Film / Bill Cosby: Himself

Bill Cosby: Himself is a 1983 stand-up comedy film by African American comedian Bill Cosby.

Recorded in Hamilton, Ontario in 1981, the special finds Cosby almost squarely at the midpoint between the young hip urban dude of The '70s and the curmudgeonly father figure as codified by The Cosby Show later in The '80s.

The segment opens with an unusually harsh routine on the dangers of drugs, followed by a re-enactment of a visit to the dentist and a number of routines on the trials and tribulations of parenting. These themes would find themselves ingrained into his body of work in later years.

An abridged version of the special was also released as an album called Himself on Motown. The album received a nomination for a Grammy Award in the category of Best Comedy Album at the 26th Grammy Awards.

Track listing for the album version:

1. "The Dentist" - 5:59
2. "Natural Childbirth" - 8:16
3. "Brain Damage" - 4:20
4. "Kill the Boy" - 4:07
5. "Chocolate Cake for Breakfast" - 7:44
6. "Same Thing Happens Every Night" - 7:56
7. "The Grandparents" - 7:06

Tropes present in this film and/or album:

• Angrish:
  • "Did you ever make your mother so mad that she forgot your name? 'Come here, Roy—uh Ralph—Roquefort— Rutabaga—what is your name, boy? And don't lie to me, 'cause you live here and I'll find out who you are! Take a stick and knock your brains out!'"
  • Later in the same skit: "I used to think my father was an idiot because the man could not complete a full sentence… Now I understand … had it've been a grown person, you'd have cursed: 'What the foul filth foul foul filth filth filth foul foul! And you're filth and foul!' But you talk to your child, you censor yourself, and you say, 'What the… Get your… I'll bust… Get outta my face!'"
• Answers to the Name of God: Inverted:
  It was because of my father that, from the ages of 7 to 15, I thought that my name was Jesus Christ, and my brother, Russell, thought that his name was Dammit. "Dammit, will you stop all that noise?" And, "Jesus Christ, sit down!" One day, I'm out playing in the rain, and my father yelled, "Dammit, will you get back in here!" I said, "Dad, I'm Jesus Christ!"
• Arson, Murder, and Jaywalking: During Bill's wife's labor pains. She stands up on the table in the stirrups, grabs Bill's bottom lip, yells at him for morphine, and tells everybody in the delivery room that his parents were never married.
• Awful Wedded Life: Several moments on the routine indicate this. "Natural Childbirth" is about him and his wife getting into a fight during lamaze class and the ensuing childbirth, while "Chocolate Cake for Breakfast" has his wife demand that he make breakfast for the kids and then become angry when he feeds them chocolate cake instead.
• Big "SHUT UP!":
  • During "Natural Childbirth", as his wife gets hit with contractions and she demands morphine:
    I said, "But dear!" [imitates Lamaze breathing] She said, "YOU SHUT UP!!! YOU DID THIS TO ME!"
  • He also says this when he talks about his mother's hypocritical parenting skills:
    When a mother asks you a question and you try and answer, she tells you to shut up! "Day and night, night and day, work my fingers to the bone, and for what?" "I don't—" "Shut! UP! When I ask you a question, you keep your trap shut! Think I'm talking just so I can hear myself talk?! ANSWER ME!!!"
• Brick Joke: He describes childbirth pains in "Natural Childbirth":

  "Carol Burnett described what labor pains feel like. She said, 'Take your bottom lip and pull it over your head.'"
  "Then my wife stood up. In the stirrups. Grabbed my bottom lip. And said, 'I! WANT! MORPHINE!!!'"

