Earlier this week, we told you that the Internet had some pretty strong feelings about Malia Obama’s decision to drop her famous last name as she debuted her short film “The Heart” at the Sundance Film Festival this year.
While some accused the eldest Obama daughter of trying to “sneak past” nepo baby accusations, most people were supportive of her effort to take her name out of the conversation and let her work speak for itself.
Now, the ladies of “The View” are weighing in, wondering why we’re even talking about what the 25-year-old Harvard grad wants to call herself. Moderator Whoopi Goldberg, who knows a little something about name changes, was one of Obama’s strongest supporters on the panel.
“She knows she’s an Obama. Why do you care?” Goldberg said. “Why do you care what she calls herself? If she wanted to call herself Jeanette McDonald, she has the right to. If I can be Whoopi Goldberg, she can be whoever the hell she wants to be.”
The actress and co-host, whose real name is Caryn Elaine Johnson, told Marlo Thomas in 2014 that her creative stage name was a hilarious combination of her propensity for passing gas and a family surname she thought would get her farther in Hollywood.
“I’m a farter. And so we had a small theater in San Diego called the San Diego Rep,” she said. “And if you had to let it go, you had to let it go. And people would say, ‘You’re like a whoopee cushion.’”
“The View” Co-host Alyssa Farah Griffin threw in her two cents, arguing that there’s nothing wrong with Obama’s name change, especially since she’s doing something completely outside of politics.
“If she was running for congress in Illinois and was like, ‘I’m running as Malia Ann,’ I’d be like, ‘That’s too cute by a half. You’re obviously an Obama following in Obama’s footsteps,’” she said. “But she’s doing her own thing.”
But Joy Behar played devil’s advocate, suggesting that of all the presidential last names, Obama is not a bad one to have.
“It’s not like her last name is Nixon,” she said. “Her last name has great vibes around it. So she might as well use it.”