When blah-blah-blah can ruin the View!

Sometimes when you're in TV, and often on TV, it's best to not forget that the microphones are always on, one way or another. It can pay to filter what's on its way from the neuronal highway down to your mouth, before the entire world (or a compartmentalized section of it) gets to hear it or read it. 

This is something that resonates with a certain Jenny McCarthy today, I imagine, after recent events surrounding the television version of (un)happy families, commonly known as "The View". In a recent interview for the "New You" magazine when asked the job interview-like question of where she thought she would be in a couple of decades, McCarthy wheeled out the rather optimistic statement that she expected to still be on "The View". This became an extremely ironic state of affairs when it was subsequently announced (seemingly mere hours later) that "The View" had in fact unceremoniously exited her. Ouch!

Now don't get wrong, I don't know what she was doing on that show in the first place, but you have to be totally heartless to not feel even a wee bit of sympathy for her, but that's all she gets. Especially on a show that has become a dysfunctional version of musical (host) chairs of late, one should not predict that even the show will be around in twenty years, never mind oneself! It sure came across as a serious touch of hubris on Jen's part, not least given the fact that this show was founded by a real deal, old school, living legend journalist, i.e. none other than our Babs, Barbara Walters. Need I say that Jen ain't no Barb?!

Quite what McCarthy thought she contributed that made her in any way whatsoever indispensable, is way beyond even my imagination. She's a former Playboy alumni, who parlayed that into way more fame than was merited (is it ever merited?!) and some bright spark at "The View" felt that her extremely controversial views on autism and vaccination, and parenting, somehow made her qualified to be spouting on any number of topical issues on a daily basis on the show. The last thing I remembered her hosting was some candyfloss tropical island version of "The Bachelor(ette)"; all bare skin and exposed hormones, which is way more her thing than any legitimate talk show. 

It remains quite shocking to many that Walters and Geddie let her in, not least in the face of serious and vocal objections by personalities from Time magazine, The New Yorker, The Huffington Post, and even some public health authorities who began Twitter campaigns to get her booted from the show. 

"It's high time the woman who once said that 'I do believe sadly it's going to take some diseases coming back to realize that we need to change and develop vaccines that are safe' took a step back and reconsidered the merits of that increasingly crackpot stance. And it's time she acknowledged that clinging to research that's been deemed patently fraudulent does not make one a 'mother warrior.' It makes her a menace."

But the fact that a former Playboy model managed to almost start a movement in terms of her totally uneducated opinion on how vaccination causes autism, in the absence of any medical/scientific evidence of any kind, well, it kind of does prove that when you have fame, you can get taken seriously on any number of matters that you have almost zero foundation for talking publicly about. I mean, who in God's name wants to hear Sharon Osbourne's opinions on basically anything, yet there she is on the execrable (and execrably-named) "The Talk" - a weakass attempt to clone/compete with the heretofore queen of housewives' talk shows, "The View". 

It's either that someone made a huge mistake when bringing Jen in, or that they always knew that her arrival would cause a lot of fuss (i.e. free publicity), then they could dispense with her when she didn't work out. TV has become that cynical of late, I feel, if one thinks of all the shenanigans that have gone on in the talking heads arena in recent times. McCarthy lasted barely a year in the end, and if that was a sign of producing issues on the show, well, even veteran linchpin producer Bill Geddie is now out, so someone must have decided that enough was enough, I guess. 

Hearing McCarthy announce that she was leaving too if Sherri Shepherd was out came across as hilarious given the fact that McCarthy was already out, in spite of her excruciatingly embarrassing prediction of two decades more on "The View". I will bet you any amount of money imaginable that had she not already been out, she would not have said a word about leaving herself! But saving face is King, even when exited from the queen of daytime talk shows, it seems. 

These shows are such stereotypes, and in the absence of real, raw talent and professional polish as exemplified by a Barbara Walters or a Meredith Vieira, then they are doomed to repeat previous mistakes and get further down and dirty, all in the relentless pursuit of ratings. This fact is underscored by the almost inconceivable return of that classic loose cannong radical, Rosie O'Donnell. God help them, but if they hired her again then they are gluttons for punishment and they deserve what happens next. I am sure the Trumpster would agree with me!

It was no shock at all that Rosie's "The View" nemesis, Elisabeth Hasselbeck, went on the offensive and attacked the move. But Hasselbeck herself should never have been on that show; her only claim to fame previously having been a non-winning contestant on "Survivor", but like Jen she was blonde and glamorous so let's bring her on. Sadly, she was as out of touch with the show's demographic as O'Donnell is to listening to anyone else's opinions on almost anything. Quite appropriate that Hasselbeck refers to her outrage as a #monoversation on Twitter, because essentially all of her spouting on "The View" was either talking to herself, or to the 1%-ers in the audience. No one at the table ever cared to hear it. 

The thing that really annoys me about all of these shows with a bunch of women spouting their varied opinions is that rarely is anyone even close to being an authority on anything, so it's all meaningless blah-blah until the bitching begins. Then things start to get really interesting if you are either the show's producer(s) or a bored audience member. Production values have become so crass that this is what they really want to see today, as opposed to deep, meaningful actual conversation. Cue that split screen of Rosie and Elisabeth going at it on the "View"! 

I am sorry, and maybe it's my stereotypical male point of view (no pun intended!), but if you put a gaggle of gals of varying ages from different generations and cultures combined with questionable degrees of "celebrity", together at a table, well, it almost certainly is going to get bitchy once the gloves come off. At some point when home on a day off, it took mere minutes of listening to Behar, Hasselbeck, O'Donnell and Walters going at it to cringe in physical pain and change the channel in a flash. All I can say is that all those housewives must truly be bored if they can sit and listen to that high paid bitching, each and every day! And/or, no wonder the hubbies get it in the ear over dinner in the evening, after their gals got amped up by a huge fight on the show earlier, and the wife is just bursting with tension over what happened. 

"You wouldn't believe what that bitch said about my girl Elisabeth, how dare she?! They were all ganging up on her, I wanted to fly to New York and race to the studio to defend her! Uh-huh. How are the kids today? What? Listen! There's evidence that some of these vaccines cause autism, I heard all about it! Isn't Jenny an amazing mother warrior? Don't be ridiculous, vaccines don't cause nothing, and I should know, I am a doctor! Oh yeah, go on, play the MD card, and put down one of my girls, why don't you? You never listen, and you refuse to try to understand, you men are all the same! Aww, for Christ's sake, not another evening ruined by that godamn show again, I am off down the pub for a pint and a burger and the football game. You can be exited from this show, boy, just like my Elisabeth was, don't you dare leave this set, errr, house!!" 

One day we might get back to higher class highbrow TV conversation shows that actually deliver content and actually remember that there is an audience out there; maybe someone should be told that seeing a bunch of famous and famously overpaid women going at it, or ganging up on each other, does little for those seeking distraction. It just reminds them of their very own coffee mornings or girls nights out - because the days of "The View" (or any of the current wannabe clones) actually being inspirational are sadly way, way back in the past. Just as the memory of Jenny McCarthy ever being on the show soon will be!

If I was in ABC's place, I would be thinking long and hard about how to turn this thing around, because it's starting to look like a sinking ship. No, I do not in any way believe that Rosie O'Donnell is going to steer the ship into calmer waters, and we all know already that if she slips even once or twice, she will be lucky to survive one year. Come back Babs, all is forgiven, because in the absence of a real journalist or someone respected as an authority on contemporaneous topics - it's all just blah-blah-blah spoiling the view! - Kevin Mc