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Why Whoopi Goldberg is Taking a Break From ‘The View'

Whoopi Goldberg is taking a leave of absence from "The View." Find out what's pulling the OG cast member away and who took her spot at the table

ABC's "The View" - Season 25
Jenny Anderson/ABC via Getty Images

Whoopi Goldberg is leaving "The View" -- for a bit.

Goldberg is on hiatus from the roundtable chat show while she films a TV show, it was announced on the April 11 episode.

"If you're wondering where Whoopi is, the girl's got a movie she's making and she will be back when she finishes whatever she's doing," fellow panelist Joy Behar revealed. "So she's gone for a while."

"The View" announced that Whoopi would return to the show on May 2.

What Goldberg is actually doing is filming the new Prime Video limited series "Anansi Boys" in Scotland. Based on the fantasy novel by Neil Gaiman, Whoopi will play Bird Woman, the villain of the story, who is seeking revenge on Anansi, played by Delroy Lindo.

The series also stars Fiona Shaw, CCH Pounder and L. Scott Caldwell.

The project has long been a dream of the EGOT winner, who most recently appeared in Paramount+'s "Star Trek: Picard" and Prime Video's "Harlem."

Why All of These Hosts Really Left The View

"I have been a fan of this book for a very long time," Goldberg said when "Anansi Boys" was announced. "When Neil Gaiman told me it was being brought to the screen, I did everything I could to be part of it to help make people aware of Anansi and all his magic."

Since she's been gone, conservative political commentator Alyssa Farah Griffin has been keeping her seat warm. Griffin worked as the White House Director of Strategic Communications and Assistant to the President in the Trump administration in 2020.

Griffin filled in for Goldberg on April 11 and 12, and has been announced as her replacement for the April 13 episode. It's unclear whether she will continue to fill in for Goldberg while she films.

Goldberg's break comes just over two months after she was suspended from the show on Feb. 1. The suspension came as a result of Goldberg saying that the Holocaust was "not about race" during a discussion about a Tennessee school board's decision to remove graphic novel "Maus" from the curriculum.

She returned to the show on Feb. 14.

"There's something kind of marvelous about being on a show like this because we are 'The View' and this is what we do," Goldberg said during the episode. "Sometimes we don't do it as elegantly as we could, but it's five minutes to get in important information about topics. That's what we try to do every day. I want to thank everybody who reached out while I was away."

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