Sherri Shepherd Comes into View

Thu., Sep. 6, 2007 7:54 AM PDT by Gina Serpe

Talk about your spoiler alerts.

Capping weeks of intense speculation, actress-comedian Sherri Shepherd is set to fill the fifth and final seat on The View.

Barbara Walters will make the announcement official during Monday's show.

The 40-year-old entertainer had been expected to be part of the View crew when the new season debuted this week, joining new moderator Whoopi Goldberg in Walters' revolving team of coffee klatschers.

But Shepherd, who has served as guest host on many occasions, including an extended run in the hot seat this summer, reportedly balked at her initial contract offer, and negotiations dragged on.

Shepherd, who achieved moderate fame with a long-running stint on ABC's Less Than Perfect, as well as roles on The Jamie Foxx Show and the recent big-screen bomb Who's Your Caddy?, will fill the spot vacated by Star Jones Reynolds more than a year ago, marking the first time since spring 2006 that the chatfest will be able to boast a full fivesome at the table.

For the time being, anyway. Elisabeth Hasselbeck is temporarily jumping ship this fall for maternity leave—she's expecting her second child with football-tossing husband Tim Hasselbeck in November.

Walters announced on Wednesday that she would be naming the newest member of the daytime show next week.

"It's been empty for a year, but this Monday, Sept. 10, if you tune in, you will find that we have somebody else joining the panel permanently," she said.

"I was only here a day, you replacing me already?" Goldberg said in reply. "Oh, my God, oh, my God!"

Goldberg needn't worry about job security just yet.

While her View debut on Tuesday drew 3.4 million viewers—a full million less than Rosie O'Donnell's 4.4 million-strong debut at this time last year—it still marks the second-best season-premiere figures of the show's 11-year history.

But while critics have already begun to deride Goldberg's reign as the safe, and some may say bland, antidote to O'Donnell's tenure in the seat, she has already won over one viewer.

"It was all right. It was good. Whoopi was good," O'Donnell said of her successor's debut in a videoblog posted to rosie.com. Though her praise for the new season seemed to begin and end with Goldberg.

"It was okay...It was interesting."

Oddly enough, O'Donnell seemed to take the most issue not with The View's choice of host but with the revamped set.

"I was sad that the set was beige," she said. "Truthfully, it was just wrong. Maybe people like beige, and I'm the only one who doesn't...Why did they change the set back to beige? That was an error in judgment."