Susan Page on the Legendary Broadcast Journalist and Television Personality Barbara Walters, Both Onscreen and Off

Today on the show we’re talking about the legend that is Barbara Walters. We actually have another journalist I admire, Susan Page, who wrote The Rulebreaker: The Life and Times of Barbara Walters (which just came out on April 23), talking about a journalist I admire, so our cup runneth over with powerhouse female journalists. Barbara lived a long, full life, passing away on December 30, 2022, at 93 years old. In her lifetime, she became one of the most well-known and well-regarded broadcast journalists and television personalities, perhaps most famous for her genius level interviewing ability and for breaking barriers that once prevented women from being equal to men when it came to broadcast journalism. She was an Emmy winner and hosted numerous programs like Today, the ABC Evening News, 20/20, and she created The View, which Susan and I talk about on the show today. She was a working journalist from 1951 until her retirement in 2015 and was very deservedly inducted into the Television Hall of Fame in 1989; she even has a star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame. In the early 1960s, Barbara was relegated to reporting on women’s interest stories on Today, but her popularity amongst viewers eventually catapulted to her becoming a co-host of the show in 1974, the first woman to hold such a role on an American news program. In 1976, she broke down more barriers when she became the first American female co-anchor of a network evening news program alongside Harry Reasoner on the ABC Evening News—which, um, did not go so well. Don’t worry, Susan and I talk about that, too. She became known for her annual Barbara Walters’ 10 Most Fascinating People, and during her career interviewed every sitting U.S. president and First Lady from the Nixons to the Obamas; she also interviewed both Donald Trump and Joe Biden, but not when either was president. Her interviews with subjects ranging from Fidel Castro to Monica Lewinsky and so many more gained her recognition as the best interviewer in the business, but who was Barbara Walters the person, not the personality? Well, Susan’s book lays it all out. We learn about Barbara’s marriages—she was married four times to three men—her daughter, other romantic relationships, and her childhood, especially her relationship with her father and her sister, and how those relationships shaped her into the woman she became. Today on the show to discuss it all is Susan Page, the Washington, D.C. bureau chief for USA Today. This is Susan’s third biography of a powerful woman: her first, about Barbara Bush, was released in 2019 and is called The Matriarch: Barbara Bush and the Making of an American Dynasty. She then released a biography about House Speaker Nancy Pelosi called Madam Speaker: Nancy Pelosi and the Lessons of Power in 2021, and her third book is The Rulebreaker. Susan has covered seven White House administrations and 11 presidential elections and has interviewed 10 presidents, right up there with Barbara Walters. She also moderated the 2020 vice presidential debate between Kamala Harris and Mike Pence, founded and hosts a video newsmaker series for USA Today called “Capital Download,” and appears frequently as a panelist or an analyst on various news programs, including Meet the Press—and was even president of the White House Correspondents Association at one point. I can’t wait for you to hear our conversation.

The Rulebreaker: The Life and Times of Barbara Walters by Susan Page