Barker Dressed Down in Price Suit

Former Price Is Right host sued along with the show's producer and CBS for wrongful termination by an ex-employee who says a hostile working environment forced her to quit after testifying for

UPDATE: A judge threw out Curling's lawsuit on Sept. 18, 2009, citing a lack of triable issues of fact in her complaint against Barker and CBS.   

"We're obviously pleased," said Barker's attorney, Patricia L. Glaser. "The case should never have been brought in the first place. It was meritless."
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Bob Barker may have retired from The Price Is Right, but his litigious legacy remains.

A former contestant screener on the classic game show filed a wrongful termination lawsuit Thursday against its former host, CBS Broadcasting and producer FremantleMedia North America, claiming that she was ultimately forced to quit after testifying on behalf of an ex-colleague who was suing Barker at the time.

In an 18-page complaint filed in Los Angeles Superior Court, Deborah Curling states that, after he became an executive producer in 1990, Barker "made it his life mission to destroy the livelihood of every person who contradicted him or did not do what Barker ordered him/her to do, whether it was legal or not."

CBS, knowing Barker was a huge moneymaker, "did absolutely nothing" to stop him, going so far as paying his legal fees, the lawsuit states. Fremantle, as well, was "fully aware of…Barker's wrongdoings," such as sexual harassment and racial discrimination.

The complaint cites multiple examples of litigation that swirled around the show in the past 15 years, including the 1994 sexual harassment lawsuit filed by model Dian Parkinson against Barker and the Emmy winner's 1995 defamation suit against another of "Barker's Beauties," Holly Hallstrom, who claimed that Barker fired her because of her weight.

Five women were subpoenaed to testify in the Hallstrom case and, after all of their statements only served to bolster Hallstrom's position, Barker was forced to drop the suit in September 2000, according to Curling's lawsuit.

About a month later, all five women were fired.

So, Curling alleges, she was toast after she testified for Linda Riegert—who was one of the women who claimed to have overheard Barker telling Hallstrom to drop some weight—when the former production assistant sued Barker for wrongful termination.

Curling's suit states that Barker "destroyed those employees' lives by firing them and then dragging them through endless litigation."

Curling, who is black, claims that after she took the stand for Riegert she became an object of racial discrimination in the workplace and was transferred from the friendly confines of the studio's Green Room to a backstage area. CBS officials also asked her to sign a "hush clause," she claims, and persisted in ignoring her complaints about her working conditions.

The 24-year Price veteran also says that the show's producers and director frequently made disparaging comments about Jews and blacks in her presence and liberally tossed around the N-word.

In addition to wrongful termination based on retaliation, Curling is also alleging a hostile work environment and intentional infliction of emotional distress. She is seeking unspecified damages.

Despite the large amount of courting that went on, the 83-year-old Barker capped off 50 years in broadcasting—35 of them as the face of The Price Is Right—in June amid a whirlwind of tributes and fare-thee-wells, including a 19th Daytime Emmy for Outstanding Game Show Host. The last new episode of the show featuring Barker aired June 15.

Drew Carey was chosen as his replacement in July.