Joy Behar mourns her ‘mentor’ Barbara Walters: ‘I will miss him’

joy behar paid tribute to Barbara Walters following his death at the age of 93. The comedian, who co-hosted Intuition – which was created by Barbara – since 1997 appeared on abc to remember the television myth. “She became a mentor. She is definitely the role model for many people in the world of entertainment and the world of news… 31.

“She was always prepared and always working on her material. She didn’t go there and she didn’t know what she was doing. It was an important thing to learn,” the 80-year-old recalled, also sharing that Barbara had an unexpected sense of humor. “She could laugh, have fun, tell a dirty joke. It was so much fun!… We laughed a lot inside and off camera,” he also said during the interview.

“Of course, [she’s] she meant a lot to me in my professional life and in my career: she came to see me at a charity event and that’s how she met me… she understood that humour,” Joy said of their first meeting at the end of the 1990s.” He said, ‘who? is that woman?’ And that was the beginning of her decision to call and air me,” adding, “I will miss her.”

Joy and Barbara have had a long working relationship since the early days of Intuition. Although Joy was not a full-time part of the original cast and was initially a fill-in host, she was quickly added to the group as a regular host during the first season.

Barbara described the show at launch as “a talk show featuring four or five women ‘of different backgrounds, different generations and different opinions’, discussing the topics of the day, mixing humor with intelligent debate” during “Hot Topics”. , followed by interviews with guests from the political and entertainment scene.

Joy was a fixture Intuition since 1997, she has only left for two years starting in 2013 after being fired. “Someone wanted me to leave,” she told her in 2017 at PEOPLE. “It wasn’t 100% my choice. When they told me they weren’t going to renew, I said, “Great, I’m leaving.” She didn’t like how the show was going at the time,” she told of the two-year hiatus, in which she still appeared as a guest host. She said she was “glad to be fired” TIME magazine, finally returned full-time in 2015 and currently still hosts the series.

Before in reality fired, it turns out that Joy was almost on the block thanks to Barbara herself in 2006 for accidentally revealing that Rosie O’Donnell joined the cast. Joy recalled the Hulu scenario Behind the table: an exhibition meeting. “[EW called and] She said, “Oh, and Rosie O’Donnell is coming on the show.” And guess who told him?’” Joy said, remembering Barbara’s conversation with her. After Joy speculated that maybe Meredith Vieira spilled the beans, Barbara replied, “No, you! Joy Behar did it. And I want you to know that I’m not renewing your contract. Notably, Joy remained in the series at the time.

Barbara retired from the show in 2014, receiving a legendary send-off from her co-hosts, including Joy, as well as many other women she has inspired on television.

Click to sign up for our free daily HollywoodLife newsletter for the hottest celebrity news.