Joy Behar Leaves The View

Joy Behar is leaving The View, with her last appearance already taped and airing tomorrow.

On The View, Joy Behar has been a constant alongside Barbara Walters — and through many rotating co-hosts. Behar has also seen her share of controversy and controversial show mates, including the ill-fated tenure of Rosie O’Donnell and sometimes contentious hosting of Whoopi Goldberg.

Behar, 70, is the longest running member of The View’s panel alongside Walters… and has been hosting the show since 1997, when it started.

Of her exit, Behar says that at 70, she doesn’t just “want to do one thing,” and the standup comic is leaving a year ahead of the planned retirement of Walters.

Behar’s exit from The View comes as another controversial name, Jenny McCarthy, joins the show. While McCarthy still has some star power, many feel her advocacy of dangerous anti-vaccine rhetoric and embrace of now-discredited autism vaccine links makes her a potential public health risk on the popular daytime program.

Another factor is at play, however, with the younger and marginally hipper The Talk cutting into The View’s target demographic.

The AP reports:

The changes will give ‘The View’ a chance to reach out to a younger audience. The median age of a typical viewer is 61.6 years old, according to the Nielsen company. That’s about two years older than ‘The Talk,’ the CBS lookalike show that has had a particularly strong summer. ‘The Talk’ has recorded four of its six most-watched weeks on the air during this summer.”

While Joy Behar signs off The View for good on Friday, August 9, a replacement for the long-running host has yet to be selected.