Biography
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Lisa Bonet is best known for being on The Cosby Show alongside Bill Cosby and Tempestt Bledsoe, among others, but Bonet actually began acting when she was 11, attending many auditions and participating in several television commercials before she became a star.
Lisa Bonet was known to have a wild side, like her character of "Denise" in the
Cosby show. In 1987 she accepted the part of a s--y character in the movie
Angel Heart opposite Mickey Rourke, directed by Alan Parker. Her appearance
there drew some controversy and some scenes had to be edited for the
American public. Her explicit s-- scenes in the film drew concern from the
producers of "The Cosby Show," who felt it detracted from the image of her
character. The film did not help her movie-acting career and she returned to
the television world with another Cosby-produced show, A Different World. In
1987 she married singer Lenny Kravitz. In 1988, she posed naked for Rolling
Stone Magazine, causing a large controversy and serious concerns from Cosby,
who treated her and the rest of the actors who played his kids on the show
as if they were his real-life kids. Although posing naked gave her name much
international exposure, it did not help her career in the movies very much.
After giving birth to daughter Zoe in 1989 Lisa Bonet's erratic professional
behavior began to worsen. She was constantly late (or did not show up) for
tapings of her sitcom, and eventually she was removed from it entirely. (It
seemed to fare well in the ratings without her.) Her character was brought
back to The Cosby Show, but as she continued to behave unprofessionally she
was eventually fired. She and Kravitz divorced in 1993 and she began to
accept jobs on straight-to-video releases and made-for-TV movies. Soon after
she changed her name legally, deciding to keep using her birth name on the
productions she participated in. Soon she started dating yoga instructor
Brian Kest, with whom she had another child, and in 1998 she had a
supporting role in Enemy of the State with Will Smith. In 2000 she appeared
in the movie High Fidelity. Lisa Bonet later appeared in the film "Biker Boyz".