Who

Joy Behar is a stand-up comic and co-host of The View.

Backstory

Born into an Italian-American family in Brooklyn, Josephina Victoria Occhiuto started out teaching at Lindenhurst High School on Long Island (Pat Benatar was a student of hers). Set on a career in entertainment, Behar traded a career in education for a receptionist job at Good Morning America. After she was fired six months in for being rude to callers, she turned to stand-up comedy and eventually landed a call-in talk show on WABC radio. In 1997, Barbara Walters spotted Behar performing at a birthday party for Milton Berle and a few months later Behar was called in to audition for Walters's new chat show. She won a co-hosting spot on The View, and has been there ever since, bickering with her co-anchors and hosting the segment "Joy's Comedy Hour," where she spotlights young comedy talents.

Of note

Like all the ladies on The View, Behar has had her fair share of spats. She publicly feuded with former co-host Star Jones over everything from Jones' extravagant wedding to her rapid weight loss. (Memorably, after Jones gabbed excessively about her breast augmentation on air, Behar interrupted Jones' recapitulation of her saga with the terse cut-off, "Keep your tits perky!" which prompted Jones to call her a bitch.) But after Star left the show and the Rosie O'Donnell era began, Behar frequently found herself in a referee role during Rosie and Elisabeth Hasselbeck's all too regular disputes. Now that Rosie's been replaced with Whoopi Goldberg, Behar doesn't have to play babysitter as much.

On the side

Behar has written three books, the first of which was the 1999 memoir Joy Shtick—Or What is the Existential Vacuum and Does It Come with Attachments? She followed up with a kids' book about her late dog Max, called Sheetzucacapoopoo: My Kind of Dog, and most recently released When You Need a Lift: But Don't Want to Eat Chocolate, Pay a Shrink, or Drink a Bottle of Gin. She's also served as a spokesperson for Jenny Craig; she claims the diet helped her lose 23 pounds in 11 weeks.

Medical file

Behar almost died from complications related to an ectopic pregnancy in 1979.

Personal

Joy married college professor Joe Behar in 1965; the pair had a daughter, Eve, before divorcing in 1981. Behar now lives with longtime boyfriend Steve Janowitz in an Upper West Side apartment decorated by HGTV design guru Robert Verdi. (Her daughter lives in the same building.) She also owns a barn-style vacation house in Sagaponack, although she claims to hate the beach.