The Slippery Slope From Success To Downfall Quiz

Answer: Bill Cosby

In the 1980s Bill Cosby was the star of one of the biggest shows on television. "The Cosby Show" was the sit-com that majored in homely family values. Then in 2004 the first cracks started to appear in Cosby's personal life when a woman accused him of sexual assault. Ten years later, more than 60 women had told similar stories of abuse dating back to the 1960s. In 2018 he was convicted of aggravated indecent assault and drugging and sexually assaulting a woman in 2004. He was sentenced to a jail term of three to 10 years.

Answer: Harvey Weinstein

It all started to fall apart for Weinstein in October 2017 when allegations of decades of sexual harassment were made by several leading actress. He apologised but it did not save him from being sacked from the board of his production company. The allegations continued and the numbers increased until around 80 individuals had made claims.

In January 2020 he went on trial. After almost two months of hearings, Weinstein was found guilty of a number of charges and was sentenced to 23 years in jail.

Answer: Lance Armstrong

Lance Armstrong was idolised as the hero who won the Tour de France cycle race seven years in a row. Rumours started to circulate that Armstrong had used performance-enhancing drugs. He denied them.

After his seventh win, Armstrong retired, but made a comeback and soon the speculation began again. He consistently denied all allegations and pointed out that he had passed numerous drugs tests. In 2012, though, he was banned for life from all competitive sports and his titles were purged. In 2013, Armstrong appeared on the "Oprah Winfrey" television show and admitted that he had taken drugs throughout his career.

Answer: Phil Spector

Phil Spector was the man behind the "wall of sound" music effect that was much in demand by many singers and bands. In all, about four dozen songs by some of the biggest acts around were produced by Spector, according to sngfacts.com. In 2007 an actress, Lana Clarkson, was found shot to death in Spector's home. Two years later he was found guilty of second degree murder and jailed for 19 years.

In January 2021, it was reported that Spector had died in hospital from natural causes.

Answer: Roscoe Arbuckle

By the age of seven Roscoe "Fatty" Arbuckle was hailed for his singing voice and soon began travelling with a theatre group. He started off in the movies as an extra but his talent was quickly recognised and in 1918 he was offered a contract worth $3million - that is $49m in today's money. In 1921, at the height of his career as the highest paid actor in the world, it all came crashing down. He was accused of the rape and manslaughter of the actress Virginia Rappe. She was found dead in a hotel room after a party hosted by Arbuckle.

He was charged and the first trial resulted in a hung jury. He was retried with a similar result. In a third hearing a jury found him not guilty - and even gave him a written apology. Whatever happened when Arbuckle and Rappe were alone in a hotel room, the evidence against him - on detailed examination - was circumstantial. The formal cause of death was a ruptured bladder and peritonitis, probably from a pre-existing condition. Acquittal was not to be enough. Arbuckle's star had been eclipsed and he could not get any decent roles - even the movies he had made were binned. By the 1930s he had started directing, but he died of a heart attack at the age of 46.

Answer: Robert Maxwell

Born Ján Ludvík Hyman Binyamin Hoch in Czechoslovakia in1923, he later changed his name to Robert Maxwell. He fled Nazi occupation and served with the British Army in World War 2, earning a Military Cross (MC). After the war he began to build a publishing empire that led to the pinnacle of owning the British popular newspaper "The Daily Mirror". (Among other enterprises).

A larger than life character, Maxwell became a Member of Parliament, and was also known in high social circles. But the sheen of success for 'Captain Bob", as he was known, began to tarnish. Rumours of bullying followed him, as did one that he was a spy for Israel. His companies began to lose money and he propped them up with resources from the pension fund of the "Daily Mirror". Many once-loyal employees faced huge losses when they retired. In 1991, his body was recovered from the Atlantic Ocean close to his luxury yacht "Ghislaine". Did he fall, or did he jump was the question that has never been answered.

Answer: Charlie Sheen

I will write that again in case you thought it was a typo Charlie Sheen was paid $1.8m an episode for his starring role in "Two and a Half Men" and was U.S. television's highest paid star. In 2018 it was reported he was down to his last $10m dollars, and still owed money to the taxman.

An alcohol addiction seemed to pre-empt Charlie Sheen's fall from grace and he entered rehab. More sessions followed over the years and he also had anger management issues that led to physical assaults. In 2015 he revealed he was HIV positive. By 2019 Sheen appeared to be getting his life back on track. On Jay Leno's television show he said he had overcome his addictions to drugs and alcohol and had been sober for many months.

Answer: Gary Glitter

Glitter by (adopted) name and glitter by nature, the British pop star born Paul Gadd cut a flamboyant figure. For several years in the 1970s he strutted his stuff on stage and on record, taking "I'm the Leader of the Gang (I Am)" to number one in the UK in 1973.

But Glitter hid a dark secret: his perversion for young children. In 1999 he was jailed for four months for possessing thousands of images of child abuse. Afterwards he fled the UK for Cambodia, but was then deported to Vietnam. More jail time followed and he returned to the UK in 2008 but more allegations and a court appearance followed in 2015.

He was jailed for 16 years.

Answer: Rolf Harris

"Can You Tell What It Is Yet?" was a catch phrase of Rolf Harris who mixed painting with music on his television show. He was actually a talented painter (even if he did 'trace' his television paintings onto a blank piece of paper over a pre-painted scene - oops, another television secret revealed). As a singer, Harris had chart success with songs like the tear-jerker "Two Little Boys" and the humorous "Tie Me Kangaroo Down".

Then in 2004 a dark past began to emerge. Harris went on trial in 2014 on charges of indecent assaults and one of sexual assault on victims aged 12 and 42 between 1971 and 2004. He was jailed for five years and nine months. Appearing for the defence, his barrister said "It's difficult to imagine a harder or faster or deeper fall from grace than that suffered by Rolf Harris."

Answer: Jimmy Saville

It may have been 20/20 hindsight, but after the complete and utter trashing of the deceased Jimmy Saville's reputation, many people were heard to say "I always thought there was something creepy about him". Jimmy Saville made his name as the presenter of radio music shows in the UK (what were once termed 'disc jockeys'). He was also the presenter of a TV show "Jim'll Fix It". It involved young people writing in and expressing their wishes - perhaps a day behind the scenes at a radio station - and he would arrange for it to come true.

He was also involved in charitable work. Among this was volunteering at a hospital for people with behavioural problems (name deliberately omitted by quiz author). After his death it emerged that all the while he had been abusing vulnerable people. To make things worse, his former employers, the British Broadcasting Corporation (BBC), had been working on a documentary that would have exposed his predilections much earlier, but shelved it. In 2011, Independent Television (ITV) broadcast "Exposure: The Other Side of Jimmy Savile". So reviled did his reputation become that appearances on re-runs of "Top of the Pops" his links were were cut. The headstone at his final resting place was removed by his family.