Is it possible that the late Barbara Walters was forced out of her seat on The View — the hit daytime talk show that she created in 1997?
via: Page Six
ABC forced an ailing Barbara Walters to quit “The View” in 2014, according to former co-host Lisa Ling.
In a recent interview, Ling recalled a conversation she had with Walters on the late broadcast journalist’s last day on the talk show.
“‘Barbara, in a couple of months, are you going to be lounging in a hammock in Tahiti?’” Ling said she asked Walters while they were off the air.
“And [Walters] just leaned over and whispered, ‘They’re making me quit,’” the CNN host claimed to the Cut in a story published March 13.
Ling, 49, told the website that she has “never shared this with anyone.”
After starting her legendary career at NBC, Walters joined ABC in the 1970s and created “The View” in 1997. She co-hosted the roundtable show for 17 seasons and remained an executive producer until her death last year.
“I do not want to appear on another program or climb another mountain,” she told the Los Angeles Times in 2013 before retiring. “I want to instead sit on a sunny field and admire the very gifted women — and OK, some men too — who will be taking my place.”
But Walters also spoke about the changing tides in journalism that foreshadowed the end of an era.
“Since the Britney Spearses of the world and sensational crime stories became the big network draws, international political leaders, with few exceptions, have come to be considered dull fare,” she wrote in her 2008 memoir, “Audition.”
After leaving “The View” — which centers on discussions about politics, entertainment, family and other trending topics between a diverse cast of voices — Walters leaned out of the spotlight and into a more private life.
During her career, Walters received numerous accolades, including multiple Emmys and a Lifetime Achievement Award from NATAS. At one point, she was the highest-paid TV journalist. She interviewed countless politicians, icons and pop culture figures including Barbra Streisand, Monica Lewinsky, Fidel Castro and every president since Richard Nixon besides Donald Trump.
The “20/20” alum died in December 2022 at the age of 93.
“Barbara Walters passed away peacefully in her home surrounded by loved ones. She lived her life with no regrets,” her rep, Cindi Berger, said in a statement to Page Six at the time. “She was a trailblazer not only for female journalists but for all women.”
Ling, for her part, was a co-host on “The View” from 1999 to 2002. She currently hosts “This Is Life with Lisa Ling” on CNN.
Ling decided to leave the ABC show so she could pursue other ventures.
“I loved doing ‘The View,’ but I was 26 years old when I was doing it,” she told Larry King in 2013, “and I still had this desire to be in the field, and I was kind of constrained to be in a studio five days a week.”
