“I have a career, for over three decades, of talking about people and now, I’m being talked about,” Wendy Williams says at the start of the trailer of Wendy Williams: What A Mess!, the new Lifetime documentary about the media personality. In the preview of the doc (premiering Sunday, Jan. 30 at 10 pm ET/9 pm CT), Wendy’s personal drama with her then-husband and once manager, Kevin Hunter, is front and center. After gabbing about other people’s drama for thirty years – “I do ‘Hot Topics,’ I don’t live ‘Hot Topics,’” she says in a fateful clip – Wendy, 56, had to deal with her own shame after Kevin, 48, fathered a child with his mistress. The whole scandal, as seen in the trailer, took a toll on Wendy. “This is the culmination of everything,” she said, as the tears begin to pour from her eyes. “Everything – everything!”
Wendy Williams: What A Mess! promises to offer a “no-holds-barred look with never-before-heard truths about Wendy’s notorious feuds with celebrities, her shocking divorce, her childhood, and the private darkness she has endured,” according to Lifetime’s press release. “This is the story of a self-made woman who finds herself at the start of a new life, uncertain of the future, but ready to reclaim her crown.”
For fans of The Wendy Williams Show, the story is already well-known: after 22 years of marriage, Wendy filed for divorce in April 2019 amid reports that Kevin had a secret love child with his alleged mistress. This wasn’t the first affair, as Wendy had spoken about Kevin cheating on her shortly after they welcomed their only child, son Kevin Hunter Jr., in 2000. When speaking to Andy Cohen in late 2019, Wendy said she knew about Kevin Sr.’s two-timing “for years,” but “had to get my ducks in a row” before she could pull the plug on the marriage. Ultimately, Kevin Sr.’s love child was the straw that broke the camel’s back. She filed in 2019, and by January 2020, the split was finalized.
Oddly, Wendy Williams: What A Mess! isn’t the only film covering this Queen of All Media’s rise. Lifetime will also air Wendy Williams: The Movie, a Lifetime Original biopic, on Jan. 30, 2021, at 8 pm EST / 7 pm CT. In this movie, actress Ciera Payton portrays Wendy as she deals with Kevin Hunter (played by Morocco Omari) and his cheating. “Before I had you, I had me, and not you, nor anyone else has the power to take away my gifts!”
Wendy Williams: What A Mess! airs on Lifetime on Jan. 30, 2021, at 10 pm ET / 9 pm CT.
