Comedy kingpin Judd Apatow and Girls creator/star Lena Dunham shared a stage in New York on Monday to discuss Apatow’s new movie when the talk turned quickly to rape allegations against comedian Bill Cosby.
“I hope it’s not Cosby. Are you Periscoping?” Apatow said when he noticed a fan recording the event on his cellphone, according to the Telegraph.
“Bill Cosby is sitting in his house, watching,” Dunham joked. “You are literally his No. 1 enemy. He knows by now about you.”
Apatow has been a vocal critic of Cosby, at times calling him a “rapist” and a “monster.”
“I have people tweeting at me, ‘When’s Judd going to let it go with the Cosby thing,'” Dunham told the crowd at Lincoln Center in Manhattan. “I’m like, when are we as a country going to let it go with the defending rapists thing? It’s not like he was really upset about the finale of Breaking Bad and he just can’t stop talking about it.”
Of course, Dunham has some unfortunate experience with the issue of rape; last year, the writer and actress remained silent for months as an innocent man withered under the glare of a false rape accusation, according to an exhaustive investigation by Breitbart’s John Nolte.
Dunham didn’t hold back in going after Cosby on Monday.
“If Bill Cosby agreed to be roasted on a spit, I would participate,” Dunham reportedly said when asked if she would join in a Comedy Central “roast” of the comedian. “But if anything was like putting money in Bill Cosby’s pocket, then I would not participate.”
Dunham also said she wants to hear from other entertainment industry figures who have remained silent about Cosby.
“But that being said, I would love to hear all of the people in the industry who’ve stayed quiet and who’ve not wanted to speak until they saw any actual evidence of like, purchased quaaludes finally talk about what they’ve been f***ing thinking for the last six months.”
Last week, the Associated Press released a 2005 deposition in which Cosby admitted to giving quaaludes to women with whom he intended to have sex. In the wake of the report, activist groups had lobbied the Hollywood Chamber of Commerce to remove Cosby’s star from the Hollywood Walk of Fame. The Chamber of Commerce denied the request, but a statue of Cosby will be removed from a Disney theme park, and the comedians’ alma mater cut ties with him last year.
Apatow also called Cosby a “symbol of something that’s important.”
“I feel like women just not being listened to is what’s scariest,” the director said. “Bill Cosby is just a symbol for a situation that’s just so obvious, and yet people don’t stand up and say, ‘This is crazy, we should do something about it.’ Even now, people resist it, even when Cosby says he gave them quaaludes, I still get tweets every day where people are like, ‘Innocent until proven guilty.'”