NEWSBehind-The-Scenes Drama: Joy Behar Takes Over 'The View' As Whoopi Sidelined
Jan. 7 2021, Updated 9:27 a.m. ET
Joy Behar returned to The View on Monday, November 23, after her absence on Friday, but Whoopi Goldberg was missing in action. As a result, Behar was tasked with filling in for Goldberg while the show's moderator dealt with some behind-the-scenes drama.
Behar kicked off the program by revealing that Goldberg was dealing with technical issues that the show was working to resolve. That is the same problem that ABC's top-rated daytime show was forced to deal with Thursday, November 19, when both Behar and Sunny Hostin were nowhere to be seen at the start of the episode.
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Unlike Thursday, when Hostin and Behar were missing for five and ten minutes, respectively, Goldberg's absence lasted less than a minute. The speed at which this technical problem was solved made it seem as though this might be some sort of joke as to what happened last week, but a spokesperson for the show assured OK! it was technical difficulties.
The show then went off without issue or any signs of tension between the hosts on Monday: Goldberg, Behar, Hostin, Sara Haines and Ana Navarro — who was absent both Thursday and Friday of last week. Navarro has been filling in for Meghan McCain, who is out on maternity leave.
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Behar was absent on Friday, one day after that behind-the-scenes drama forced Goldberg to go live with just Haines on Thursday. A short while later, Hostin joined the ladies, followed a few minutes later by Behar.
A rep for the show blamed a technical glitch for the delay on Thursday's The View. Still, Behar appeared to be particularly rattled and seemed distant throughout the episode. She was also wearing mismatched earrings and struggled to read off her questions to the show’s guests. Even her jokes, which seldom fail to land, were a bit off during the program.
A rep for the show told OK! that Behar had been scheduled to take Friday off, but did not reveal when the host made that request.
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JOY BEHAR ABSENT FROM THE VIEW ONE DAY AFTER BEHIND-THE-SCENES DRAMA
Behar has been on the panel for 22 of the show’s 24 seasons, having exited the show in 2013 only to return in 2015.
It is still not clear why Behar was out of sorts, and when contacted by OK! on Thursday, a rep for the show would only say: “We have to give kudos to our outstanding production team who didn’t miss a beat when Joy’s and Sunny’s systems needed to be rebooted. The show must go on and Whoopi and Sara got the show started with Sunny and Joy soon joining once they were back up and running.”
Goldberg was quick to acknowledge how strange a situation the show was in at the top of the episode on Thursday. “Well hello, and welcome to a very unusual View,” said the show’s longtime moderator. “Apparently there are just two of us here today. It’s the Sara and Whoopi show until some else checks in.”
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She then tossed things over to her co-host for the morning. The lack of hosts was all the more jarring since the show is still airing socially-distanced episodes, meaning that both women were broadcasting from their home and not together in the studio. “And then there were two,” joked Haines.
There was a brief pause between the ladies until Goldberg replied: “That’s it. So shall we just hit it until someone comes through?”
