Radio personality turned talk show guru Wendy Williams might not be everyone’s cup of tea, but there is no denying the sexagenarian’s cultural impact. The former DJ has just as many fans as she has detractors for her fixation on gossip. Through the years, Williams has royally ticked off plenty of groups by denying men can be sexually assaulted, gatekeeping what it means to be a woman, and with her consistent disregard for public figures’ privacy. Despite her offending topics, and a public battle with addiction that resulted in her losing her talk show in 2022, Williams has remained a pop culture staple for more than 20 years.
The sheer magnitude of her success might give the impression that Williams was born with a silver spoon in her mouth, but that couldn’t be farther from the truth.
Where did Wendy Williams grow up?
Ever quick to spread gossip about others, Wendy Williams has been incredibly guarded about her own past. She opened up about her childhood with American Masters back in 2015, telling PBS that she “had a perfect childhood.”
Wendy Williams was born July 18, 1964, in Asbury Park, a suburb of New Jersey. Both of her parents were schoolteachers. Her mother, Shirley, specialized in Special Education, and her father, Thomas, was both a teacher and the principal. In 1969, he became the first Black school administrator in Red Bank, New Jersey. The 1970 Asbury Park race riots – caused in part by weekend tourism that favored employing white youths over Black, and a lack of youth organizations for Black teens – pushed the family to leave the area and move to the nearby Wayside, a suburb of Ocean Township, New Jersey.
Williams was the middle child of three. Her older sister, Wanda, was a brilliant student, nabbing a university scholarship by the time she was 16. Wendy Williams also has a younger brother, Tommy, who occasioned Wendy’s first taste of the commentator lifestyle — she was the ad hoc announcer for her brother’s Little League Baseball games. Williams was a hyperactive child, but her parents never wanted to subject her to medication. Instead, they came up with a system while in public, “They would say ‘Wendy, TL!’ or Wendy, TM!’ or ‘TF!’ and from there I would tone it down.”
The acronyms stood for “too loud,” “too much,” or “too fast,” all qualities that she would later employ to make her name in show business. Her ostentatious personality, combined with her natural curiosity (her father told The New Yorker that he could see the moment an inappropriate question was about to come out of her mouth), made Williams the perfect recipe for an unconventional talk show host.
Williams was one of only four Black children in her school, and she often felt adrift. She felt the only thing she had in common with the other kids of color was their affinity for smoking weed. Her “white-sounding” manner of speech reportedly set her white classmates at ease enough that they would use the N-word around her — even if they had to add, “Not you, Wendy,” after each sentiment. She cites lack of early exposure to her later obsession with hip hop, as well as “rough-necks and homeboys,” though she has said that her parents made sure their children were exposed to their own culture, as well.
Williams struggled in school, both with her grades, and her self-image. She says her first diet was imposed by her parents when she hit the first grade. They put her on “a strict diet of tuna and mustard, with a side of grapes.” Sometimes they would switch things up and give her yogurt, instead.
She expressed herself by adding rhinestones to her jackets, ripping her clothes, and dressing flamboyantly. She was never invited to the prom, “because that was before you could ask a Black girl to the prom — but I saw the boys looking.” That same exclusion has worked out in her favor later in life, Williams thinks; because she wasn’t exposed to the party side of life as a youth, there was little temptation to get involved in crazy celebrity shenanigans later — though she has been known to make an appearance, now and then.
Williams graduated at the bottom of her high school class, placing 360th of 363 students. Her excelling at extracurricular activities made her a “good package,” however, and she was accepted into Boston’s Northeastern University in 1982.
Since 2022, Wendy Williams has been battling her own personal demons. The 60-year-old is currently in talks to get a podcast, talk show, or reality TV show off the ground, but rumors are still swirling on the mystery project.