--- description: As Cosby's latest comedy tour winds down, he remains unimpeded by a recent scandal title: Bill Cosby: Final Tour Dates, Comedy Shows & Assault Allegations image: https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/blt3eec2ca84225ef2d/6987791e5f570f7573b149a8/bill-cosby.jpg?branch=production&width=3840&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=16:9 ---  * [Entertainment](/section/entertainment/) ## Entertainment Update your preferences in [Account Settings](/account/preferences/) Close * [celebrities](/tag/celebrities/) ## celebrities Update your preferences in [Account Settings](/account/preferences/) Close # Bill Cosby's Comedy Tour Is Ending, But His Career Could Well Go On  by [Daniel D'Addario](/author/daniel-daddario/)  ## Daniel D'Addario Update your preferences in [Account Settings](/account/preferences/) Close May 1, 2015 1:30 PM CUT  Bill Cosby speaks at the Jackie Robinson Foundation 2014 Awards Dinner at the Waldorf Astoria Hotel on March 3, 2014 in New York City. Bill Cosby speaks at the Jackie Robinson Foundation 2014 Awards Dinner at the Waldorf Astoria Hotel on March 3, 2014 in New York City.Stephen Lovekin—Getty Images  by [Daniel D'Addario](/author/daniel-daddario/)  ## Daniel D'Addario Update your preferences in [Account Settings](/account/preferences/) Close May 1, 2015 1:30 PM CUT Bill Cosby’s “Far From Finished” comedy tour, whose [final scheduled show](http://www.ticketmaster.com/Bill-Cosby-tickets/artist/702564 "undefined") is May 2 in Atlanta, has come at a precarious moment for the former TV star. In the face of tremendous scrutiny over Cosby’s alleged past of sexual assault, [more and more women came forward](http://www.vulture.com/2014/09/timeline-of-the-abuse-charges-against-cosby.html "undefined") to claim the comedian assaulted them. Cosby’s shows were cancelled or protested (Gloria Allred, the lawyer, [has said](http://time.com/3833918/bill-cosby-sexual-assault-three-women-accuse-comedian/ "undefined") the Atlanta show will see a protest). A planned [Cosby special on Netflix](http://www.ew.com/article/2014/11/19/netflix-bill-cosby-special "undefined") was indefinitely postponed, and an NBC sitcom in development [was halted](http://www.ew.com/article/2014/11/19/nbc-bill-cosby-sitcom-plan "undefined"). Why is it, then, that Cosby seems to be thriving? His shows—those that were not cancelled—draw crowds, and Cosby himself apparently feels liberated to joke with his fans about the allegations of date-rape drug use, [saying at an Ontario show](http://www.slate.com/blogs/the%5Fslatest/2015/01/08/cosby%5Fdate%5Frape%5Fjoke%5Faccused%5Fcomedian%5Freportedly%5Freferenced%5Fallegations.html "undefined"), “You have to be careful about drinking around me.” His disregard for the turn in public attention against him would seem to be proof that he does not believe himself to have done anything wrong. Further, though, it indicates he’s aware that any public-relations crisis a male celebrity undergoes can be outlived. The past week has seen the release of the [trailer for Woody Allen’s new movie _Irrational Man_](https://youtu.be/ZvOnxL2pKbI "undefined"), about a professor who has a relationship with his young student. If this trailer bore echoes of allegations against Allen by his daughter Dylan Farrow, ones that had dominated the news cycle only last year, it seemed few had the bandwidth to consider them. And Mike Tyson, who’s actually served jail time for rape, has put any whiff of controversy behind him: He was just recently a featured guest on the feel-good hit of the season, _Lip Sync Battle_. ### Bill Cosby’s Public Life in Photos  Bill Cosby performs on The Ed Sullivan Show in 1964. CBS/Getty Images  A portrait of Bill Cosby taken in 1965. Hulton Archive/Getty Images  Bill Cosby poses with his Emmy for his role in I Spy at the Primetime Emmy Awards in New York City in 1966. AP  A portrait of Bill Cosby taken in 1969. Alfred Eisenstaedt—The LIFE Picture Collection/Getty Images  Bill Cosby performs on The Second Bill Cosby Special in 1969. Fred Sabine—NBC/Getty Images  Bill Cosby attends the "Concert at Town Hall" at Town Hall in New York City in 1971. Ron Galella—WireImage/Getty Images  Bill Cosby as Chet Kincaid on The Bill Cosby Show. NBC/Getty Images  Bill Cosby as Dr. Heathcliff 'Cliff' Huxtable in The Cosby Show. Frank Carroll—NBC/Getty Images  Bill Cosby is interviewed by Jay Leno on The Tonight Show With Jay Leno in 1992. Wendy Perl—NBC/Getty Images  Bill Cosby speaks to an audience on the campus of the University of the District of Columbia in 2006, in Washington D.C. LAWRENCE JACKSON—AP  