He had already recorded his segment for Painted Down, about the old Hollywood practice of blacking up white stuntmen to stand in for black actors, but in the wake of the latest revelations about his alleged serial sex abuse, it has now been cut. We were the last project standing behind him, but now with Whoopi (Goldberg) and (Creative Artists Agency) pulling the plug, we must also disassociate and cut all ties with Cosby.
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In the deleted interview Cosby recalled watching a white stuntman being painted with black make-up to double for him on an episode of the 1960s series I Spy.
Producer Nonie Robinson said Tuesday that Cosby has been removed from “Painted Down“.
“The day of the shooting, I showed up for that scene to see it”, Cosby reportedly said. So I’m… staring at this, and then they pulled his sleeve up and they put the black stuff all over his hands and all, and that too looked kind of amusing. “Looks like they scalped a sheep and dyed it”. This makes some sense as it turns out it’s actually hard to tell the story of the history of black stuntmen without him.
The former TV star protested this and the next day a black stunt-performer was hired – a move which ultimately helped to give traction to creating the Black Stuntmen’s Association in 1967.
“Even though it is a part of history and there isn’t anything we can do to take away what he did for stunt performers, at the same time we can no longer glorify it in light of these allegations”, she said, adding that the goal of the project is to “bring awareness” to the antiquated practice of “Paint Down”, which she says still occurs today. “Bill Cosby has been on television for so long, usually in rather silly sitcoms or commercials for Jello, it’s easy to forget that he used to be amusing – and hip”, the tribute stated.
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Most of the objects are from the permanent collection of the National Museum of African Art. About one-third are on loan from Camille and Bill Cosby.