• Bring My Brown Pants: "Grandparents":
  And mothers are always more interested in the condition of your underwear than your body if you're ever in an accident. And they tell you that; "I hope for my sake if you're ever in an accident, you have on clean underwear." Well, I thought that's what an accident was! Look; you're driving a truck. Here comes another truck, gonna hit you. Now, whether you hit the truck or not, you're going to have soiled underwear. Because first you say it, then you do it! Now comes your mother to the hospital: "Did he have on clean underwear?" "Yes, we found it in the glove compartment."
• Childhood Brain Damage: A Running Gag throughout the special is his children being caught doing something they're not supposed to, and then responding with "I don't know" when the parent asks them why. Every time this happens, Cosby refers to it as "brain damage".
• Corporal Punishment: In "Same Thing Happens Every Night", he describes his wife wielding a yardstick like a samurai sword while he corralled the kids to make sure all were punished.
• The Dentist Episode: "The Dentist" is an exaggerated look at a trip to the dentist, complete with him voicing the dentist, pantomiming the various tools used, and making up his own sound effects.
• Gasshole: Himself closes with a skit about how fathers are the only people in the house who are allowed to pass gas. He says that his father used to do it and blame it on invisible animals, which his brother Russell was dumb enough to go looking for. The last line of the special is him stating that his father's game was "pull my finger".
• Hypocritical Humor: "Dentists tell you not to pick your teeth with any sharp metal object. Then you sit in their chair, and the first thing they grab is an iron hook."
• Insane Troll Logic: "Chocolate Cake for Breakfast," wherein, having been woken out of a sound sleep to go feed the kids breakfast, he gives his kids the chocolate cake they clamour for after rationalizing that it's healthy for them — because, after all, it has wheat and eggs and milk. And when his wife demands to know why they are eating it for breakfast, his kids pipe up, "We asked for eggs and milk! AND DAD MADE US EAT THIS!!!" So his wife sends him to his room. Which is where he wanted to go in the first place.
  "[Men] are the geniuses of the house because only someone as smart as we could fake such stupidity. […] We are dumb, but we are not so dumb. It takes great skill and work to keep from working."
• Lamaze Class: The "Natural Childbirth" routine. Cosby seems to enjoy his role much more than his wife does, even doing "macho breathing" along with her and cheering, "Push 'em out, shove 'em out, waaay out!" Trying to apply this approach in the delivery room of the hospital, however, was rather less successful.
• Laser-Guided Karma: Invoked with the "Jeffrey" story, where, after Cosby and an airplane full of other people were terrorized by a four-year-old boy named Jeffrey for the entire flight, the kid fell asleep. The passengers took great pleasure in yelling "Goodbye, Jeffrey!" in the kid's ear, waking him up crying. This also extends to Jeffrey's poor, harangued mother, who came down the airplane stairs, handed the boy to his father...and then punched him dead in the face.
  We don't know why. Jeffrey's such a lovely child.
• Narrative Profanity Filter: When Bill recounts the events of his wife giving birth, he mentions that his wife told everyone in the delivery room that his parents were never married.
• Obfuscating Stupidity: Bill suggests this is the attitude many fathers take towards things they don't want to do.
  "Fathers are the geniuses of the house. Because only a person as intelligent as we could fake such stupidity. Think about your father! He doesn't know where anything is! You ask him to do something, he messes it up! ... That's a genius at work! Because he doesn't want to do it! And he knows someone will be coming soon to stop him from doing it! ... So you see, we are dumb, but we are not so dumb. It takes great courage and work to keep from working."
• One-Winged Angel: Played straight:
  "I've often heard of people having a conniption, but I'd never seen one. You don't wanna see 'em! My wife's face...split! The skin and hair split and came off of her face so that there was nothing left except the skull! And orange light came out of her hair and it lit all around! And fire shot from her eye sockets and began to burn my stomach! And she said, 'Where did they get chocolate cake from!?!?'"
• Precision F-Strike: Occurs twice in the "Drugs and Alcohol" segment. At one point, he says, "I asked a friend, 'What is it about cocaine that makes it so wonderful?' And he said 'Well, it intensifies your personality.' To which I responded, 'Yes, but what if you're an asshole?'" Later on, he says "shit, I'll do a few lines" when discussing cocaine.
• Punctuated! For! Emphasis!: As part of his "Natural Childbirth" routine, when he talks about his wife actually giving birth:
