New York, NY - April 3, 2019: Rosie O'Donnell (R) attends the HBO Game of Thrones final season premiere at Radio City Music Hall. (Photo credit: lev radin / Shutterstock)
Rosie O'Donnell is heading back behind a talk-show desk this week as she fills in as guest-host on "Jimmy Kimmel Live."
The former host of "The Rosie O'Donnell Show" and "The View" will host the late-night show starting Monday night while Kimmel's on vacation, reported Variety.
Kimmel has said he chose O'Donnell as "a special treat" for Donald Trump, referencing the president's two-decade feud with O'Donnell that began when she mocked his bankruptcies on "The View."
O'Donnell told Variety the offer "came out of the blue." She and Kimmel had never spoken by phone and had what she described as an "adversarial relationship."
"Jimmy was never a fan of mine," she said, "and it was kind of an adversarial relationship — not that I was fighting back, but I was like, 'Okay, one of the bro guys.'"
The dynamic shifted, O'Donnell said, after she reached out to Kimmel following the death of his uncle, Frank Potenza, a former New York City police officer known for comedic appearances on the show.
"When everything happened with his uncle dying, I wrote him and he wrote back," she said. When her publicist later relayed the guest-hosting offer, O'Donnell said she was "surprised" and "very thankful" to accept.
O'Donnell said another motivation is to support the late-night community amid what she describes as Trump's pressure campaign against TV comedy — one that contributed to Stephen Colbert's cancellation and nearly cost Kimmel his job.
"I support him in what he's doing with the First Amendment," she said, adding she wished Colbert had received similar backing.
O'Donnell also criticized David Ellison's pending $111 billion bid for Warner Bros. Discovery, which includes CNN, comparing the prospect to Fox News dominating media, and she had especially pointed criticism for CBS News editor-in-chief Bari Weiss.
“Look at what’s happened to CBS News and ‘60 Minutes,’ which was the gold star of their entire network, and they blew it up,” O’Donnell said. “This Bari Weiss person, I don’t know how she can live with herself. There are people who are sidling up to him and history will record all of their names, what they did, and who they stood next to.”
“If you’re in a room with 10 Nazis at a table and you’re the only one who’s not," O'Donnell said, "there’s a pretty good chance you’re a Nazi.”