Emmy for acting. However, public perception of the comic, now 84, changed when he was accused of sexual misconduct by dozens of women. Now, Showtime is set to examine the complicated nature of Cosby's historical significance in relation to his tarnished reputation in the new limited series "We Need To Talk About Cosby." "Do not edit this," warns a woman in the trailer for the show, which was released Wednesday.

“The idea being if I’m to really learn the lessons of Bill Cosby then this is a part of that,” exclaims W. Kamau Bell of the trenchant We Need To Talk About Cosby. “This is about being smart, being aware, caring about your community,” adds the director of the four-episode docuseries set to premiere at the Sundance Film Festival on January 22 and on Showtime on January 30.