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Cheryl Hines is not happy with the way her appearance on The View went. The actress, 60, went on the ABC talk show earlier this month to promote her memoir, Unscripted, but has since criticized the interview, saying the hosts “just wanted to grill me” about her husband, Robert F. Kennedy Jr. —who is serving as Donald Trump’s secretary of Health and Human Services — instead of asking her questions about herself and her book. “You know, I was actually hoping that it was going to be more personal on The View," Hines said on Monday’s episode of the Hot Mics with Billy Bush podcast. "But it was what it was. They just wanted to grill me about Bobby.” Host Billy Bush then asked the Curb Your Enthusiasm actor if she can tell when someone hasn’t read her book, to which she responded, “Yes.” “I mean, I don’t think the ladies on The View asked me one question about my book," she said. "But, you know, that’s okay.” During Hines’ October 14 appearance on the show, The View hosts questioned her about her husband’s stance on vaccines, his relationship with President Donald Trump, and whether he was qualified for the health secretary job. She hesitated and became visibly frustrated at multiple points during the tense interview, even interrupting to ask co-host Sunny Hostin at one point, “Can I finish?” Following Hines’ telling Bush she was “grilled,” her representative told Entertainment Weekly that they still consider the appearance a “success.” “Cheryl engaged with respect and class, in light of them asking her repeatedly to defend her husband, which by the way was not the purpose of her appearance, it was to discuss her new memoir Unscripted,” the representative told the outlet. “She was completely unbothered, as one would have to be living in a cave to think they wouldn’t make Bobby the primary focus. We still consider the appearance a success in spite of this.” During her appearance on The View, Hines told the co-hosts that she had “not been a political person” in the past. While Joy Behar acknowledged that Hines was being put “on the spot,” and Whoopi Goldberg also told her that it wasn’t her “fight to be having,” Hostin didn’t hold back in addressing Hines, who has been married to Kennedy since 2014, despite rumors of Kennedy’s infidelity. “Your husband is the least qualified Department of Health and Human Services head that we’ve had in history,” Hostin said. “How is that possible? He has spent his career studying toxins — studying people's health,” Hines pushed back. Hostin replied, “He has also spread a lot of misinformation, a lot of chaos, a lot of confusion, and I think it’s just a very dangerous thing. I say it with the utmost respect.” The discussion followed a Cabinet meeting where Kennedy shared the unfounded claim that people who were circumcised as babies “have double the rate of autism.” It followed Kennedy’s other unfounded claims that there is a link between over-the-counter pain reliever Tylenol and autism. At the end of Hines’ interview, Goldberg invited her to come back, saying, “We don’t often get people on this show who we can ask these questions to, and I appreciate that you came on. Because you know what, if we can have the discussion back and forth, it then becomes people’s — then they can decide what they believe, and they don’t just hear one side.”
