Why Barbara Walters was “threatened” by Diane Sawyer: Director of Doc

The interviewer is now the subject.

The legendary broadcast journalist Barbara Walters, who died in 2022 at 93, occupies the front of the scene in the new documentary “Barbara Walters: Tell Me Entre” (first on Monday, June 23 on Hulu and Disney +).

Directed by the filmmaker winner of an Emmy Jackie Jesko, the program offers a complete overview of the Pioneer’s career in Walters and his life in his first years until his retirement.

“It is not a hagiography, and it was never intended for being,” Jesko told the post exclusively.

She added: “I think that with someone like Barbara, people know that she was a difficult person and a complicated person, and it would be ridiculous to do something about him who did not include this.”

The Doc covers the beginnings of Walters’ career as the first woman to co-host a national news program on television at prospective hours, his first difficulties in the club environment for boys in the 1970s, his ascent towards “TODAY”, “20/20” and “The View”, his famous interviews, his Rocky friendship with his controversial daughter, Jackie Guber.

He also covers his contradictory attitudes to embrace his mentor position for women – but considering Diane Sawyer as a rival.

“I thought it revealed a lot about Barbara and somehow what made her vibrate and what she was not safe,” Jesko told post, referring to her tension with Sawyer, 79.

“I understand that it is logical that Barbara would have been extremely threatened by Diane Sawyer,” she said, adding that Sawyer had as much talent as Walters, but was also “beautiful” in the way that “Barbara wanted her to have been.”

The film includes many voices off from Walters archive sequences.

“You probably catch in the film that she talks about herself as a kind of ugly, which is really shocking when you see the photos and videos of her when she was much younger. You say to yourself:” Wow, you were absolutely beautiful. What are you talking about? “”

“But I think it did not correspond to the beauty standard of the 60s, which was much more Diane Sawyer than Barbara Walters,” said Jesko. “All her life, she always felt less than in one way or another. And for a mixture of reasons, Diane took this out in her. ”

Interviews include Oprah Winfrey, Connie Chung, Katie Couric, Joy Behar, Disney CEO Bob Iger, Bette Midler and Monica Lewinski (who was one of Walters’ main “Get” for a sit-down).

“I had not achieved exactly how much Barbara had an impact on her life – Oprah saw [Walters] as a roadmap for itself. I found it touching and found it really interesting, ”said Jesko.

The director was not shocked by any information she found, but she was fascinated by Walters’ friendship with the lawyer and controversial fixer – who was recently dramatized by Jeremy Strong in the 2024 “The Apprentice” film.

“It was very revealing that she was so close to this man, and that she did not seem to care about it a lot of things he did, which was terrible in her life … She was held next to himself when he was very disadvantageous for her to do it.”

She added: “So theirs were to be a real friendship at a certain level.”

The film, however, does not cover the drop in health of Walters, as its dementia reported before his death. The reports have never been confirmed.

“When you make celebrity movies on someone who died, it’s always like, ok, you make a cradle to engrave? Where do you want to finish the story? And we were not sure at the beginning where we wanted to put an end to the story,” Jesko told the post.

The cap with the retreat on the screen of Walters of “The View” in 2014 – when two dozen women in journalism came to pay tribute to it – it was the most logical.

“I haven’t really seen a strong reason to maintain history at that time,” said Jesko. “It was like an end.”