Jenny McCarthy on her year from hell onThe View.
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As the 11th co-host onThe View, Jenny McCarthy found herself in a horror movie.
Whoopi Goldberg had no patience for Barbaras clinging to whatever power she had left.
And ABC bosses soon realized that they had accidentally dumped what had madeThe Viewsuccessful the panels fire and ice.
Jenny, who had been a guest onThe Viewin the past, had already survived a traumatic encounter backstage.
You know the movieMommie Dearest?
Jenny asked me one afternoon over lunch.
I remember as a child watching that movie and going, Holy cow!
She paused for effect.
Ive never seen a woman yell like that before until I worked with Barbara Walters.
I was onOprah, Jenny recalled.
Everyone was coming out of the woodwork.
I was mainly getting, Thank you for speaking up.
Her publicity tour took her all the way toThe View.
Before the interview, a producer told Jenny that Barbara wanted to speak to her.
I walked into her dressing room and she blew up at me, Jenny said.
She was screaming, How dare you say this!
That autism can be cured?
My knees were shaking.
I remember my whole body was shaking.
Jenny responded that she never used the wordcuredto describe Evans condition.
Youre such a liar!
This lasted for about seven minutes, Jenny said.
Finally, someone pulled me out of the room.
I went back to my dressing room, not knowing what the fuck to do.
One of my heroes just chewed me a new asshole, and Im going on live TV.
Im freaking the fuck out.
As they pull out from her face, Im sitting there, terrified.
Jenny wasnt worried about what she had to say; she thought Barbara wouldnt let her speak.
It was not like I was trying to prove a scientific fact.
I knew she couldnt outsmart me in this interview because she cant tell me what happened with my child.
I was able to calm myself down.
The conversation played out more peacefully than it had in the dressing room.
Barbara challenged Jenny as any journalist would about the idea that autism could be cured.
Barbara often said that she thought Jackie might have been autistic.
Back then, there really wasnt anything you could do about it, Jenny said.
She didnt want to hear that there was maybe a possibility that her sister could have gotten better.
When Jenny finished the interview, she made a promise to herself.
I said, Im never going on the fuckingViewagain.
Cut to a few years later, I have more books to sell.
She fully read my book cover to cover, Jenny said.
She was hugging me, loving on me.
I was like, This is the craziest fucking shit Ive ever experienced in my life.
Jenny saw an opening for herself.
I remember thinking to myself,I want to do something that has a little more class to it.
And spread my wings a little bit.
In 2013, she hosted a cable talk show on Friday nights, where C-list stars guzzled down Martinis.
My VH1 show was a little too raunchy.
I wanted something in the middle.
Then she heard about Joy Behars departure.
I thought to myself,Thats where Im going next.
Bill Geddie invited her to audition for season 17.
I went on and it went great, and I went on again.
They said, Youre in the top consideration to be a co-host.
As she waited for an offer, she pursued an opportunity with CBS for her own daytime show.
She believed, perhaps naively, that there would be more job security onThe View.
I would rather be on a show thats established, she told herself.
That summer, in 2013, CBS tried to get her to sign with them.
Shit, he said.
Give me an hour.
That was the winning formula onThe Talk, which still trailedThe Viewin the ratings.
I liked her, Geddie said.
For some reason, our audience never warmed to her.
Another option: the comedian Ali Wentworth, fromIn Living Color, who was married toGMAco-anchor George Stephanopoulos.
Since Barbara didnt feel strongly about any of the options, she let Geddie choose his favorite.
She was too big of a name then.
He made the case to ABC, and they drafted a contract.
I thought that for the show they wanted to do, she was a good choice.
One red flag that no one seemed to worry about was Jennys views about autism.
Hed told her they wanted her to riff on movie stars.
Thats the word he kept using: It was verypolarizingto the audience.
He told her, We want pop culture, irreverent, fun, sassy.
I checked all those boxes for him.
Media outlets that didnt normally cover daytime TV, such as theColumbia Journalism ReviewandThe Nation, voiced their disapproval.
He expressed concerns about Jennys becoming the new Elisabeth, with quackery instead of political controversy.
Discussing the news, even at 11 in the morning, comes with responsibility, he wrote.
Jenny believed that the hostility toward her originated from a lobbying group that wanted to silence her.
I had to deal with a hurricane, a tornado.
I consider myself to be pro-vaccine, but prosafe vaccine.
They are invisible but powerful.
Geddie tried to assure her that it didnt matter, that there was no such thing as bad publicity.
I was a nervous wreck.
I just let go of my own talk show in Chicago.
I had signed a one-year contract withThe View.
Now Im dealing with all this bad publicity and I have to feed my baby.
When Jenny started atThe View, she wondered which version of Barbara shed see every day at the studio.
Hopefully, I get the Barbara Walters who is nice, she told herself.
The timing of her arrival made that unlikely.
For Barbara, Jenny represented that the end was near.
Her memory was cloudy, and shed been known to make odd outbursts in private conversations.
Imagine a woman like Barbara Walters, Jenny explained.
Its her last year and she doesnt want to leave.
And Im the new bitch there.
One day in Hot Topics, Jenny sounded off about Katy Perry dating the bad-boy musician John Mayer.
I saw Barbaras face with her big saucer eyes look at me, Jenny said.
Then we went to a commercial.
She said, Who is it that youre talking about and why are you bringing her up?
Im, like, Thats Katy Perry.
You interviewed her last week!
Jenny recalled, That wasnt the right thing to say.
I felt everyone kicking me under the table.
The other co-hosts had devised a method to send signals to one another about how to deal with Barbara.
You either had the knee hold or the kick under the table.
Who is Jenny McCarthy?
Barbara asked on TV.
