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Joan Rivers Dies At Age 81

Aired September 04, 2014 - 15:30   ET

THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

JOAN RIVERS: I'm still angry with my husband. I'll never forgive him. It's 12 years. People say, oh, you'll go to heaven and meet Edgar. I say I'll kill him.

LARRY KING, TV AND RADIO HOST: Because.

RIVERS: Because what he did to my daughter, because what he did to us, because what he did to our lives.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

BROOKE BALDWIN, CNN ANCHOR: Joan Rivers on with Larry King talking about her husband, Edgar Rosenberg, who had taken his own life. And you can hear, she was mad. She was mad in talking to Larry. Larry King is back on the line. Larry, are you with me?

KING (via telephone): Yes, I'm right here.

ALDWIN: Larry King, you had talked to us a little while ago about how there will never be another Joan Rivers. We were talking about her chops, her comedian chops. But to see this different side of Joan Rivers, to talk about her late husband, she was angry. Tell me more about that.

KING: She was angry, disappointed. She didn't see it coming at all. I guess a lot of people treat suicide differently. I know some people very angry at Robin Williams for taking his talent away. There's a great argument, a lifelong argument over suicide.

Is it guts or is it chicken? Are you escaping or are you taking the ultimate act that's the hardest to take. I regard it as gutsy. But she took it badly. I interviewed her so many times. You see all the different looks of Joan Rivers as you have on the screen there.

In fact, I saw her just a couple weeks ago at Craig's Restaurant here on Melrose in Los Angeles. She looked terrific. She was bouncing up around, table hopping, as she always did. She was a table hopper. But as with regard to her husband, she took that very, very, very badly.

BALDWIN: Did she ever, Larry, think of remarrying? KING: I don't think she ever did. She dated a lot and she saw a lot of men. I think there was one guy -- I never talked to her much about it. I think there was one guy she was dating semi seriously, but she never did. Her career came first after that. Her career and her daughter and her grandchild. They were paramount in life was career and family.

BALDWIN: Can we talk about Johnny Carson? That was her big break, right, back in 1965?

KING: He shunned her after that.

BALDWIN: What happened?

KING: She never got over that.

BALDWIN: What happened?

KING: Wouldn't take a call from her. Well, he thought that, you know, she was his sub host, and that he gave her a start. And that she blindsided him by taking a deal with Fox to go on opposite him. He thought -- I think he saw her as heir apparent. Johnnie can be that way. He never talked to her again, wouldn't take a call, wouldn't talk to her. Of course, never booked her on again.

BALDWIN: And how did that sit with her, all those years later?

KING: Disappointed. She never felt it as being -- she thought -- her career a great boost. She never thought him -- she never thought it as disloyal. It was a career move. I could see Johnny's viewpoint too.

That maybe she should have called him first and said, listen, I'm talking to Fox, what do you think? What would he have said? Don't take it? I think that's what hurt him most. I think he thought he deserved a phone call.

BALDWIN: Larry King, thank you so much for coming on.

KING: Any time, dear.

BALDWIN: I really appreciate you very much. As we're learning of the death of 81-year-old Joan Rivers, let's take a look back at her life.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

RIVERS: Can we talk?

NISCHELLE TURNER, CNN ENTERTAINMENT CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): Joan Rivers could always talk.

RIVERS: Do you know what it's like to go in the morning to take off a facial mask and realize you're not wearing one? You don't know!

TURNER: With sometimes outrageous jokes, nothing was ever off limits.

RIVERS: I hate old people. I -- if you are (inaudible) old, get up and get out of here right now!

TURNER: Born in 1933, Rivers says even as she was growing up in the New York suburbs, she wanted to be an actress.

RIVERS: I never had a choice. I always say it's like a nun's calling.

TURNER: But her show business career didn't start until she was 24 years old. The Phi-Beta Kappa graduate from Bernard with one failed marriage behind her, moved out of her parents' home and tried to get a jobs an actress.

While her acting career didn't take off right away, she got her first break writing for the puppet "Topo Gigio" on "The Ed Sullivan Show." And joined the iconic Second City Comedy Theatre in 1961.