Host Bill Cosby speaks onstage at the 2011 Jackie Robinson Foundation awards gala atThe Waldorf Astoria in 2011 in New York City. Stephen Lovekin—Getty Images  Bill Cosby attends the 2011 Temple University Commencement at the Liacouras Center in 2011 in Philadelphia, Pa. Gilbert Carrasquillo—Getty Images  Bill Cosby attends the 2014 American Comedy Awards at Hammerstein Ballroom on April 26, 2014 in New York City. Andrew Toth—FilmMagic/Getty Images Cosby’s future as a comic is certainly in doubt; with two big partnerships cancelled, he has no outlet but future live dates. If history is guide, though, that may just be temporary. Cosby scoffing at the charges against him makes explicit what anyone who’s paid attention to celebrity redemptions of the recent past should assume: That he’ll, ultimately, be fine. Periods of extremely intense scrutiny can’t, realistically, be sustained by a public whose attention is divided. Besides, the anger of some doesn’t matter much when die-hard fans are willing to keep on buying in. Consider recent figures who rode out periods of intense scrutiny: The Allen furor of early 2014 faded to a dull awareness that his career is unstoppable; criticisms of Charlie Sheen’s behavior towards his co-stars and towards women were muted as his sitcom _Anger Management_ kept on rolling; Roman Polanski basically didn’t acknowledge the renewed ire around him after his 2009 arrest, and has continued making movies in the years since. Is it that hard to imagine, after a cooling-off period, Cosby working on TV again? Indeed, with the charges against Cosby having long ago exceeded what the casual news reader is able to comprehend, and with the comic largely falling out of the news cycle, perhaps the cooling-off period is already underway. As long as a celebrity is willing to play to whomever is their base, they’ll eventually see their critics silenced, because it’s simply too frustrating and tiresome to protest a problematic star who won’t express remorse, or go away. Cosby seems to relish performing, and has plenty of admirers who are willing to pay to see him do it. That’s a more powerful force than those angered by the allegations against him, who can do little but continue to speak out—and Cosby has already made it clear that he’s not listening. ```json [{"@context":"https://schema.org","@type":"NewsArticle","@id":"https://time.com/3842016/bill-cosby-comedy-tour-assault-allegations/","mainEntityOfPage":{"@type":"WebPage","@id":"https://time.com/3842016/bill-cosby-comedy-tour-assault-allegations/"},"headline":"Bill Cosby's Comedy Tour Is Ending, But His Career Could Well Go On","datePublished":"2015-05-01T13:30:37.000Z","dateModified":"2026-05-11T05:04:16.309Z","description":"As Cosby's latest comedy tour winds down, he remains unimpeded by a recent scandal","url":"https://time.com/3842016/bill-cosby-comedy-tour-assault-allegations/","keywords":["celebrities","Bill Cosby topic"],"thumbnailUrl":"https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/blt3eec2ca84225ef2d/6987791e5f570f7573b149a8/bill-cosby.jpg?branch=production&width=1200&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=1200:675&height=675","author":[{"@type":"Person","name":"Daniel D'Addario","jobTitle":null,"url":"https://time.com/author/daniel-daddario/"}],"articleSection":"Entertainment","image":[{"@type":"ImageObject","url":"https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/blt3eec2ca84225ef2d/6987791e5f570f7573b149a8/bill-cosby.jpg?branch=production&width=1200&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=1200:675&height=675","width":1200,"height":675,"headline":"Jackie Robinson Foundation 2014 Awards Dinner","caption":"Jackie Robinson Foundation 2014 Awards Dinner","creditText":"Stephen Lovekin—Getty Images","representativeOfPage":true}],"publisher":{"@type":"Organization","name":"Time","url":"https://time.com/","logo":{"@type":"ImageObject","url":"https://time.com/images/logo.png","width":528,"height":156},"foundingDate":"March 3, 1923","sameAs":["https://www.facebook.com/time","https://www.instagram.com/time/?hl=en","https://twitter.com/time","https://www.pinterest.com/timemagazine"]}},{"@context":"https://schema.org","@type":"BreadcrumbList","itemListElement":[{"@type":"ListItem","position":1,"item":{"@id":"/section/entertainment/","name":"Entertainment"}},{"@type":"ListItem","position":2,"item":{"@id":"/tag/celebrities/","name":"celebrities"}},{"@type":"ListItem","position":3,"item":{"@id":"https://time.com/3842016/bill-cosby-comedy-tour-assault-allegations/","name":"Bill Cosby's Comedy Tour Is Ending, But His Career Could Well Go On"}}]}] ```