Barbara Walters, the intrepid interviewer and program host who led the way as the first woman to become a US TV news superstar during a remarkable career, has died at the age of 93.
Walters, who created the popular ABC women’s talk show The View in 1997, died at her home in New York, Robert Iger, chief executive of ABC’s corporate parent, Walt Disney, said in a statement. The circumstances of her death were not given.
“Barbara was a true legend, a pioneer not just for women in journalism but for journalism itself,” Iger wrote. Her publicist, Cindi Berger, said: “She lived her life with no regrets. She was a trailblazer not only for female journalists but for all women.”
A statement from the producers of The View – which featured an all-female panel for whom any topic was on the table said Walters created the show in 1997 “to champion women’s voices”, and said it was “proud to be part of her legacy”.
During nearly four decades at the network, and before that at NBC, Walters’ exclusive interviews with rulers, royalty, and entertainers brought her celebrity status that ranked with theirs, while placing her at the forefront of the trend in broadcast journalism that made stars of TV reporters and brought news programs into the race for higher ratings.
Walters interviewed an array of world leaders, including Fidel Castro, Margaret Thatcher, Muammar Gaddafi, Saddam Hussein, and every US president and first lady since Richard and Pat Nixon.
She had the first interview with Rose Kennedy after the assassination of her son, Robert, as well as with Princess Grace of Monaco and President Richard Nixon. She traveled to India with Jacqueline Kennedy, to China with Nixon, and to Iran to cover the shah’s gala party.
She earned 12 Emmy awards, 11 of those while at ABC News, the network said.
Walters’ critics said she too often asked softball questions and she was long skewered for a 1981 interview in which she asked Hollywood actress Katharine Hepburn what kind of tree she would like to be. Walters pointed out that she only asked because Hepburn had first compared herself to a tree.
But she knew how to ask tough questions, too. “I asked Yeltsin if he drank too much, and I asked Putin if he killed anybody,” Walters told the New York Times in 2013. Both answered no. Walter began her journalism career on NBC’s The Today Show in 1961 as a writer and segment producer. She began getting air time with feature stories – such as a report on her one-day stint as a Playboy bunny – and became a regular on the program.
Walters made headlines in 1976 as the first female network news anchor, opposite Harry Reasoner, with an unprecedented $1m annual salary that drew gasps and criticism – while lost in the outcry were her additional duties extending beyond the news.
Reasoner made his disdain for Walters obvious even when they were on the air, and Today show host Frank McGee resented her presence and tried to limit her role. McGee insisted she wait for him to ask three questions before she could open her mouth during interviews with “powerful persons”.
“These two men were really quite brutal to me and it was not pleasant,” Walters told the San Francisco Examiner. “For a long time, I couldn’t talk about that time without tears in my eyes. It was so awful to walk into that studio every day where no one would talk to me.”
Her drive was legendary as she competed – not just with rival networks, but with colleagues at her own network – for each big “get” in a world jammed with more and more interviewers, including female journalists who had followed on the trail she blazed.
The New York Times called her “arguably America’s best-known television personality” but also said that “what we remember most about a Barbara Walters interview is Barbara Walters”.
For 29 years she hosted a pre-Oscars interview program featuring Academy Award nominees. She also had an annual “most fascinating people” show but dropped it when she decided she was weary of celebrity interviews.
“I never expected this!” Walters said in 2004, taking the measure of her success. “I always thought I’d be a writer for television. I never even thought I’d be in front of a camera.”
But she was a natural on camera, especially when playing notables with questions. “I’m not afraid when I’m interviewing, I have no fear,” Walters told Associated Press in 2008.
