by Mj Ferruzza

Created on: May 31, 2007

Rosie O'Donnell had a juggernaut daytime talk show.
She was an alternative to Oprah by just offering good old fashioned
celebrity fawning and musings. Her show was a throw back to a Merv Griffin or Mike Douglas type talk show. She was even considered a bookend to David Letterman's Late Night Talk Show.
Her fans didn't care about her sexuality as long as she (like them) fawned over Tom Cruise.

She was East Coast and could promote East Coast things like Soaps, Broadway, and Stars who may or may not have been on Regis & Kathy Lee earlier that day.

The chink in her armor started when she ambushed visiting guest Tom Selleck on his membership and support of the NRA (quite a turn from a mostly apolitical TV show).
And when she tried to compete with Oprah by starting a magazine named after her. (If the Rosie O'Donnell Show was running like a well tuned engine, Oprah's Empire was a Lear Jet...Rosie's Magazine folded from mismanagement or just lack of content and sales!)

Her sexuality became a media sensation during the popular Ellen is Out! Era of the Entertainment. She lost little in her amount of viewers, but die hard fans no longer believed that she was oh so hot for the George Clooneys or Brad Pitts.

Burned out (but probably bored) and rich she left her show and retired to Florida. She occasionally would make an appearance. Even produce a faltering theatrical or two.

Joining the View was not a tough decision. Get back into the public eye. Bicker with some heterosexual women. Play tough guy (or just be opinionated without having to be entertaining). Participating on The View would raise her "Q" Number and she would get a talk show again!

Rosie has her sights set on Late Night Talk especially with the coming shake up at NBC (Leno/O'Brien) in 2009. Will she go the Arsenio Syndicated route? Does she want an after slot (after Dave or Conan)? Does she still have the chops to carry an hour long comedy/variety talk show? We'll have to wait and see. But...It may take more than just shooting cooshballs at the audience.

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