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While many of his biggest critics would assume that Howard Stern's lifestyle is as wild as his radio show once was, fans know this is far from the truth. Howard is a big old softy and has been fully monogamous with his second wife Beth O for the past 21 years. Beth is Howard's everything, and he makes sure to tell his audience that almost every single day. Aside from their shared love of "Bang O'Clock", horrible reality television, and basically sequestering inside one of their mega-mansions, the two are also extremely active animal activists. At any given time, they could be fostering up to 30 cats out of their own home. While Beth loves this soft side of Howard, she has occasionally been exposed to his darker side.
On January 3rd, 2022, Beth admitted that she was furious with her husband due to how he was treating one of his most loyal staffers... wealthy producer Gary "Ba Ba Booey" Dell'Abate. While Gary has been a punching bag for all of Howard's staffers since day one, Beth thought Howard took things too far. Here's what happened and why Howard's wife is currently "so mad" at him.
Howard Stern Hated Ba Ba Booey's Gag Gift
Howard has absolutely lost it on Gary a number of times. But his January 3rd, 2022 rant against him was particularly mean. The segment started off with Howard voicing his dissatisfaction with a gag gift Gary got him for Christmas/his birthday. But as he spoke about it, Howard relived the anger he felt when he initially opened Gary's gift.
"I was so f***ing angry with Ba Ba Booey that I wanted to fire him. I wanted to fire him. But Beth calmed me down about him. And It's all about a gift. She thinks I'm nuts," Howard said to his co-host Robin Quivers and the audience. "It was my New Years' resolution to be nicer to Gary but he makes it impossible. He wants to be funny like the guys on this show and he's not. He's not funny."
According to Howard, Gary sent him a giant box that was tightly taped up. Just minutes before Howard was about to pop on a Zoom meeting, he thought he could open the gift. But it turned out to take him far longer than he expected. When he finally opened it, he saw that it was a box set for George Takei's Broadway show, Allegiance. The musical about the imprisonment of Japanese Americans during WW2 has been the subject of a lot of satire on The Stern Show. As much as Howard and his staff love George (who is the show's announcer), they just can't understand why anyone would want to see Allegiance... let alone own the box set. This was the gag. But instead of making Howard laugh, it straight-up pissed him off as it brought up issues of Gary's worth ethic.
"I guarantee Gary would have been a postal worker if it wasn't for me," Howard said. "Now he's sending me f***ing garbage!"
This is far from the only time Howard has been angry at Gary for wasting his time, not working hard enough, and being cheap with all the money that he's made from the job Howard gave him. But usually, these comments turn into funny bits. In this instance, Howard was cutting, personal, and downright cruel... And he immediately regretted it. So much so that the rant is nowhere to be found as he's edited it out of his show. Howard admitted that he was projecting other frustrations onto Gary, but knew what he was being abusive.
What Beth Thought Of Howard Bullying Gary
Shortly after the segment, Beth came into the studio and laid into Howard about both his on-air Gary rant and what he said about him in private.
"You were awful. Awful," Beth said to Howard sharply before addressing Robin and the audience. "He was so ungrateful. He was so rude. I have never heard... I was so couldn't even believe that that was my husband speaking like that."
"And then I went on the air, against your advice, and I started yelling at Gary about the Allegiance box set," Howard said.
"[Gary] was so thoughtful and sent you a birthday gift and you were... You should have seen the steam coming out of your ears and your nose when I walked into your office. After you just opened that gift."
"You know what it was? It took up all my time and I was busy--"
"You told me to get rid of it," Beth said. "That's what I did. I am so mad at you right now."
"I wasn't looking for jokes from Gary. I really wasn't. But I overreacted. And I should have been a bit more gracious."
Beth then went on to say that just hours later, Howard was on the phone with someone who received a gift that they didn't like and Howard was appalled that the person wasn't being grateful.
"And I said, 'Time out. Take two steps back and think about what you did this morning.' And you did not even think it even correlated at all," Beth said, noticeably angrier.
"It didn't. Gary sent me a goof gift. The person you're referring to received a gift of food, beautiful food, and was not grateful," Howard said. "That was a thoughtful gift. Gary's gift was not thoughtful. It just created work for me."
After Beth called her husband a "piece of work", Robin stepped in to stand by her side. "[Howard] was so bad this morning [with Gary] that I said, 'Look, Howard, you're going to regret what you're saying later today. You better stop now.'"
Howard then claimed that he would edit out the segment where he yelled at Gary, which he did. Then he apologized to Gary for his bad behavior. While Gary accepted the apology, even the fans thought that he shouldn't have.
"I do want to say one thing," Gary interjected. "In some respect, it was a goof gift, but what happened on the air this morning was what I had hoped would happen. Not the yelling part... I hoped that the part where we goofed on what was I the box set, and how ridiculous it was, was on the show. I was hoping to provide some content."
While Gary did end up providing Howard with some entertaining (yet cringe-worthy) content for his show, there's no doubt that Howard's reaction caused him grief with his wife.