What is the Brooke Shields and Barbara Walters interview?

MODEL and actress Brooke Shields has opened up about a 1981 interview with television personality Barbara Walters.

She spoke about the interview with Dax Shepard on his podcast, Armchair Expert, on Monday, December 6, 2021.

What is the Brooke Shields and Barbara Walters interview?

When Brooke Shields was just 15 years old, she was interviewed by Barbara Walters following her controversial Calvin Klein campaign.

During the 1981 interview, Walters asked Brooke a series of questions that she has now described as "criminal."

Walters asked then 15-year-old Brooke what her measurements were, and asked her to stand up so the audience could see her height and size.

"I think when people see you they don't realize how tall and slim you are. We haven't really seen you standing next to someone," Walters said.

Alongside Brooke was her mother, Teri, who Walters mentioned in her questions.

"Would you be a mother like your mother?" she asked at the time.

"What about people who say, ‘She had no childhood’?" Walters followed up with.

Brooke went on to defend her mother, saying she was still in the midst of her adolescence.

"Do you have any secrets from your mother?" Walters then asked.

What did Brooke Shields say to Dax Shepard about the interview?

While on Shepard's podcast, Brooke claimed the interview with Walters was "practically criminal."

"It is not journalism," the now-56-year-old model continued.

Shepard responded to Brooke, saying: "That Barbara Walters interview is maddening."

At the time of the 1981 interview, Brooke had shot her first campaign with Calvin Klein just months prior.

The campaign caused quite the controversy, as the then-teenage model was said to the camera: "You want to know what comes between me and my Calvins? Nothing."

In an interview with Vogue in October of 2021, Brooke opened up about how she was "naive" at the time of the shoot.

"I was naive, I didn't think anything of it. I didn't think it had to do with underwear. I didn't think it was sexual in nature," she said.

"I'd say that about my sister, nobody could come between me and my sister," Brooke continued.

"If they had intended on the double entendre, they didn't explain it to me. It didn't faze me. It didn't sort of come into my psyche as it being anything overtly sexual, sexualized in any way."

Who was Barbara Walters?

Born on September 25, 1929, Barbara Walters was an American retired broadcast journalist, author, and television personality.

She began her career in the 1960s as a writer and segment producer on The Today Show, becoming the first woman co-host in 1974.

Two years later, in 1976, Walters became the first female co-anchor for a late night news show, starring alongside Harry Reasoner on the ABC Evening News.

Walters went on to produce and co-host 20/20. She then created, produced, and co-hosted the popular talk show, The View, where she worked from 1997 until her retirement in 2014.

Throughout her career, Walters has interviewed every sitting president between Richard Nixon and Barack Obama.

She has also interviewed Donald Trump and Joe Biden, but not during their time in office.