The Cosby Show

St. James Encyclopedia of Pop Culture, Jan 29, 2002 by Robin Markowitz

"Significant" things seem to actually go on beyond the door of the Huxtable household, but almost never within its borders. The Huxtables experienced only the banal, uninterrupted hubbub of the everyday, only those aspects of life to which real people rarely give much thought and attention. Every Thursday night during the show's run we watched the children's endless squabbles, activities useful mainly in their ability to allay boredom (playing chess, shooting baskets), recreational cooking (Cliff's Special Secret Spaghetti Sauce), and the annoyances--but never the life-altering burdens of working parents caring for a young child. In a memorable vignette, Cliff asks five-year-old Rudy if she needs to use the bathroom before he puts her into her elaborate snowsuit and, of course once she's zipped into it, she exclaims, giggling, "I have to go to the bathroom!" An exasperated Cliff sent her to her mother.

Observers eventually tried explaining the unprecedented success of the show by suggesting that its success reflected "the love in the house." In fact, a record album released during the show's heyday of theme music connected with the program is called A House Full of Love. The reason for this is not the adequacy of the explanation, but Cliff's use of the language of "love" to diffuse any potential conflict. We love each other; therefore we cannot have a problem.

In the alternative universe of the Huxtables, it is clear, problems are only apparent: they can't really exist. In one episode, Claire knocks 14-year-old son Theo's notebook off the kitchen table. A marijuana joint falls out of the book. The parents look at each as if the sky has fallen. This cannot be happening in our house! Our house full of love! Theo is summoned to make some explanation of the event. He tells them it is not his and they believe him. (Huxtables, like George Washington, cannot tell lies.) This does not thoroughly satisfy Theo, who fears the loss of his parents' trust, so he drags the culprit who hid the joint in his book home with him to explain the situation to his parents. Cliff tells the boy from the errant outside world to see some adult about his problem---perhaps even the good doctor himself. It was not possible for Theo to have been the affected youth. Things like that did not happen to Huxtables.

In an episode from the 1885-86 season, one of the girls tells Cliff that a friend needs a medical appointment with him and that he not contact the girl's parents. Cliff sees her and although it turns out to be a simple problem of no moral consequence, he becomes troubled (a strange state for Cliff). He is worried that his own children will not come to him if they have a problem. He gathers the children around to tell them that they must talk to him if they're ever in trouble; the kids let slip that may have already happened. When the tension increases, they indicate that they were, of course, only kidding. The episode ends on this note with nary a suspicion that they may have been telling the truth. Cliff had no reason to worry in the first place.