The View Wraps Its 25th Season With a Peek Behind the Scenes

The View closed the book on its historic 25th season on Friday, a day after naming Alyssa Farah Griffin the show's new conservative co-host, officially filling the seat once held by Meghan McCain. Farah Griffin will be a much-scrutinized part of The View's panel this fall, especially as we head into election season and beyond.

We also learned that Ana Navarro has signed a long-term deal with the show, after serving as a fill-in starting in 2013. This sends the show into its 26th season in September with six co-hosts, including Whoopi Goldberg, Joy Behar, Sunny Hostin, and Sara Haines.

For its season finale, The View got into some hot topics — including speaking to Dr. Ashish Jha about Joe Biden continuing to test positive for COVID as well as the emerging monkeypox situation — and welcomed Kevin Bacon to the table to talk about his upcoming film They/Them. But to commemorate the close of its anniversary season, The View gave us a unique look behind the scenes at what goes into making this show happen every day.

Starting with the ladies arriving at the studio first thing in the morning — and Behar speaking Italian with the coffee truck guy out front — we got a tour through a day in the life of The View. Executive Broadcast Producer Robin Hommel talked about how the co-hosts get a packet of stories the night before to read through, but it's the morning Hot Topics meetings where the day's episode really takes shape.

"Honestly, I think we'd have better ratings if we put the Hot Topics meeting on TV," said Ana Navarro. "But we'd probably also be in jail."

Between Sunny discussing about how she dreads whenever the Real Housewives come up on Hot Topics and Sara talking about how moved she gets when Joy calls her a "natural beauty," it was a chance to watch these ladies in their element. We even got to see Joy poke fun at executive producer Brian Teta for being the only person who can help her "technically" behind the scenes (Teta clarified that this mostly meant helping Joy with her iPad).

"I think one of the things that people are most surprised about," said Ana Navarro after the segment, "is just how many people behind the camera there are. It takes a village to put this show on. And they come in every day, and they work so hard to make us look good, and to put on a show through thick and thin."

And with that, the 25th anniversary season came to a close. Expect the show to kick off Season 26 after the Labor Day holiday in September, and for the world to be ready with a whole list of hot topics to dive into.

Joe Reid is the senior writer at Primetimer and co-host of the This Had Oscar Buzz podcast. His work has appeared in Decider, NPR, HuffPost, The Atlantic, Slate, Polygon, Vanity Fair, Vulture, The A.V. Club and more.