Phylicia Rashad on Bill Cosby: "What you’re seeing is the destruction of a legacy"

Phylicia Rashad is a celebrated actress perhaps best known for her role as Clair Huxtable on "The Cosby Show." Since the reemergence of decades old sexual assault claims against her former TV husband, Ms. Rashad has remained mum.

But now she's opened up to Showbiz411's Roger Friedman calling the allegations "orchestrated." She went on to defend his silence on the matter telling Friedman, "If he spoke now, what do you think the media would do with it?"



Here's Friedman's account of the conversation:

But knowing this she did say to me “I love him” about Bill Cosby. She stands defiantly behind him. She told me that in the years she’s known him, she has never seen the behavior alleged by the women who say they were drugged and raped, or sexually harassed.

“Forget these women,” Rashad said. “What you’re seeing is the destruction of a legacy. And I think it’s orchestrated. I don’t know why or who’s doing it, but it’s the legacy. And it’s a legacy that is so important to the culture.”

Rashad dismisses claims from both Beverly Johnson and Janice Dickinson. “Oh, please,” she said when their names came up. She also is quick to defend Camille Cosby. “This is a tough woman, a smart woman,” she told me. “She’s no pushover.” There is no question, Rashad said, that Camille Cosby has not been complicit or looked the other way as her husband terrorized women for the last 50 years.

She said, “Someone is determined to keep Bill Cosby off TV,” alluding to people other than the women. “And it’s worked. All his contracts have been cancelled.”

We talked more about the legacy of The Cosby Show. “This show represented America to the outside world. This was the American family. And now you’re seeing it being destroyed. Why?”

Many have been waiting for Ms. Rashad's thoughts on the matter, and now we have them.

Photo: Joe Seer / Shutterstock.com