‘Where is Wendy Williams?’ Doc Explores TV Host’s Finances, Fractured Family Relationships and Alcohol Abuse
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It doesn’t take long for viewers of Where is Wendy Williams? to see that the former radio and TV show host is currently in a fragile state. The four-part Lifetime documentary, which airs Feb. 24 and 25, begins in 2022 with Wendy Williams appearing to be back to her old self as she talks about making a comeback to television. But within minutes she’s in tears for reasons that aren’t immediately known to the audience, yet later come to light as details of her health and financial status unravel.
“Do you like being the center of attention and having people wonder?” a producer asks before Williams interjects. “I demand,” she says. “Six years old that’s all I wanted. The center of attention.”
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“Well, you got it,” the producer states, to which Williams responds, “Of course, and I always will.”
Two days prior to the documentary airing, a press release claiming to be sent out on behalf of Williams and her care team announced that in 2023 she had been diagnosed with primary progressive aphasia and frontotemporal dementia. Evidence of some form of cognitive decline appears in moments in the film where Williams struggles to remember details of her life, like where she grew up, or that she no longer has a talk show.
Yet the documentary tells a larger story about the factors that led to Williams’ overall downturn, from the death of her mother and divorce from ex-husband, Kevin Hunter, in 2020, to increased alcohol use, and being placed under financial guardianship that has kept her isolated from her family.
Two days before the documentary’s release, the identity of William’s court-appointed guardian — who had not been made public and who is not identified in the doc — was revealed when Sabrina Morrissey filed a lawsuit for injunctive relief against Lifetime parent company A+E Networks. The complaint was vacated on Friday, with Lifetime confirming to The Hollywood Reporter that the documentary would air this weekend as planned. Hours later, Williams released a rare statement via a representative, saying, in part, “I continue to need personal space and peace to thrive. Please just know that your positivity and encouragement are deeply appreciated.”
Here are the biggest questions raised from parts one and two of Where is Wendy Williams? after the conclusion of night one.
Williams still has no access to her money
“One judge and three doctors say my money is still stuck at Wells Fargo and I’m going to tell you something, if it happens to me, it could happen to you,” Williams states in part one of her documentary. However, it’s not until part two that the reason behind her lack of access to funds is fully explained.
In May of 2022, Wells Fargo petitioned for guardianship of Williams, claiming that she was an “incapacitated person” and the “victim of undue influence and financial exploitation.” Prior to that time, Williams had been staying with her family in Miami, FL.
“My mom made me power of attorney because at that time the banks started accusing the family of doing things that weren’t true and saying that my mom wasn’t fit to make choices,” Williams’ son, Kevin Hunter, Jr. says in the doc. “As one can imagine, it’s not a cheap lifestyle. The court tried to frame it as though I was making all these charges for my own happiness. My mom has never been a cheap person, whether it’d be flying her back and forth on private planes or even paying for appointments, it was all under one American Express [card.]”
According to Williams’ nephew, Travis Finnie, who had a hand in her caregiving while she was in Florida, the total purchase amount the bank questioned was $100,000.
“To put it in perspective, Kevin’s birthday party that year that his mom booked was $120,000. Kevin’s rent was $80,000. Kevin’s Uber Eats probably exceeded $100,000, that his mom approves. For them to have a court case and rip him away from taking care of his mother, it’s very questionable.”
Williams backs up her son and nephew’s words when a producer asks if she currently supports Kevin Jr. Brought to tears by the question, she answers, “I’ve got so much money. I want it for my son.”
Williams later reveals plans to sell some of her designer items to get cash, but the morning a representative from the luxury retailer What Goes Around Comes Around shows up at her home, producers find Williams lethargic in bed and reportedly slurring her speech from assumed alcohol use, so the visit is rescheduled.
Williams was removed from her family’s care as a result of the guardianship
When Kevin Jr. first appears on screen, he reveals that he hasn’t seen his mom in eight months. In May of 2022, Williams was forced to appear before a judge in New York City regarding Wells Fargo’s petition for financial guardianship. When the guardianship was granted, Kevin Jr. was cut off both financially and personally, along with the rest of his family. Asked whether he thinks his mother should have a guardian, Kevin Jr. says, “I think my mother should have family.”
He goes on to explain that that belief is why he and his family decided to be a part of the documentary. “The family side of the story hasn’t been told, so it’s kind of left this gray space of who’s really telling the truth of what’s really going on. I’ve always wanted the best for my mom,” he says. “I feel like the situation that she’s in right now isn’t really the best situation for her journey of trying to heal.”