Jenny played it off as a joke.
I totally brushed it off.
Thats where Barbaras head was.
She was spacing out.
She was checking out.
Within days,The Viewhad new instructions for Jenny.
I panicked because I dont consider myself a political person.
My controversy is in vaccines.
I know Im not talking about that every day.
Now I had to figure out, Am I coming out as a Republican or a Democrat?
Where do I stand on all the social issues and political issues?
At the start of the season, Jenny had visited Whoopis house, thinking they could maybe be friends.
I loved her inGhost, Jenny said.
I thought I was going to work with the Whoopi that people thought they might know fun and funny.
But Whoopi didnt warm to Jenny.
The table is an interesting dynamic because it reminds me a little bit ofSurvivor.
There were allies, and there werent many people to choose from.
Do I side with Barbara, who is royalty, but shes leaving?
Or do I take Whoopi, who is a force to be reckoned with?
Jenny aligned with Sherri Shepherd, knowing that they had similar personalities as moms with young boys.
Jenny didnt want to build a friendship out of a power grab.
That left Barbara and Whoopi to face off, each with a grip on her own corner ofThe View.
There was a war between Barbara and Whoopi about Barbara wanting to moderate, Jenny said.
This is one of the reasons I decided not to ally with Whoopi.
It broke my heart when Barbara would shuffle to Whoopi and say, Can I moderate, kindly?
And Whoopi would say no.
How can you do this to a woman who paved the way for so many female journalists?
The reason were doing this job is because of Barbara Walters.
Barbaras fixation on the moderators chair turned into an unhealthy obsession.
Whoopi resented that Barbara was trying to run her over.
Whoopi was very angry, said Jenny.
She was angry that she wasnt being paid what she was worth, rightfully so.
The internet hadnt even offered Whoopi a raise for keepingThe Viewafloat.
People dont understand, Jenny said.
Whoopi can knock over anyone in a debate.
Her voice is strong not only in meaning but also in sound.
I would be stepped on or interrupted.
Jenny thought that Whoopi didnt like that Jenny hadnt deferred to her enough.
I wasnt going to play a kiss-ass.
She had an addiction to controlling all of it and everybody.
When she wore glasses on the show, viewers attacked her on Twitter for trying to look smart.
I just couldnt fucking see.
The teleprompter was so far.
We would all show up in the makeup room, Jenny said.
Barbara would check out what I was wearing.
If she didnt agree with it, or it didnt complement her outfit, I had to change.
Barbara would object to Jennys choosing a summer dress on a cold day.
What the hell are you wearing?
Barbara asked her about a sleeveless outfit by designer Victoria Beckham.
Mind you, she doesnt look at anyones clothes but mine, Jenny said.
Id go, Barbara, youre wearing your own clothes.
Jennys outfits were pulled by a stylist.
Shed attempt to remind Barbara, Stores right now have the spring collection.
Theres nothing I can do.
I always had to go put on a sweater.
And then there was this: She wanted to start dressing like me.
I was a human Barbie doll.
To protect herself, Jenny tried to avoid Barbara.
When Id hear the shuffle of her feet, I knew that Barbara was after me.
It would get faster.
Oh my God shes coming!
Based on the speed of the shuffle, I would hide or get on the phone.
One morning that autumn, Jenny answered the door to her dressing room.
Barbara was very upset about something shed seen in the communal bathroom.
She wasnt trying to be mean to Jenny.
But she needed to express her disapproval and shed lost her bearings.
Jenny, theres a tampon floating in the toilet and its disgusting.
I dont have my period.
Do something about it!
I dont know what to do, Jenny said, flabbergasted.
Shes standing in the hallway where the guests are, yelling at me about a tampon.
This is Barbara Walters.
Im not going to yell at her.
So finally I said, Ill take care of it.
Ill take one for the team and Ill flush it.
AsThe Viewwent back to a disaster zone, the online grid rang the alarm bells.
At least under Rosie, the show was a ratings phenomenon.
With Jenny at the table, people were turning it off.
We didnt bring the numbers up that year, Geddie said.
They blamed everyone but themselves.
The idea that a show has legacies to maintain, this was lost on them.
Without politics,The Viewhad lost its edge and felt like every other copycat talk show.
All the jaws in the room dropped.
They felt we needed more conflict, Sherri told me.
I remember Whoopi making faces and saying, Were not going to fight at the table.
AsThe Viewtried to swivel back to politics, Jenny found herself in an awkward situation.
They did make a run at change me.
They wanted Elisabeth back, and I wasnt Elisabeth.
Jenny wanted to quit.
I was going to work crying.
I couldnt be myself.
My fans were telling me, Wheres Jenny?
They arent letting you be you.
If all this werent hard enough, Barbaras health continued to deteriorate.
One day, just as the show ended, she collapsed into the arms of a stage manager.
She had to be taken to the greenroom, where they laid her down on a sofa.
The staff called the paramedics.
Once inside, she locked the door and wouldnt let anyone in.
Barbara, are you okay?
She finally came out to be taken to the doctor.
The next day, Barbara acted like it was business as usual.
She kept saying backstage, I dont want to go.
I dont want to leave, recalled Jenny, who felt bad for her.
Look at what Barbara did to me.
I had zero hard feelings.
I loved her like a grandma.
She didnt know any better.
But Jenny was less forgiving of her other co-host.
Whoopi wouldnt budge she wasnt forfeiting her ground.
Every day I went home and I was miserable, Jenny told me.
It really was the most miserable Ive been on a job in my 25 years of show business.
I kicked myself for not taking the CBS job, of course.
But I felt there was a little bit of hope.
The viewers who grew up with Barbara could tell that it was time for her to let go.
