Audition: A Memoir by Barbara Walters

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Barbara Walters has been called the most important woman in the history of broadcast journalism, but she refuses to retire to a marble pantheon. Indeed, she continues to interview celebrities, stoke media controversies, and inspire mimics. Oddly enough, Audition is her first real book; a grand, deeply personal, sometimes defensive memoir that covers almost eight decades of intense activity. With surprising candor, the famed View host talks about her childhood as the privileged daughter of a Broadway producer who later went broke and her early career in an environment distinctly hostile to women. Although she describes in detail her numerous headline-making interviews with world leaders, Hollywood stars, and even Monica Lewinsky, one senses the author's presence throughout as a solitary, sometimes lonely beacon of self-sufficiency.

From the Publisher

Young people starting out in television sometimes say to me: “I want to be you.” My stock reply is always: “Then you have to take the whole package.”

And now, at last, the most important woman in the history of television journalism gives us that “whole package,” in her inspiring and riveting memoir. After more than forty years of interviewing heads of state, world leaders, movie stars, criminals, murderers, inspirational figures, and celebrities of all kinds, Barbara Walters has turned her gift for examination onto herself to reveal the forces that shaped her extraordinary life.

Barbara Walters’s perception of the world was formed at a very early age. Her father, Lou Walters, was the owner and creative mind behind the legendary Latin Quarter nightclub, and it was his risk-taking lifestyle that gave Barbara her first taste of glamour. It also made her aware of the ups and downs, the insecurities, and even the tragedies that can occur when someone is willing to take great risks, for Lou Walters didn’t just make several fortunes—he also lost them. Barbara learned early about the damage that such an existence can do to relationships—between husband and wife as well as between parent and child. Through her roller-coaster ride of a childhood, Barbara had a close companion, her mentally challenged sister, Jackie. True, Jackie taught her younger sister much about patience and compassion, but Barbara also writes honestly about the resentment she often felt having a sister who was so “different” and the guilt that still haunts her.

All of this—the financial responsibility for her family,the fear, the love—played a large part in the choices she made as she grew up: the friendships she developed, the relationships she had, the marriages she tried to make work. Ultimately, thanks to her drive, combined with a decent amount of luck, she began a career in television. And what a career it has been! Against great odds, Barbara has made it to the top of a male-dominated industry. She was the first woman cohost of the Today show, the first female network news coanchor, the host and producer of countless top-rated Specials, the star of 20/20, and the creator and cohost of The View. She has not just interviewed the world’s most fascinating figures, she has become a part of their world. These are just a few of the names that play a key role in Barbara’s life, career, and book: Yasir Arafat, Warren Beatty, Menachem Begin, George H. W. Bush, George W. Bush, Jimmy Carter, Fidel Castro, Hugo Chávez, Bill and Hillary Clinton, Roy Cohn, the Dalai Lama, Princess Diana, Katharine Hepburn, King Hussein, Angelina Jolie, Henry Kissinger, Monica Lewinsky, Richard Nixon, Rosie O’Donnell, Christopher Reeve, Anwar Sadat, John Wayne . . . the list goes on and on.

Barbara Walters has spent a lifetime auditioning: for her bosses at the TV networks, for millions of viewers, for the most famous people in the world, and even for her own daughter, with whom she has had a difficult but ultimately quite wonderful and moving relationship. This book, in some ways, is her final audition, as she fully opens up both her private and public lives. In doing so, she has given us a story that is heartbreaking and honest, surprising and fun, sometimes startling, and always fascinating.

The New York Times - Janet Maslin

…[a] legitimately star-studded autobiography…the portrait of a deftly calculating woman with an impeccable sense of timing…There will never be another television news career like this one.

The Washington Post - Kathleen Matthews

Breaking news: Barbara Walters wears fake eyelashes, is afraid to drive, gave up her black married lover to save her career (while his went down the tubes). These and other true confessions provide the tabloid interest through 600 pages of the network diva's new memoir, Audition. But it's her heartfelt candor that lifts this book above mere titillation. Finally we learn why Walters is so relentless. It's a question I've often pondered watching her on television after beginning my own TV news career 30 years ago. In this engaging and chatty look back at a life largely lived in public view, Walters provides the answer.

Publishers Weekly

Although Walters writes, "It was not in my nature to be courageous, to be the first," her compulsively readable memoir proves otherwise. No one lasts on TV for more than 45 years without the ability to make viewers feel comfortable, and Walters's amiable persona perfectly translates to the page. She gives us an entertaining panorama of a full life lived and recounted with humor and bracing honesty. Walters is surprisingly candid: about her older sister's retardation, her father's suicide attempt, her midlife affairs (including ones with John Warner—before and after his marriage to Elizabeth Taylor—and a very married Edward Brooke, the first African-American elected to the U.S. Senate since Reconstruction), her daughter's troubled teen years and her acrimonious relationships with coanchors Frank McGee and Harry Reasoner. She vividly recounts her decision to leave NBC's TodayShow after 14 years to become the first female nightly news coanchor, and tells of the firestorm of criticism she endured for accepting that pioneering position and its million-dollar salary. Alternating between tales of her personal struggles, professional achievements and insider anecdotes about the celebrities and world leaders she's interviewed, this mammoth memoir's energy never flags. 32 pages of photos. (One-day laydown May 6)

Nicole A. Cooke - Library Journal

Listeners have two recordings of Walters's 580-page tell-all from which to choose. The abridged version is read by the media personality herself, and other than affording listeners her authentic voice, complete with her trademark lisp, this version is not worthwhile-lasting just six hours, it omits massive amounts of information; notably, Walters's affair with former senator Edward Brooke.In the unabridged version, Bernadette Dunne does a fine job as a surrogate for Walters. The quality of both versions is excellent, and both are appropriate for audio and biography collections in all types of libraries. The unabridged version is recommended for purchase, though some collections may warrant the abridged, CliffNotes™ edition. [Audio clips available through www.booksontape.comand www.randomhouse.com/audio; the Knopf hc, released in May, is an LJ Best Seller, a title most borrowed in U.S. libraries.-Ed.]

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Product Details

• ISBN: 0739327305
  
• ISBN-13: 9780739327302
• Format: Paperback, 977pp
• Publisher: Random House Large Print
• Pub. Date: May 2008
• Edition Description: Large Print
• Sales Rank: 2,179

• Table of Contents
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Table of Contents

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