According to the family, Williams was doing well in their care while in Florida
Between 2020 and 2021, public concern about Williams’ health grew as social media posts showed the TV personality passed out in a high-end store and headlines reported she’d been hospitalized and required three blood transfusions after being found unresponsive. It was at that time that her family decided to intervene and see to her care personally.
“We went to New York to see her for a little bit, and she was in very bad shape,” Travis says. “We found out that she had been in the hospital, and we realized that she was in bad shape to the point where she was dying, so we proceeded to pack up her stuff and brought her down here to Florida. When she was down here, she got a lot better, and Kevin spent almost every day with his mom. She was vegan the whole time, she had a personal trainer, she was completely sober. She used to speak more clearly; she could remember what you were speaking about 20 seconds prior. We made sure she lived a healthy life.”
During the initial filming of the documentary, production was halted for two months when Williams was placed in a wellness facility at the recommendation of her manager Will Shelby, one of the few people who still has access to her under her guardianship.
“I think, honestly, Wendy needed some rest,” Shelby says in the doc as she retorts, “I could rest right here,” referencing her home.
When a producer attempts to pry about her experience at the facility, Williams advises she “stop talking, please,” and insists, “I’m very healthy.”
Williams didn’t know her talk show was being canceled
While in Florida, Williams was on an indefinite leave from The Wendy Williams Show as a result of her health issues, which included an earlier Graves disease diagnosis and contracting COVID-19. Though the show’s distribution executives at Debmar-Mercury attempted to keep its 13th season afloat by bringing in a series of celebrity guest hosts, Williams’ physical condition was too precarious to proceed with a renewal.
“By February of 2022, one person described it to me as, ‘We can’t sit here and ask, what if?’” Lacey Rose, THR’s executive editor who reported on the show’s final days, says in the documentary. “We can’t renew the maybe Wendy Williams Show. This version of this show has to end.”
According to Williams’ niece, Alex Finnie, she had to break the news to Williams that her last taping on July 16, 2021, would be her final appearance on the show.
“My aunt did not know she was not going back to the show,” Alex says. “She came over to my home one day, and this was when the news broke. I said to her, ‘Sit down. The show is no more. The show’s done. It’s now Sherri [Shepherd] who is in your time slot. The Wendy Williams Show as you know it, it’s done.’
“She didn’t believe it,” Alex adds. “She was still going out and saying, ‘I’m getting ready for a new season,’ and then it took a little bit of time — weeks, months — to really understand where things stood. That’s how that played out.”
Williams’ alcohol use continues to be a source of contention among her family and team
When a producer asks Williams why she drinks, her response is brisk as she tells him, “Because I can.”
According to lifelong friend Regina Shell, Williams began abusing alcohol as her marriage started falling apart in 2018. “When Kevin and his mistress started going about town, and he bought her a car and it started ending up in the tabloids that they were out together, Wendy was feeling played,” she says in the doc. “It was causing her to drink more than she usually would. She would drink sometimes. But when she was going through the tribulation with Kevin, it definitely was to numb out.”
In 2019, the family put Williams in a rehab facility in Florida. But according to her nephew, executives for The Wendy Williams show wanted her back in New York, so she began living in a sober house there, which she announced during a taping on Mar. 19, 2019. The death of Williams’ mother, Shirley, toward the end of 2020, further exasperated her dependence on alcohol.
Now, under her guardianship, Shelby says he attempts to control Williams’ drinking as best he can.
“Kevin does not want his mother utilizing any substances,” Shelby says. “He has a no-alcohol policy. He’s always stressed that to me. He doesn’t want her drinking a drop of liquor.”
This often doesn’t go over well with Williams. Though she isn’t under Shelby’s constant supervision, he regularly sweeps her apartment looking for alcohol. In one scene, Williams angrily dismisses him from her home after he throws out a bottle of vodka that he finds in her bedroom.
“I will smoke when I smoke and I will liquor when I liquor,” Williams yells while meeting with her publicist Shawn Zanotti, who’s with her at the time. “How dare him,” she states twice. “I control me.”
Zanotti, who as the documentary goes on, presents as a questionable relationship in Williams’ life given her current state, responds affirmatively, “And you know your limits.”
Still, there’s some level of understanding on Williams part of the wedge that drinking has driven between her and her family. When a producer asks Williams if there are any relationships with anyone that she wants to repair, she tearfully answers, “My son.” Yet when asked what the barriers to that are, she replies, “Nothing. Except for he hates liquor.”
Parts three and four of the documentary will air on Feb. 25 at 5 p.m. PT/8 p.m. ET. Read the biggest revelations from night two of Where Is Wendy Williams?
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