As her comedy career was taking off, she married producer, Edgar Rosenberg in 1964, who would manage her career and become the focus of so many of his wife's jokes.

The pair had one daughter together, Melissa. In 1965, Rivers saw her career get a huge boost when she appeared on "The Tonight Show" with Johnny Carson for the first time.

RIVERS: He gave all of us our starts. My life changed. I went on the show the first time, seven years of struggling, coming out of Second City. And on the air, he said, "you're going to be a star." And the next day my life is different.

TURNER: It was the start of a 21-year professional relationship with Carson and the show. She made regular appearances, eventually becoming the show's substitute host in 1983. But Rivers' decision to launch her own show on the brand-new Fox Network in the fall of 1986 ended her relationship with Carson and "The Tonight Show."

RIVERS: He should have been proud. I finally, after my contract was up, done, I took another job. I think because I was a woman, he never thought I would leave or maybe he liked me better. But the minute I became competition, it became out to kill me, out to kill me. And that's what came down. Forever. Never spoke to me again.

TURNER: The show was canceled in 1987. A few years later, her husband, Edgar, committed suicide in a Philadelphia hotel room.

RIVERS: Some idiot called the house, and they said, where is your mother? Somebody from Philadelphia and Melissa said she's not here and they said please tell her your father killed himself. How is that for a phone call?

TURNER: Rivers regrouped by doing what she always did, putting her life out in the open.

KING: Is there any area you would not go to?

RIVERS: No. If I think I want to talk about it, then it's right to talk about. And I purposely go into areas that people are still very sensitive and smarting about.

KING: Why?

RIVERS: If you laugh at it, you can deal with it. That's how I've lived my whole life. If you -- if I swear to you -- I'm Jewish. If I were in Auschwitz, I would have been doing jokes, just to make it OK for us.

TURNER: Her career surged again when her withering take on red carpet fashion full of biting remarks and celebrity putdowns exposed her to a whole new group of fans.

RIVERS: I love performing. It's like a drug for me.

TURNER: And in 2012, she felt she was at the top of her game.

RIVERS: I think I'm working the best I've ever worked now. Because I -- it's all been done to me. What are they going to do? Are they going to fire me? I've been fired. Audiences are not going to like me, a lot of audiences haven't liked me. I've been bankrupt. My husband has committed -- I mean, it's OK. And I'm still here. So it's OK.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: How much have you actually had done?

RIVERS: Two full face lifts and then little bitty bittees, tweakings. You know, like I have a very good friend, Steven Hoffman in California. And I'll say, what do you think, Steve? Tell me the truth. And he'll say, wait another year. Wait two years or he'll say, my God, get in here tonight.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

BALDWIN: The life of Joan Rivers. That's what we're talking about this hour as we have learned just within the past half hour that Joan Rivers at age 81 has died. She had gone in, just about a week ago for a routine throat surgery. Something went horribly wrong.

She wound up at Mt. Sinai to be treated and that is where we have Miguel Marquez standing by where I know a lot of fans through the last, you know, several days, Miguel, have come, you know, to just sort of show solidarity.

Express how they feel for at least the family, who, of course, I imagine have been hunkered down inside her hospital room. What are you seeing there right now?

MIGUEL MARQUEZ, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Look, a lot of media has gathering here. People are starting to find out about it. And I think people have been holding their collective breaths around the world for Joan Rivers, hoping for some good news.

And I want to correct one thing. She was not in there for a surgery at all. It was an outpatient procedure. This should not have been a big deal. She had performed at Lori Beachman Theater the night before.

She was there until about 9:30 or 10:00 p.m. She went in very early into Yorkville Endoscopy on the Upper East Side here in Manhattan, something happened very early on. By 9:30 a.m., it was a 911 call. She had gone into cardiac arrest. She had stopped breathing.

And then for eight days, her fans, her Joan-rangers, as they are called, held their collective breath, hoping against hope that they would get good news. It sounded at points that there might have been good news. But Melissa Rivers confirming today that at 1:17 p.m., her mother did pass away.

