Joy Behar is speaking out this week to reveal how getting divorce decades ago helped launch her standup comedy career.
Behar’s Divorce Takes A Turn
Behar, 83, was nearly 40 years-old when she divorced her first husband Joseph Behar. She had been married to him since she was 23, and they had one child together. After their split, Behar made a major life change that led her to where she is today.
“I wouldn’t have tried stand-up if I’d stayed married, and I’ll tell you why,” Behar told People Magazine. “Stand-up is the hardest thing you can do. It’s very, very difficult. I’m not saying brain surgery is easy, but I’d rather do brain surgery than face a bunch of drunks from New Jersey and 2 a.m., because that’s what I had to do in the beginning!”
Behar went on to say that she got her start in the comedy scene far later than most people do.
“I was 39 or 40,” she said of her 1981 divorce.
“When you’re thrown out into the cold cruel world with no money and no job, you say, ‘Well, I better do something!'” Behar added. “So I’d stay out late and hope to get a spot at the Improv or Catch a Rising Star, and crowds would be sparse, and you’d be bombing up there. But sometimes it worked. And that’s what kept you hooked.”
“If I’d stayed married, I’d be like, ‘What am I doing this for? I have a husband who’s backing me up! I don’t need to do this to myself!'” she confessed.
Behar Gets Reflective
Looking back, Behar believes that she was far too young when she got married for the first time.
“That’s what you did back then,” she explained. “You got married at 20, 21.”
“It’s a weird kind of thing, marriage, because if you live long enough, you go through so many changes or reinventions, and sometimes they don’t work with the same person,” Behar continued. “And it’s tragic in a way when you have kids, I guess, but what are you going to do?”
Behar’s daughter Eva was only 11 years-old when the divorce took place.
“Not a great age,” she confessed. “She was in shock, because we weren’t divorcing because of our arguing, but because we were bored. We were changing in different directions and needed to move on. It was just one of those situations.”
Behar has been with her second husband Steve Janowitz since 1982. They married in 2011.
Behar Channels Split Into Monologue Play
These days, Behar has turned her divorce into the monologue play My First Ex-Husband. The show is based on interviews with friends who shared their own divorce stories.
“Even if they were sad, they were just kind of funny,” Behar said of the stories featured in the play.
“The women love it,” Behar concluded. “They don’t feel alone.”
Behar will be performing the play at the George Street Playhouse in New Brunswick from Feb. 13-15. It will then be in Boston on March 27-29th.
Of course, Behar can also be seen every morning on her daytime talk show The View. Who would have thought that none of this would have been possible for Behar had she not gotten divorced decades ago? It truly is funny how life works sometimes. Indeed, you never know when something that may seem negative ends up becoming a blessing.