After more than thirty years in television,
The View co-host
Barbara Walters was finally given one of the most prestigious honors in the entertainment industry: a star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame.
Walters’ star was situated on the sidewalk in front of the Kodak Theater and sandwiched between those for American Idol host
Ryan Seacrest and musical group Destiny’s Child.
“This strange alignment makes me hip and hot,” Walters’ remarked at the ceremony. By her side were her
The View co-hosts
Elisabeth Hasselbeck and
Joy Behar. Other guests at the event included Police Chief William Barton, Walt Disney Co. Chief Executive Bob Iger, and Kathy and Nicky Hilton.
Walters, the daughter of theatrical booking agent Louis Edward Walters, first became part of the NBC network’s
The Today Show in 1961. After one year of working as a writer and researcher, she became one of the most prominent reporters in the show. In 1974, she was officially named the first female co-host of
The Today Show, and five years later, joined host Hugh Downs on ABC’s
20/20, where she devoted 20 years of her professional career as a television journalist.
The nature of her work has allowed her to converse with many personalities in and out of the entertainment industry. Among her most memorable interviewees are Monica Lewinsky, former Egyptian President Anwar Sadat, former Israeli Prime Minister Menachem Begin, Boris Yeltsin, Margaret Thatcher, Fidel Castro, Indira Gandhi, Hugo Chavez and Michael Jackson.
In 1997, Walters launched and began co-hosting the all-female morning talk show,
The View. Since its premiere, the show has earned several Daytime Emmy Awards, two of which was for its longtime director Mark Gentile. For this year’s awards ceremony, Walters received a nomination for Outstanding Talk Show Host (which she shared with the other women of The View), but lost to comedienne Ellen DeGeneres, who won for her daytime talk show,
The Ellen DeGeneres Show.
-Lisa Claustro, BuddyTV Staff Columnist
Source: USA Today
(Photo Courtesy of USA Today)