USA TODAY International Edition
Sunny Hostin’s ‘ Truth’ is drawn from real life
Legal analyst, ‘ View’ co- host has a platform
Sunny Hostin is turning her View to true crime.
The former federal prosecutor, who moved into television with appearances on Court TV, Fox News, as a legal analyst for CNN and as a co- host of ABC’s “The “View,” is getting her own show, “Truth About Murder With Sunny Hostin,” premiering Tuesday ( 10 p. m EDT/ PDT) on Investigation Discovery.
Hostin, 50, who joined “The View” in 2016, has a hunger for justice, formed at an early age after witnessing a traumatic incident: Her uncle was stabbed at a party when she was 7, and the ordeal helped carve Hostin’s career.
“That was a driving force, and I actually didn’t even realize how powerful that moment was,” Hostin says. “I think it turned a tragedy into a positive for me in many ways, but it’s something that stuck with me for so very long.” She told USA TODAY’s Hispanic Living magazine some graphic details are still with her. “I remember family members pulling him into the bathroom to help him and seeing the blood on the black- and- white tile.”
The focus of “Truth About Murder” and its six episodes – the victims, their families, community and law enforcement, but not what’s in the minds of the assailants – drew Hostin in.
“I have been approached about doing this kind of show, but it was always sort of from the mind of the killer, and I’ve never been interested in that,” says Hostin, “because I’ve always been a victim advocate.”
In the premiere episode, Gloria Marshall shares her clear memory of giving her daughter Danielle Marshall a final goodbye before she was killed. Danielle was just 23 when she was shot in her Powder Springs, Georgia, home.
“I remember that day like no other,” Gloria says on the show of thatc time. When her daughter requested a goodbye kiss, Gloria jokingly responded her daughter was “too grown,” referring to a conversation they had the day before.
When Gloria speaks of her regret, a visibly moved Hostin places her hands to her mouth. “Why didn’t I just give her that one kiss?” Gloria squeaks.
Hostin says in such raw moments, “You take it on and you take it in, and in many ways you learn from it.”
As the mother of two children, she says she “felt that to my core. ... That moment helped me as a mother, thinking ‘ OK, I’ve got to kiss my kids every, single day.’”
Hostin did double duty, hosting “The View” on weekdays and taping the documentary series on weekends.
“There were days we worked 15, 16 hours, sometimes 17 hours and slept a couple of hours and then got back up and then flew somewhere else,” she says. “It never felt like work; it just felt great.”
Hostin sees “Truth About Murder” as a chance to share the experiences of those who don’t have her platforms.
“It’s just part of the same thing that drives me, which is I get to give voice to people,” she says. “It’s an awesome responsibility, but it just really lights me up.”
Her daytime gig also often spurs headlines and even a book about the behind- the- scenes drama. Hostin sees it as par for the course, writing it off as “just part of the show.”
“It’s always been the case that people say that we don’t get along,” she says. For some viewers, bickering is part of the show’s appeal. Hostin speculates the suspicions stem from the co- hosts being “so strong and all so different and we do It in front of 3 million people every day.”
But she says it’s not true, and compares their conflicts to those experienced in families.
“I don’t have siblings, but I have cousins that I’m really close to and friends that I’m very close to, and we get into arguments,” she says. “And there are times when you walk back into your dressing room and you’re like, ‘ I cannot believe that she thinks that.’ But that’s fine because you’re a family, and you’re going to go to work the very next day and work together as a family.
“Families have arguments. Families have disagreements. I think the viewers are OK with us getting into disagreements, just like kids understand when their parents get into disagreements. They just don’t want us to get divorced. And we’re not gonna get divorced anytime soon.”