“The View” co-host Joy Behar attended a Halloween party dressed as a “beautiful African woman” during the 1970s, which included darkening her face with makeup, the host said in a 2016 episode of the daytime talk show.
“That is me. I was 29. It was a Halloween party, I went as a beautiful African woman. That’s my hair,” Behar said. “I had makeup that was a little bit darker than my skin, but that’s my actual hair, though.”
Given her current age of 76, the party can be dated to roughly 1972.
“You mean blackface,” fellow co-host Raven-Symoné responded, though she later said she “loved” how Behar looked.
The show ran a photo of Behar in the outfit, causing Symoné to audibly gasp at the image.
“Joy, are you my auntie, Joy?” Symoné said. “She looks black.”
The moment was reported by Jezebel at the time, but had largely been lost from people’s memories since. The discussion on set was precipitated after Behar brought up this 2016 New York Times op-ed lauding the benefits of naturally curly hair.
Reps for The View at ABC did not immediately respond to request for comment from TheWrap.
Issues of blackface have dominated the national discussion after revelations that Virginia Gov. Ralph Northam and the state’s Attorney General Mark Herring both wore blackface decades ago.
A photo of a man in blackface with another dressed as a member of the Ku Klux Klan appeared on Northam’s old medical school yearbook page last week precipitating a statewide crisis. The governor has offered shifting explanations about whether he is in the image.