And people are coming up to us now asking what's going on. And there is that moment of shock, that realization, that this great legend has passed on -- Brooke.

BALDWIN: And not only Miguel, was this supposed to be this routine in and out procedure on her throat, we were just talking do people who had dinner with her the night before, she was at dinner at midnight and indicated no trepidation over this procedure that she underwent the next day. Miguel Marquez, thank you so much. We'll check in with you.

Let me just bring in, you heard them on the phone, they have now come and have joined me now and we appreciate that, our entertainment correspondent, Nischelle Turner and our senior media correspondent, Brian Stelter.

And so we have a lot to talk about. A lot with her, of course, but first to you. We're getting statements now, we think of her, of course, on the red carpet talking fashion, dissing fashion from "Fashion Police." What has "E" said?

BRIAN STELTER, CNN SENIOR MEDIA CORRESPONDENT: And "E" her main employer at the time of her passing because of the "Fashion Police." "E" says, "E" and NBC Universal send our deepest condolences to Melissa, Cooper and her entire set of family.

I'll read another part of it, "She was unapologetic and fiercely dedicated to entertaining all of us and has left an indelible mark on the people that she touched over the years." I like that word that they used, unapologetic. That's the kind of humor that she's known for.

TURNER: It sums her up. I heard you earlier calling her a re invention and I believe she is the mother of reinvention because for five decades, just when everyone counted her out, Joan Rivers would reinvent herself, reinvent her career. Think of something new and different to do.

STELTER: And a woman who stayed relevant. So much so --

BALDWIN: Incredible work --

STELTER: And "E" actually said at the end of the moment, "Today our hearts are heavy knowing Joan will not be bounding through the doors." Because she was such a regular presence on that channel.

BALDWIN: And speaking of fashion, looking at pictures of her on the red carpet, it's fashion week here in New York. How do you have red carpet and fashion week with no Joan Rivers?

TURNER: Well, you don't. Because "E" was bringing their production here to tape two episodes of "Fashion Week" -- two episodes of "Fashion Police" from fashion week. They did it last year. They loved to kind of immerse themselves in that.

And they did decide to cancel those productions a couple days ago. They didn't today, but a couple days ago. And I know they're replacing with some different programming. But you don't really do that without her. I heard an interview with her and Melissa a while ago.

And she always said, darn, I should have trademarked that, what are you wearing? Because we all say it now. I can't even count how many times I've said that on the red carpet in the past couple weeks. Exactly. That was Joan Rivers.

BALDWIN: You mentioned as we're just taking all of this in, her voice. Right? So as we mentioned, she was just going in for this in- outpatient procedure on her throat. And so when you listen and watch Joan Rivers from earlier on in her career to as we know Joan Rivers recently, her voice has changed.

TURNER: Yes, listen to those early recordings of when she first came on "The Tonight Show" with Johnny Carson back in the late '60s and early '70s. She sounds like a completely different person.

So when they talk about her having throat problems, we see actors and comedians and singers who get nodules on their vocal cords. But her voice got progressively raspier. She did not have that same tone back in those days.

So I'm not sure exactly what was going on with her. But it definitely does seem like there was something there that got progressively worse that was a chronic thing she had to deal with through the years.

BALDWIN: So Ryan Seacrest uses this word trailblazer. When you think of women, that was Joan Rivers.

TURNER: Only one to have a late night show. Chelsea Handler on cable, but she's the only woman to have a late night show.

STELTER: Just a couple weeks ago, Chelsea Handler steps down and thought of as the only woman in late night but Joan Rivers was there before Chelsea. She was Chelsea before Chelsea. TURNER: Yes, and that kind of was the crux of her biggest controversy throughout her career, her feud with Johnny Carson. She first appeared on the "Tonight Show" in '65. He brought her and on and so impressed her on as a writer, took her under his wing.

She says he was her mentor. In '83, when Fox approached her about getting her own show and she decided I guess in '86 to take the show, didn't tell Johnny Carson.

