Controversy lost cachet, but sources say contract blocked O'Donnell's View • 1992: Rosie ... Rosie's exit blamed on money, | Sex Press
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Controversy lost cachet, but sources say contract blocked O'Donnell's View • 1992: Rosie ... Rosie's exit blamed on money,

Submitted by admin on Thu, 2007-04-26 11:00.

• Sept. 12, 2006: Ruffles the feathers of some viewers and View co-host Elizabeth Hasselbeck by saying "radical Christianity is just as threatening as radical Islam"

• Nov. 20, 2006: On The View , O'Donnell accuses daytime talk-show host Kelly Ripa of homophobia for an incident involving singer Clay Aiken. Ripa is aghast.

• Dec. 5, 2006: Makes infamous "ching-chong" remark about Chinese reaction to Danny DeVito's drunken appearance on The View . She later apologizes.

• Dec. 20, 2006: Questions Donald Trump's morals after comments the mogul made about the Miss USA pageant winner. Trump fires back and threatens to sue. A multiweek war of words begins. Trump calls O'Donnell "unattractive" and a "bully" She makes fun of his "comb-over"

• April 2, 2007: After O'Reilly calls for her to be fired, she compares him, on her blog site, to a character in George Orwell's 1984 who is "a fattish man of paralyzing stupidity, a mass of imbecile enthusiasms" She calls him a totalitarian puppet of News Corp. chairman Rupert Murdoch.

• April 24, 2007: Hosting the New York Women in Communications annual awards luncheon, she introduces award presenter Murdoch, owner of Fox News and the New York Post. "This is a celebration of women who changed the world, and no one understands why Rupert Murdoch is on the dais," she says. Turning to the audience, she adds: "I was looking for numbers on his head. There aren't any"

Rosie O'Donnell has been controversial since joining The View in September, but money — not her mouth — is apparently the reason for her planned departure in June.

Brian Frons, ABC's president of daytime programming, hinted at that, saying in a statement that "while we've tried to come to terms on a deal that would extend her co-hosting duties on The View, we find ourselves unable to agree on some key elements."

Unclear was what effect O'Donnell's brash opinions and name-calling had in ABC's refusing to meet her demands. These, too, could be some of the "key elements" mentioned by Frons, especially in the wake of the Don Imus story. CBS Radio fired Imus for making racist remarks.

One week on the job, O'Donnell said "radical Christianity is just as threatening as radical Islam." She also sparked a tiff with fellow talk-show host Kelly Ripa, accusing her of being homophobic.

Days later, O'Donnell's public feud with real-estate developer Donald Trump blanketed the airwaves starting in December and continuing into this year. O'Donnell called him a "snake oil salesman" and "a poor, pathetic man." Trump fired back and threatened to sue.

O'Donnell did not reserve all her venom for Trump. She also called out Paula Abdul, Simon Cowell, Bill O'Reilly and View co-host Elizabeth Hasselbeck on various occasions.

"I think I am in denial," Hasselbeck said on Wednesday's show, addressing O'Donnell. "I just feel like we've had such good conversation. I can't say it enough."

"Rosie's a loser, she continues to be a loser, and she was fired by ABC," he told Fox News. "I'm proud to say that I probably had a part in it.

"The feud got her good ratings, which I knew it would. But I had no choice but to attack her, because she is a slob and deserved to be attacked."

Barbara Walters, a co-owner of The View and instrumental in luring O'Donnell to the show, made it clear Wednesday that she had nothing to do with the most recent contract negotiations.

"It was not my doing," she said. "It was not my choice." She publicly thanked O'Donnell for a year that was "exciting, fun-filled and provocative."

By joining the show in September, O'Donnell immediately righted what had become a listing ship. Two View co-hosts had recently departed. Star Jones Reynolds was encouraged to leave, and Meredith Vieira was hired by NBC to replace Katie Couric as co-host of Today.

"She was accessible to the masses in a way that Stephen Colbert and Jon Stewart are not," said a cable programming executive, a reference not only to the difference between broadcast and cable TV but to The View's access to its core audience: women. "This is so disappointing."

In January, there was speculation she would leave The View to start up another daytime talk show. That could still happen, although not likely till 2008.

Late last year, reports surfaced that her briefly recurring character Dawn Budge on FX's Nip/Tuck would be plumped up into a series spinoff. But those stories were from View audience members who had overheard "between-commercial" talk between O'Donnell and Nip/Tuck's Ryan Murphy that never developed into anything serious.

There has been discussion about her doing a serious Broadway play with actor Danny Aiello. And she is producer of The Big Gay Sketch Show, an improv comedy series now airing on the cable network Logo.

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