Sherri Shepherd Returns to ‘The View’ to Pay Tearful Tribute to Late Producer Bill Geddie: “He Helped Me Find My Voice”

It was a sad day on The View as former co-host Sherri Shepherd joined the Hot Topics table to pay tribute to the show’s co-creator Bill Geddie, who died last week at the age of 68.

Shepherd, who worked on the long-running daytime talk show from 2007-2014, held back tears as she opened up to Whoopi Goldberg, Sara Haines, Ana Navarro, Sunny Hostin and Alyssa Farah Griffin about the way Geddie “absolutely changed” her life.

“When he asked me to come on, I was a single mother, just divorced, stand-up comic, didn’t know a thing about politics, and somehow he believed that people would relate to me,” she said. “I think it was the first week I sat here, he fought for me to be here — no experience on a talk show — and I think my first week, didn’t I say I didn’t know if the earth was round or flat, I think? I do know that it is round, it was a brain fart.”

She continued, “I said, ‘Bill, oh my God, I do know, I gotta go back on and say it,’ and he said, ‘No, this is ratings, baby! This is ratings!'”

According to Shepherd, she often wanted to make public apologies when she would “flub” on air. However, Geddie steered her away from doing so.

“He said, ‘Sherri, if we apologized for everything we said, this would be called The Apology Show — it’s not. It’s called The View,'” she explained. “I said, ‘But they’re picketing outside,’ and he says, ‘Well go through the other door.'”

While it’s been nearly a decade since they’ve worked together on The View, Shepherd revealed that Geddie would text her advice “almost weekly” when she began hosting Sherri in 2022. The comedian told the panel that she learned about owning her “power” from them, but received advice about how to get those “numbers up” from Geddie.

“He was just a champion for me, and he was a friend and he helped me find my voice,” she said.

Geddie, who was a longtime collaborator of the late Barbara Walters, helped create The View in 1997. He remained the executive producer on the show until 2014, before going on to executive produce The Tamron Hall Show from 2019-2020. According to his family, he died of “coronary-related factors.”

“It’s with great sadness that we share the news of the passing of The View co-creator and one of television’s most well-respected producers, Bill Geddie,” the show posted on Friday (July 21). “He was a pioneer in television and greatly beloved by The View family, creating the show with Barbara Walters and serving as its executive producer for 17 years. The View wouldn’t exist without Bill Geddie.”

The View airs on weekdays at 11/10 on ABC.