  "Then my wife stood up. In the stirrups. Grabbed my bottom lip. And said, 'I! WANT! MORPHINE!!!'"
  • Later, during his "Same Thing Happens Every Night" routine, he does it again when his wife is about to spank her children when they are fighting:
    "My wife turns around. Grabs a yard stick. She holds it like a samurai warrior. She then makes an announcement that the beatings will now begin. By saying, 'I! HAVE HAD! ENOUGH OF THIS!!!!!' Now these three brain-damaged people have the nerve to looked surprised!"
  • Near the end of this same scene, he does it again after his wife finishes spanking the children:
    "My wife comes downstairs with a broken stick. Throws it on the table. Sits down. And begins to talk out loud to... NOBODY."
• Running Gag: Throughout Bill Cosby: Himself, his kids answering nearly every question with "I don't know" is referred to as "brain damage". This becomes a Brick Joke on Those of You With or Without Children, You'll Understand a few years later.
• Sarcastic Well Wishing: This happens during the dentist appointment. Cosby plays a patient who gets an injection of Novocain, numbing one side of his face and causing his bottom lip to droop into his lap. The dentist tells him to rinse, even though he can't hold the water in his mouth, and we get this (delivered in a badly slurred voice) after the water runs down his front:
  Cosby: (slurring) I hope that you are satisfied. I hope that you are satisfied! I put the water in my mouth. I told you I can't rinse. Because I have no bottom lip, the water is all down in my lap! I hope that you are satisfied!
  Cosby: (as dentist) Rinse again.
  Cosby: (slurring) You've gotta be kidding me!
• Shout-Out: Meta example: Cosby uses his Mushmouth voice for a dentist patient who has just been shot full of Novocain.
• Silly Walk: In the opening routine on drugs and alcohol, he demonstrates several silly ways in which various people walk when they are intoxicated.
• Soundtrack Dissonance: The opening segment of the film was originally a parody of Grover Washington Jr.'s "Just the Two of Us" sung by Cosby himself, titled "Just the Slew of Us". On the original VHS and 1990s cable releases, it was replaced with an example of this trope: a slow, somber ballad called "It Was a Good Idea at the Time". The DVD release restores the original "Just the Slew of Us", however.
• Suddenly Shouting: Occurs in his anger for having to make breakfast for his children at 6 AM. He randomly shouts certain words:
  So I got up. Needless to say, I was angry. And I went downstairs without putting on my robe. Standing there in my pajamas, and I'm talking to myself. I said, "Get these, go down and cook breakfast, but it's six o'clock in the morning", and I slam the pans down. Blam! On the stove. I slam them down and go to the refrigerator and look around and I get to the damn bacon and the sausage, cooking breakfast, six oblam!!! in the morning, and I grab the- you have to be careful with eggs. Got! to have to cook breakfast! Boom!
• Take That, Audience!: When an audience member groans at him for offering grapefruit juice to his kids for breakfast, he stops mid-sentence and berates the heckler by shouting, "This is not your child!"
• Unishment: The punchline of the "Chocolate Cake for Breakfast" routine. It starts with Bill trying to go back to sleep after his wife wakes him up at 6:00 AM to make breakfast for the kids. When she finds him giving them cake (which they specifically asked for), Bill's wife sends him to his room, "which is where [he] wanted to go in the first place" because he didn't want to make them breakfast. It also features a Call-Back to his routine about Obfuscating Stupidity on the part of fathers, since Bill got it wrong so badly that he'll now never be asked to do it again.
• When I Was Your Age...: Bill mentions that his parents have now become grandparents, and his father will willingly give out money to his grandchildren — but when Bill was his children's age, in response to any request for funds, the same man "would tell [Bill] his life story. And this man never told a happy story. For 50 cents, there never was happiness!" Among other things, Bill recalls his father saying something along the lines of the usual: "I had to walk five miles to school! Uphill! Both ways! In 5 feet of snow! And I was thankful!" Also, no matter how his father suffered, he'd always say, "And I was thankful to get it!" For 30 years, Bill claims his father told him, all he had to eat was dirt. "And I was thankful to eat that dirt!" At another point, Bill recalls asking his father for a dollar for his school picnic. His father replied by explaining how he once killed a grizzly bear with his loose-leaf notebook.
  • He is incredulous at how they spoil his own kids, and tries to convince them, "That's not the same woman I grew up with! You're looking at an old person who's trying to get into Heaven now!"

---