Actor-comedian Bill Cosby said he is thinking about a return to the comedy stage, 18 months after a sexual assault conviction was overturned by the Pennsylvania Supreme Court.
Cosby, 85, interviewed by Scott Spears on his WGH Talk radio show on Wednesday, hinted at going back on tour, according to Variety and The Hollywood Reporter.
“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,” Cosby told Spears. “Yes. Yes because there’s so much fun to be had in this storytelling that I do. Years ago, maybe 10 years ago, I found it was better to say it after I write it.”
Cosby publicist Andrew Wyatt confirmed to The Hollywood Reporter that Cosby was considering a comeback next year.
“We’re looking at getting back out here around spring/summer of 2023,” Wyatt wrote in an email to the entertainment news website.
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Wyatt wrote a similar email to Variety.
Cosby was convicted in 2018 on three counts of aggravated indecent assault and sentenced to three to 10 years in prison. A jury decided that Cosby drugged and molested Andrea Constand, who then worked as the director of operations for Temple University’s women’s basketball team, at his suburban Philadelphia home in 2004.
Cosby denied the accusations, but settled a lawsuit with Constand in 2006 for a sum that was later revealed to be nearly $3.4 million, Variety reported.
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The Pennsylvania Supreme Court, on June 30, 2021, overturned the sexual assault conviction due to an agreement made with a previous prosecutor that prevented him from being charged in the case.
In March 2022, the U.S. Supreme Court without comment ruled that it would not review Cosby’s case, according to The Hollywood Reporter.
Earlier this month, five women filed a new sexual assault lawsuit against NBC and Cosby under a New York state law that temporarily suspends the statute of limitations for older sexual assault claims, Variety reported. The women allege that Cosby either raped them or forced them into sexual acts.
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Four of the allegations date to the late 1980s or 1990, when the actor was at the height of his fame as the star of “The Cosby Show” on NBC, according to Variety. The fifth allegation involves Cindra Ladd, a former Hollywood executive who has accused Cosby of raping her in 1969.
Wyatt called the lawsuit “frivolous.”
Cosby last did a live comedy tour in 2015, according to The Hollywood Reporter. His performances across North America drew protests and included several cancellation after news of the comedian’s alleged sexual assaults came to light.
