Posted on 07/21/2025 7:23:16 PM PDT by E. Pluribus Unum
SAN JOSE, Costa Rica (AP) — Malcolm-Jamal Warner, who as teenage son Theo Huxtable on “The Cosby Show” was central to a cultural phenomenon that helped define the 1980s, died at 54 in an accidental drowning in Costa Rica, authorities there said Monday.
Costa Rica’s Judicial Investigation Department said Warner drowned Sunday afternoon on a beach on Costa Rica’s Caribbean coast. He was swimming at Playa Cocles in Limon province when a current pulled him deeper into the ocean.
“He was rescued by people on the beach,” the department’s initial report said, but first responders from Costa Rica’s Red Cross found him without vital signs and he was taken to the morgue.
Warner created many TV moments etched in the memories of Generation X children and their parents, including a pilot-episode argument with Cosby about grades and careers, and another episode where Theo tries in vain to hide his ear piercing from his dad.
Theo was the only son among four daughters in the household of Cosby’s Cliff Huxtable and Phylicia Rashad’s Clair Huxtable on the NBC sitcom, and he would be one of the prime representations of American teenage life and Black boyhood on a show that was the most popular in America for much of its run from 1984 to 1992.
(Excerpt) Read more at apnews.com ...
From all accounts, nice guy.
Sounds like he panicked in a Riptide. RIP Malcom
Very sad...RIP!
Oh man! I liked his character. RIP Malcolm.
Major bummer.
Wow... so sad. RIP MJW.
That’s usually how deaths occur they panic not knowing what to do and the rip currant swallows them up very sad he was an amazing actor I’ve watched every episode of the Cosby show he was truly talented RIP
Swim parallel to the shore, when you are caught in a riptide.
Yep.
Sad. What’s a brotha doin’ in the water?! C’mon, man.
Rest in Peace and prayers to his family!
They should have huge signs on every beach reminding people of that.
About 50 yards to the south, I was "gaining ground" toward shore.
They really should. Makes you wonder what percentage of people are aware how dangerous riptides can be or that they even exist. Pretty sad that MJW probably drowned because he did not know that.
Even if you do know it, I’m sure in panic mode, it suddenly becomes counter-intuitive for some.
A riptide is usually only about 20-30 yards wide.
Wow...did not know that!
The reason you want to swim on beaches with lifeguards
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