Within the first episode of The Cosby Present, Cliff Huxtable (performed by Invoice Cosby) walks into his solely son’s messy room with a mission: getting him to care about enhancing his straight-D report card. However the teenager proves troublesome to rattle.
After his father makes a giant present of giving him Monopoly cash after which taking all of it away invoice by invoice for hypothetical bills, Theo (Malcolm-Jamal Warner) holds agency in his assertion that he doesn’t want to emulate his dad and mom as a way to be pleased. “For those who weren’t a health care provider,” he tells his father, “I wouldn’t love you much less, since you’re my dad.” Can’t the identical be true in reverse? For a second, it appears as if Theo has gotten by means of. However as a substitute, Cliff goes off, scolding his son for being “afraid to strive, since you’re afraid that your mind goes to blow up, and it’s gonna ooze out of your ears.”
The genius of the scene is that each characters are proper. Theo is afraid to strive, however he additionally acknowledges one in all his father’s limitations: Cliff has a really particular thought of what success appears like, which may burden his kids as they attempt to reside as much as it. It’s a testomony to Warner’s ability as a performer that even when Theo isn’t profitable an argument together with his dad, he evinces a posh vulnerability.
Warner, who died final week, on the age of 54, struck a fragile steadiness whereas taking part in Theo: He’s hubristic however not smug, clueless however not buffoonish. Nailing these nuances was key. Though at this time Cosby’s identify is inextricable from his tarnished legacy, The Cosby Present was nonetheless groundbreaking in its portrayal of a well-educated, middle-class Black household—and Theo’s story bookends the sequence, beginning with the Monopoly lesson and ending together with his commencement from faculty. Cliff makes use of robust love to show his son that arduous work is instrumental to prospering in life. However Warner performed Theo as the home jester, balancing the dramatic rigidity of his character’s unsure future together with his impeccable capacity to ship a one-liner. In the end, Theo’s improvement doesn’t quantity to easy “success” or “failure.” His arc comes into focus when he finds his sense of function—partially by difficult his dad and mom’ judgments and assumptions.
As a high-school freshman in the beginning of the sequence, Theo isn’t a lot for learning. As a substitute, he hopes to skate by on charisma alone—which not often works—and aspires to land quite a lot of unbelievable dream jobs, akin to tennis professional, pilot, and mannequin. Theo’s apathy serves as a counterpoint to Cliff’s moralizing in regards to the significance of schooling and household values to 1’s social mobility, which echoed Cosby’s personal. On reflection, Cliff’s fears about his son’s future foreshadowed the comic’s public excoriations of Black youth, which drew nationwide consideration within the early 2000s—primarily, his cost that they have been “going nowhere.” The harshness that typically emerges in Cliff’s strategy to parenting lands with a extra punitive thud in that context. And with Theo, we finally see that the slacker persona his father has projected onto him will not be the complete image.
Theo’s obvious lack of motivation often drives his father to theatrical extremes. In a single episode, Cliff enlists all the household to simulate the “actual world” for his son; the train walks Theo by means of getting a job, renting an house, and surviving life’s disagreeable realities for a day. Like the sooner Monopoly gambit, it doesn’t actually work. When his mom, Clair (Phylicia Rashad), suggests afterward that he’s discovered an essential lesson, Theo clarifies for her. “I discovered that after I go into the true world,” he says, “I don’t wish to do enterprise with anybody in my household.”
The episode’s punch line displays a standard parent-child dynamic: Reasonably than looking for frequent floor, either side put up a wall—within the Huxtables’ case, by means of humor. The Cosby Present indulges on this time and again, as Theo’s dad and mom invent dramatic methods to high school their son; they even go as far as to stage a mock trial to catch Theo in a lie. Their son, in the meantime, usually shrugs all of it off with a joke. The present’s early years typically performed the chasm between Theo’s overconfidence and the outcomes of his actions for laughs too. For instance, take a scene wherein he tries to impress his older sister Denise’s (Lisa Bonet) research buddy: Theo adopts a baritone voice, after which Denise manhandles him out the door.
As with many adolescent boys, Theo’s bravado is a masks for his still-developing id. The relatability of his “pretend it ’til you make it” perspective renders him endearing, even when he’s the butt of a joke. Nonetheless, Theo’s self-mythology suggests a latent disappointment, maybe stemming from a suspicion that he would possibly reside out his grownup life as a daily individual, moderately than the educated skilled his dad and mom count on him to develop into.
However for as typically because the present factors out the teenager’s foibles, Warner by no means lets viewers dismiss Theo outright. For some time, he animates his character’s puppyish demeanor with completely timed voice cracks and awkward physique language. But the actor slowly recalibrates as each he and Theo age, shifting the fumbling swagger towards a extra mature type of self-assurance. A number of the present’s most rewarding scenes arrive when Theo, as an older teen, earns his father’s respect by displaying up as his full self. On two separate events, Theo and his greatest pal, who goes by the nickname “Cockroach” (Carl Anthony Payne II), write a rap for a category task. Each iterations embrace catchy lyrics that reveal an understanding of the fabric; teenagers like Theo and Cockroach can do nice work, the present suggests, after they have room to be artistic.
It feels becoming, then, that Theo’s emotional turning level comes from a analysis that upends his dad and mom’ skepticism about him. After he enrolls in faculty, Theo learns that he’s dyslexic, which reframes his tutorial challenges, flighty aspirations, and self-doubts. (Charting a transparent path ahead is tough whenever you consider that you simply aren’t sensible sufficient to advance.) The revelation frees Theo from the “failure” narrative that the adults in his life have pinned on him; he begins performing higher academically in consequence. Extra essential, he invests his downtime in a significant, altruistic pursuit.
As a volunteer at the area people middle, Theo lights up whereas mentoring tweens who’ve struggles much like his personal, and never simply because he’s good at it. Working with a youthful technology offers Theo a platform to attract upon his life experiences and be taught as he goes, affirming his newfound sense of accomplishment. When one in all his advisers tells him he’s doing properly however isn’t “there” but, Theo agrees—a second Warner underscores by smiling to himself as he murmurs, “However I’m rising.” The pleasure Warner brings to the change displays simply how a lot his character has remodeled from an aimless teen afraid to fail into an grownup who acknowledges that trial and error are a part of life.
The Cosby Present closes with the entire household gathering. Though Cliff displays on the lengthy, arduous highway his son confronted to get right here, Theo’s actual triumph is completely different, and extra vital. He’s not feigning confidence or struggling to grasp why the issues that come simply to others are so troublesome for him. He received’t develop into a health care provider or a lawyer. After years of effort, he’s outlined what private success means to him. A way of course is what his dad and mom have wished for him all alongside. And now he’s discovered it for himself.
