Keshia Knight Pulliam is ‘happy’ for Geoffrey Owens, ‘speechless’ about Cosby

Keshia Knight Pulliam has nothing but kind words for her former Cosby Show costar Geoffrey Owens, who made headlines earlier this year when he was job-shamed for working at Trader Joe’s.

“I’m really, really happy for him,” the actress, 39, told Us Weekly exclusively during the It’s a Wonderful Lifetime celebration at The Grove in Los Angeles on Wednesday, November 14. “He’s an amazing man, and I’m grateful that the situation happened and shed light on this because it really kind of backfired on the people who tried to shame him in realizing that there’s nothing wrong with earning an honest living.”

A customer at a Trader Joe’s in New Jersey snapped photos of Owens, 57, working behind the register in September. The actor later said on Good Morning America that he took the job because he wanted something with more “flexibility.” Soon after being shamed online, Owens accepted an offer to have a recurring, 10-episode role in Tyler Perry’s The Haves and the Have Nots.

“I hope people have learned the lesson that your job or what you’re doing right now does not define your worth as a human being,” Knight Pulliam told Us. “People are people, so at the end of the day, it’s not our job to judge, but I’m grateful this has become an amazing blessing for him.”

Another Cosby Show alum who made the news earlier this year was the show’s titular character and patriarch, Bill Cosby. The disgraced comedian, 81, was sentenced in September to three to 10 years in prison for drugging and sexually abusing former Temple University employee Andrea Constand.

Knight Pulliam, who played Cosby’s daughter Rudy Huxtable on the NBC sitcom from 1984 to 1992, supported her TV dad throughout his trial. They even walked arm-in-arm into the courthouse in June 2017.

“I’m really speechless about the whole thing,” the Celebrity Big Brother alum told Us on Wednesday about Cosby’s verdict. “Like, that’s just the bottom line.”