BALDWIN: That was the beginning of the fallout.

TURNER: Yes, there's two different stories that I've heard her tell. One was they never spoke again. Another was, after he found out, she tried to call him, he immediately hung up on her and never talked to her.

STELTER: We were talking about earlier on the phone about how she has traced the arc of media. Fox was a brand-new network at that time. She went over to "E!" a cable network, she had a YouTube channel with lots of fans there and able to follow in that way.

BALDWIN: She was on Twitter.

STELTER: And Ryan also said Joan was full of surprises. Witty surprises and had so much spirit. That's the thing about her on the red carpet. If she was the one doing the interview or being interviewed, she always surprised you somehow.

BALDWIN: We have to take a quick break. When we come back, Joan Rivers has a star on the Hollywood walk of fame. We'll show new front of the Roosevelt hotel and we'll pull out as we have in the archive that is CNN a bunch of Joan Rivers one liners. We'll be right back.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

RIVERS: This is what the Midwest thinks a gay wedding looks like. I love the shape. It goes in and out more than Britney Spears in an Arby's drive through. I don't know. It's black with a little bit of white or is it white with a little bit of black.

You know, which is exactly what Kris Jenner said the first time she saw the Northwest. And Anthony Weiner just saw Parker this and went limp for the first time in years.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Here's Lindsay leaving rehab in Malibu.

RIVERS: I'm thrilled she's out. I can't believe those are the shoes she has chosen to take her next 12 steps in. I love this. How chic can you get? I love this, love this, love this, love this. The only thing I don't kind of like is that gothic makeup, you know, her makeup is heavier, like a sack full of Gwyneth Paltrow's hate mail.

I love the hair. That hair is really the second biggest cut she's ever made. The first was when she cut Kelly and Michele out of Destiny's Child.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Denim overalls like that, he will be mistaken for a day laborer. I don't get it.

RIVERS: I don't get it. I know what he was trying to achieve because I'm very close to him. He wanted to dress like a train conductor because he is sending out the message that black men like caboose.

I think this is the cutest thing I've seen since Reese Witherspoon mouthed off to that cop. But otherwise -- picture please. Could be Paris Hilton working on the pilot for her new TV show "Taxicab Infections."

(END VIDEOTAPE)

BALDWIN: Nischelle Turner and Brian Stelter joining me. Just watching that, we were all giggling through the whole thing. I was asking both of you to come up with those zingers, the one-liners. She had a team working on that.

TURNER: Well, of course. I mean, all comedians have a team of writers. She's a funny lady. There's something about comedic timing --

STELTER: Delivery.

TURNER: -- impeccable delivery, exactly. She was impeccable at it. She was just that good.

STELTER: My understanding was a bunch of index cards. She would have piles of index cards and pick the best ones as the moment struck her because it's a panel show, "Fashion Police." She's the leader of that discussion. Exactly.

And it's not a question for today, but it is a question down the road about what E! is going to do about that. I can't think of someone that's going to play that traffic cop.

TURNER: She embodies that show. That show is about her. She brought it to prominence. I'm not sure what they can do, but you're right. It's not a question for today. You were talking earlier about this, she is big on social media. She does have her Twitter page.

Her profile on Twitter is a simple girl with a dream. I do believe everyone would say that dream has been fulfilled of hers, 50 years of a brilliant career.

BALDWIN: More moments of Joan Rivers, roll it.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

ANNOUNCER: Here's Joan Rivers!

RIVERS: My hot flashes are so bad, I was hit by a heat seeking missile. You don't know. If I want to see three people who make tons of money and have

no talent, I will not much watch you guys. I will watch the Kardashians. It is --

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: What happened to your eye? What happened?

RIVERS: I scratched it on Al Roker's zipper. It was just --

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: And now it's time to bring up the man of the hour. Comedy legend Joan Rivers.

RIVERS: I drew an upside down glass because I have not seen cups this empty since I did shots with Dina Lohan. I'm sure some of you are wondering if my breasts are real, OK? Let me just explain to you, thank you. This one is --

(END VIDEOTAPE)