Rosie O’Donnell explains why a return to ‘The View’ is unlikely: ‘Whoopi really didn’t like me’ – EW.com

Rosie O’Donnell may have been able to bring back her daytime talk show for one night, but don’t expect her to return to The View any time soon.

In an interview with Howard Stern, the former host of The Rosie O’Donnell Show explained her 2015 exit from The View, saying, “I think we all agreed … that it was better for everyone. Whoopi really didn’t like me.”

After O’Donnell first left The View in 2007, Whoopi Goldberg replaced her and was given the moderator position. Prior to returning to the ABC daytime show in 2014, O’Donnell told Stern that she went to Goldberg’s house to make sure her casting would not be an issue, telling her fellow comedian, “I only want to do this if you want me to do this with you.”

While O’Donnell did not share Golberg’s response, any assurance she was given soured by day one of production. O’Donnell told Stern she upset Goldberg by throwing the show to a commercial break when her co-host seemed to miss a queue from producers. O’Donnell would eventually leave the show again in 2015, after only four months of working with Goldberg.

“Whoopi Goldberg was as mean as anyone has ever been on television to me, personally,” O’Donnell said in Ramin Setoodeh’s 2019 book Ladies Who Punch: The Explosive Inside Story of The View. She elaborated on the quote to Stern, saying she was referring only to her on-camera moments with Goldberg. “When people say, ‘Well, what happened?’ I say, ‘Go back and watch them.’ It’s not like a mystery. Watch the way it went down, and I don’t need to say anything.”

O’Donnell noted that she recently had an unexpectedly pleasant encounter with Goldberg. When she arrived to a Megan Mullally and Nick Offerman concert, her former The View co-host happened to enter the venue right behind her. They said an effusive hello, and the maître d’ even offered them a table for two. When O’Donnell declined the table because she was meeting actress Ally Sheedy there, Goldberg looked at her and said, “Would it be that bad?”

EW has reached out to representatives for The View and Goldberg for comment.

Related content:

• Watch Alan Menken’s delightful medley of Disney hits from Rosie O’Donnell’s benefit show
• Watch Whoopi Goldberg greet a live audience of empty chairs on The View
• Elisabeth Hasselbeck reacts to Rosie O’Donnell’s crush confession: ‘I immediately started praying’

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