I was “abused” in the Barbara Walters interview
Brooke Shields felt she was being “exploited” as a young teenager when she was grilled by Barbara Walters.
Recalling “the fiasco” from Tuesday’s episode of “The Drew Barrymore Show,” the world-famous model said she believed the legendary broadcaster was after a “negative soundbite” during their controversial encounter, which ended in took place in 1981 on the heels of Shields’ famous Calvin Klein jeans campaign.
“She asked me what my measurements were and asked me to stand up,” Shields, who was 15 at the time, told Barrymore. “And I stood up, and she was like comparing herself to this little girl. And I thought, ‘This is not right. I don’t understand what it is.
“But I just behaved and just smiled,” she said, acknowledging that she “felt so taken advantage of in so many ways.”
In fact, Shields once called her interview with Walters “virtually criminal” and “not journalism.”
“But then you learn to say no,” she explained, referring to another disturbing encounter she had when she was about “10 or something.”
“This woman asked the same question over and over,” the model said, clarifying that this interviewer was not Walters.
Shields, 57, then ‘finally’ told the anonymous interviewer: ‘I don’t think you want to know my answer because you keep asking me the same question, and that’s my answer but I can’t change it because it’s my truth.”
Barrymore, 47, shared her own nasty Walters story, but prefaced it by saying she loves, looks up to and looks up to the “View” creator.
“I never thought of Barbara Walters in a negative light, and neither did I,” the actress insisted as Shields “absolutely” agreed.
Still, Barrymore didn’t appreciate it when the TV personality, 93, asked what she considered invasive questions.
“She was like, ‘Tell me about drugs and alcohol, tell me about your mom, tell me about bisexuality, tell me about everything,'” she claimed.
“And I kept saying, ‘You know, Barbara, I’m really fine,’ and it was five, six, seven times more.”
Representatives for Walters did not immediately respond to Page Six’s request for comment.
New York Post
