'The View' Somehow Managed to Get Even Worse as Writers' Strike Leaves Whoopi Totally Lost
It turns out, the legal department’s lawyers aren’t the only writers for “The View.”
Most Americans who are even aware of ABC’s hour-long exercise in intellectual ineptitude probably look at “The View” like a particularly annoying happy hour in a college town: A collection of wealthy, ill-informed women voicing utterly conventional opinions on the “hot topics” of the day.
But the Writers Guild of America strike that started Tuesday revealed there’s something else going on besides the usual limousine leftist echo chamber — and Whoopi Goldberg & Co. weren’t dealing with things particularly well.
At the top of the hour, Goldberg — the de facto ringmaster of the chattering circus — announced to the viewers of “The View” that the show was going on despite the writers’ strike, and the warts might show.
They showed — almost immediately.
“OK. So you know how we’re always talking about how we’re very different than most other shows,” Goldberg said. “Well, as you know, there’s a writers’ strike going on, so we don’t have writers. So you’re going to hear how it would be when it’s not, you know, slicked up. OK?”
Apparently, “slicked up” in Goldberg parlance means actually knowing what topics of conversation are going to come up next.
Check out Goldberg’s exchange with Brian Teta, executive producer of “The View,” posted by Nicholas Fondacaro, associate editor at NewsBusters.
As a segue between segments, it’s about as un-“slicked up” as it gets.
“Apparently, The View’s writers were the ones keeping the train on the tracks,” Fondacaro wrote.
Apparently, The View’s writers were the ones keeping the train on the tracks in terms of telling them what topics they were talking about and in what order. They had to rely on their producer, Brian Teta, to tell them they were talking about ChatGPT. pic.twitter.com/Ly54W37mbC
— Nicholas Fondacaro (@NickFondacaro) May 2, 2023
“So, Brian, since we don’t have writers, what do you think is next?” Goldberg asked.
“I believe we’re going to talk about ChatGPT,” Teta responded, referring to the artificial intelligence program that’s making waves for a leftist political bias that leads to wildly incorrect statements that are offensive to the point of repugnance.
(Does that bring any particular morning talk show to mind?)
Keeping the show going without writers might have been a problem for “The View” co-hosts (and disillusioning for fans who might have thought the cackling members of the coven cast their own spells), but critics saw the humor in the moment.
The hags don’t write their owm material?
— libertyforall (@liberty60479294) May 3, 2023
Did the trained seals in the studio go on strike too? Will they have to go with canned laughter and applause?
— Robert Craigen (@RCsEvilTwin) May 2, 2023
Wow I didn’t know that they didn’t write all those lies
— Michael OCallaghan (@Michael94366903) May 2, 2023
Washed up actresses & journalists sitting around reciting the words of underpaid writers, and this is where people some people get their news. The entire thing is a real life sitcom.
— SliqTalk (@SliqTalkk) May 3, 2023
To be fair, it’s probably not professional writers who come up with the worst of what some call “The Spew.”
Even a moderately educated writer with a modicum of self-respect (and a moment for reflection) would probably avoid using the kind of lines that have the co-hosts forced to read corrective “legal notes” on an all-too-common basis, almost always related to conservative politicians or political figures.
Last year, Ginni Thomas, the wife of Supreme Court Justice Clarence Thomas was the subject of five corrective notes from legal, according to NewsBusters, the most for any single individual.
So, the vitriol is almost certainly a product of the co-hosts’ own maliciously empty heads. But keeping the show on topic and running smoothly? That’s a job for competent professionals, and according to an Associated Press report Wednesday, the writers’ strike could well last a while, possibly into the fall.
It will be interesting to see if “The View” sticks it out that long.
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