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Barbara Walters passed away on December 30, 2022, but she will always be remembered for here iconic and deep celebrity interviews.
The legendary Barbara Walters died on December 30th at the age of 93.
From the mid-1970s through the early 2010s, no one could land a coveted interview with headline-making stars like Walters could. She was a leading figure for women in journalism until the day she retired from ABC News in 2014. Throughout her career, Walters won 12 Emmy Awards, 11 of those while at ABC News.
Walters made her mark with her initial appearances on Roone Arledge’s ABC News. Her sharp perspective on news and culture helped her transform from a writer and producer to an iconic on-air personality for NBC News’ “Today.” Her first outing was reporting on haute couture in Paris, but she really made herself “Today’s” coverage of President John F. Kennedy’s assassination.
She was known for being a master of sit-down interviews, talking to everyone from Hollywood legends to world leaders and controversial figures. Here are 8 of Barbara Walters’ biggest interviews.
8/8 Barbara Walters’ Iconic 1999 Interview With Monica Lewinsky
Barbara Walters’ March 4, 1999, interview with Monica Lewinsky, after her relationship with President Bill Clinton was revealed, remains the highest-rated TV interview special of the past 25 years. An estimated 74 million viewers tuned in to see the former White House intern break her silence after 14 months of incessant media coverage.
Nearly 50% of Americans tuned into the two-hour 20/20 special to see Walters ask questions like if Lewinsky was still was in love with Clinton, to which Lewinsky answered “No. Sometimes I have warm feelings. Sometimes I’m proud of him still, and sometimes I hate his guts. And, he makes me sick.”
At another time, Walters asked Lewinsky, “What will you tell your children, when you have them?,” to which Lewinsky replied, “Mommy made a big mistake.”
7/8 Barbara Walters Interviewed Christopher Reeves In 2002
Barbara Walters’ interview with Superman actor Reeves is one of her most heart-wrenching. Barbara Walters interviewed Reeve several times after a 1995 equestrian accident left him paralyzed. Reeve’s 2002 interview with Walters determined his legacy as a survivor using his experience to advocate for the rights of the disabled.
He died two years after the 2002 special aired. She called it “one of the most moving interviews I ever did.”
6/8 Barbara Walters Interviewed Fidel Castro In 1977
Barbara Walters flew to Havana to interview Castro in 1977 and enjoyed a 10-day adventure where the leader drove her around Cuba in his Jeep. The dictator historically escorted Walters and her crew across the Bay of Pigs — making them the first Americans to traverse the inlet in 16 years since America’s failed 1961 invasion.
“The word charismatic was made for him. You would have liked him, I would have liked him,” she told ABC’s Byron Pitts in 2016. “Then you had to stop and say, ‘Just a minute.’ You know, this is a man who does not believe in freedom of the press, does not believe in democracy as we know democracy, had political prisoners. But when you were with him, he was forceful, charming, forthcoming.”
5/8 Barbara Walters’ 1981 Interview With Katharine Hepburn
This 1981 interview with Katharine Hepburn is not Barbara Walters finest moment. This is mainly due to the moment when the Oscar-winning actress compared herself to a tree, and Walters pushed to learn which specific type she meant. Hepburn quickly snaps, showing off her legendary wit.
In 2006, Walters addressed the comment in a special titled 30 Mistakes in 30 Years. She begins with No. 30: “And it’s a big one. Never ask anyone what kind of tree they want to be…”
Another iconic moment is when Walters asks the late actress if she ever wore a skirt. “I’ll wear it to your funeral,” she quips.
“You’ll wear it to my funeral?” Walters asks in response. “I’d be delighted to know you were coming. May I tell my friends?”
Read Related Also: The Truth About Good Morning America’s T.J. Holmes And Amy Robach’s Relationship
4/8 Barbara Walters’ 1990 Interview With Donald Trump
Barbara Walters did not hold back when she frilled the future president in 1990 about his financial situation. Donald Trump waves away doubt about his precarious finances, calling them “lies” and then told Walters that bankers told him he was stronger than ever.”
Walters wasn’t that easy to fool. She announced Trump was on the “verge of bankruptcy” and had been “bailed out by the banks.”
“Skating on thin ice and almost drowning, that’s a businessman to be admired?” asked Walters before announcing she had personally spoken to his banker.
Trump continued to argue that his bankers were telling him he had made a “great deal.” Walters bluntly responded, “No, they’re not.”
3/8 When Barbara Walters Interviewed Mike Tyson And Robin Givens In 1988
In 1988, Barbara Walters sat down with boxer Mike Tyson and his then-wife Robin Givens to discuss the alleged violence in their relationship.
Walters pressed the infamous coupon about why they remained together and bluntly asked him if he was abusing the actress. A week after the interview, Riverdale actress Givens filed for divorce. Many praised Walters for asking Givens, despite Tyson’s presence in the room.
Although neither explicitly addressed the accusations, Givens did give a telling answer: “I think for the first time I can understand abused women…you know, you say, ‘Why do you stay in there?’ Well, number one, you love the person, and number two, you get accustomed to being treated poorly. So every day, behavior that you would normally not accept becomes everyday behavior.”
She also described being married to him as “torture, pure hell, worse than anything I could possibly imagine.”
When asked if he hit her, Given replied, her husband sat beside her. “He shakes. He pushes. He swings. Sometimes I think he’s trying to scare me … He’s got a side to him that is scary. There are times when I thought I could handle it, and just recently, I’ve become afraid. I mean very, very much afraid.”
2/8 Barbara Walters’ 1987 Interview With Sean Connery
In his 1987 interview with Barbara Walters, the former James Bond infamously tried to justify comments he made to Playboy 20 years earlier in which he defended slapping women. “I haven’t changed my opinion. … They want to have the last word and you give them the last word, but they’re not happy with the last word. They want to say it again and get into a really provocative situation, then I think it’s absolutely right.”
Sean Connery’s response prompts Walters to ask what such circumstances would “merit” slapping a woman. He responded with “Well, if you have tried everything else – and women are pretty good at this, they can’t leave it alone.”
He claimed in 1993 that the interview had been taken out of context “Barbara Walters was trying to get me to say it was OK to hit women. But I was really saying that to slap a woman was not the crudest thing you can do to her. I said that in my book – it’s much more cruel to psychologically damage somebody.” After Walters death, clips from the interview had gone viral with many wondering how Connery was allowed to make such remarks.
1/8 Barbara Walters Interviewed Brooke Shields In 1981
Brooke Shields complained in November 2022 that she felt taken advantage of by Barbara Walters’ questions during a 1981 interview. Not long after her infamous Calvin Klein jeans campaign, 15-year-old Shields and her mother Teri sat down for a tell-all interview that the actress/model now regrets.
“She asked me what my measurements were and asked me to stand up,” Brooke Shields told Drew Barrymore. “And I stand up, and she was like comparing herself to this little girl. And I thought, ‘This isn’t right. I don’t understand what this is.’”
“But I just behaved and just smiled,” she said, acknowledging that she “felt so taken advantage of in so many ways.”
“But over the years, you know when you’ve been in the public eye and have been commented on all the time, everybody has an opinion, and you all get to say it, and now that’s where social media I think can be dangerous. Then you learn to say no this is my truth,” Shields added.