Wondertrash®

So what does it take to get Barbara Walters into the sack? These days probably a defribulator and more life insurance than your average millionaire can afford. Back in her juicy prime and sexual hey day any guy with intelligence, class, and charm had a fair shot. If he was wealthy, powerful, and already married, then so much the better! Barbara reveals in her new autobiography Audition: A Memoir that Walters could slut it up with the best, or worst, of them.

For instance Barbara recalls her first European trip, just after finishing at Sarah Lawrence College. The European vacation has been a traditionally rite of passage for well heeled young Americans trying to shake off their 'provincial' roots, and soak up some continental sophistication. Needless to say many a young debutante has gone wrong that way. Barbara was top be no exception.

Alone and unsupervised in Rome, Barbara sunk her claws into an unsuspecting young Italian. In what was to become the pattern of a lifetime, Babs soon tired of him, and took up with a Frenchman. This was when Barbara first learned of the consequences of sex. She was horrified to learn that she had missed her period. Barbara says that abortion was definitely an option, although she doesn't explicitly say that she had one. What she does say was that there was a quick trip to London to see a specialist/surgeon, and then a ocean voyage back to the Land of the Free, during which she magically got her period again. Use your imaginations.

Nothing encourages you to push your luck like getting away with it once, and so Barbara embarked on her career as a companion to the high and mighty, with professional journalism as a profitable sideline. The first notch on her knickers was American business man Robert Katz. He proved an uninteresting paramour. In Babs' own words "I felt little sexual interest in him". Divorce, and abortion, are like the eraser in a pencil to the modern, active woman, and so after 3 years, Walters and Katz went their separate ways.

After that it was back to the Frenchmen, this time in the form of New York hotel executive Claude Philippe. Babs was impressed by is European sophistication, saying that "he knew all about wine and restaurants". Since he was also married, there was little danger of getting over involved.

Eventually she was ready to take the plunge again. That's where husband No 2 Lee Guber comes into the picture. With typical Dreamy eyed American romance Babs says that "Somewhere out there was the ideal man for me, but it wasn't Lee". Still they managed to stick it out for ten years.

Walters was ready for a change from European sophistication, and the security provided by American businessmen. This time she wanted a taste of the heady aphrodisiac that is political power. Married US Senator Edward Brooke was to be the man to give Walters her first taste of that particular love drug. Walters describes Brookes as "simply the most attractive, sexiest, funniest, charming and impossible man". Why Am I suddenly seeing Katherine Hepburn and Spencer Tracey tormenting each other??

Since Brooke was married, this relationship afforded Walters all the fun of sneaking around, and the usual back door maneuvers. Babs herself off handedly describes it as the fascination of "the forbidden fruit and all that". Her insouciance almost leads you to wait for a following Yadda Yadda Yadda. The relationship was far from dull, as Brookes saw Walters at his Watergate Hotel office, not to mention his Virgina home. This went on for several years, until it started to dawn on Ms Walters that the relationship might not have much a future beyond the present.

After that her relationships were pretty much more of the same: a fling with Alan Greenspan, trysts with John Warner both before and after his Liz Taylor marriage, and Alan Ace Greenburg. The final serious relationship seems to have been her 1986 marriage to Merv Adelson. That relationship held on for 6 years.

No word on whether Barbara ever did find that ideal man, though she seems to have left no stone unturned. Through out her life she seems to have been content with repeating the same pattern of screw 'em and leave 'em. It does seem to have covered that angles: giving Walters the excitement of novelty, combined with the security - if not monotony - of a familiar routine. As for her chances of ever finding Mr Right, those seem to get slimmer, as the clock continues to run out. Don't fret Babs, cause you'll always have Paris, as well as a lifetime of sordid little incidents, to console you. Now they can't take that away from you. Only Alzheimers can do that. So much more the reason to get it in writing now, before the dirty details get too blurred!

That's Love American Style. Many of their cast of forgetables regulars weren't to find steady work again until the Love Boat set sail, almost ten years later. At least the show kept them busy, and off of infomercials, not to mention out of state politics!

So many memories, and none of them are mine! No wonder Gen X is so screwed up. We were raised on Happy Days and the Love Boat. We didn't stand a chance! Now back to youtube, to continue oogling Lynda Carter!