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Joy Behar has been absent from several episodes of The View this week.
And fans of the show are growing increasingly concerned about the 83-year-old’s health and well-being.
Longtime viewers know that Joy has been a fixture on The View since its very first episode, back in 1997.
Behar took an extended hiatus from the show between 2013 and 2015, but those years aside, she’s appeared in virtually every episode.
So where has she been this week? And is she planning another extended hiatus?
Here’s everything we know about this perplexing situation:
Whoopi Goldberg explains Joy’s absence, admits uncertainty about return
On Wednesday’s episode of The View, co-host Whoopi Goldberg offered the most detailed explanation yet of Joy Behar’s situation.
“Well, hello, hello, hello, and welcome to The View, y’all,” Goldberg said at the start of the taping (via People). “Now, Joy is out because she hurt her foot, and hopefully she’ll be back here tomorrow.”
Goldberg went on to say that Behar had suffered a foot injury that prevented her from attending Tuesday and Wednesday’s tapings.
She apparently took a scheduled day off on Monday.
It remains to be seen if Joy will be in attendance for Thursday’s taping. We’ll keep you posted as new information becomes available.
Joy’s decades of ‘View’ stardom
Earlier this year, Joy recalled the long and winding road that led her to her gig of more than 28 years.
“When I got this job — when was it? 1997? — I was sort of on the cusp of getting a sitcom. I had been in a sitcom already, and I’d done a pilot,” she said.
Interestingly, she says her agent initially advised her against signing on to The View.
“The call comes for this job to do The View with Barbara Walters. Do you know that my agent told me not to take it,” she added.
The agent, it seems, felt that The View didn’t pay enough, but Joy “knew that it would be a smart show.”
And nearly three decades later, we can’t picture the show without her. We wish Joy a speedy recovery and hope to see her back on the panel soon.
