This morning, The Wendy Williams Show will air Wendy Williams’ exclusive interview with Aretha Franklin.

In their one-on-one sit-down interview, Aretha opened up about the health scare that knocked her off tour and placed her in a Detroit hospital. Wendy told the legendary soul singer that she heard the illness started out with a slight pain.

Aretha replied:

“Yes, that was my first inkling that something was wrong, that something wasn’t what it should be. The pain was so hard it nearly brought me to my knees. So I said, ‘The concerts are over. I have to go find out what is wrong.’”

Now Aretha says she’s in much better spirits.

While she didn’t reveal specifics about her condition, Wendy did tell the 68-year-old singer, “In December we all found out that you were having abdominal surgery.”

To which Aretha said: “Hmm … Is that what you heard?”

Clearly Aretha isn’t going to reveal all.  Nonetheless, be sure to check out the interview on The Wendy Williams Show today.

Check out BET’s interview with Wendy Williams.

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The new cast of Dancing With the Stars has been revealed, and they don’t disappoint. It’s a motley crew of reality TV stars, boxers, talk-show hosts, rappers turned actors, and more. In addition to an interesting cast, they’ve made some new additions to the show. Entertainment Weekly caught up with the show’s executive producer, who gave them some intel. He said that viewers can expect more theme weeks like last season’s tributes to rock ‘n’ roll and TV.

See below for the full cast:

Wendy Williams, 46

Sugar Ray Leonard, 54

Romeo, 21 – rapper, actor and best of all, Master P’s son

Kendra Wilkinson, 25 – various E! reality TV shows

Ralph Macchio, 49 – the star of the original Karate Kid movies

Kirstie Alley, 60 – Fat Actress and Cheers

Petra Nemcova, 31 – a Czech model

Psycho Mike, a.k.a. Michael Catherwood, 31 – a popular DJ for KROQ in Los Angeles

Chelsea Kane, 22 – She’s best known for playing Stella on Disney Channel’s Jonas L.A.

Chris Jericho, 40 -  pro wrestler (WWE)

Hines Ward, 34 – NFL Pro Bowler from the Pittsburgh Steelers. He’s the third wide receiver to appear on DWTS.

Who do you think will do well? I think Wendy Williams might surprise us and go far because she’s competitive and knows how to win. Romeo also has a lot to prove. His father was on the show a few season ago and didn’t do too well because, surprisingly, he had two left feet and not much energy. However, Romeo has to do better to redeem the family name and I think he will. Who are you betting on? Let’s hope there won’t be another Bristol Palin voting scandal?

Dancing With the Stars returns to ABC on March 21.

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Wendy Williams just expanded her TV franchise to include another gig. She will be hosting a new dating show on the Game Show Network.

The Game Show Network will reportedly air 32 a half-hour episodes of the new show entitled, Love Triangle, which has been described as a cross between a game and a talk show. Guests on the show must must chose one person for an exclusive relationship by the time the episode has ended.

“We’ve had great success with our dating and relationship game shows Baggage and The Newlywed Game. Love Triangle will follow in that vein and Wendy will bring a strong voice, personality and sense of humor to the show,” Kelly Goode, GSN senior programming VP, told Variety.

Wendy will continue to host or own talk show, The Wendy Williams Show, and says she is open to many other projects. (But we already knew that because Wendy Williams is a hustler).

Love Triangle premieres on April 18th.

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The Wendy Williams Show will return for a third season in September. The renewal deal follows a ratings uptick this season for Wendy in a number of Fox markets, including New York and Los Angeles.

“Wendy has reached new creative heights this season and stations have taken notice,” Bernstein and Marcus said in a statement. “It has performed exceptionally well in recent months leading out of morning newscasts on the Fox stations, with viewers rediscovering Wendy’s fun, irreverent and entertaining style.”

Wendy Williams debuted on the national talk show circuit in July 2009 with the launch of her daily strip following years as a radio personality. I guess this more toned down version is working wonders. Congrats!

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As much as I love me some Wendy Williams, sometimes I look at my cable guide’s listing for her show in befuddlement.

You know: Who in the hell is she talking to again? I’m not talking the likes of Vanessa Williams, of course. But some of the others, though, I don’t know.

But, Wendy has been getting better with guests and for November sweeps she’ll really be stepping it up.

Comedian and The View moderator, Whoopi Goldberg, will return along with Suze Orman, Kelly Ripa, Larry King, and Shannen Doherty (Brenda Walsh will always be everything to me).

Also, Natalie Cole, Iman, Kimberly Elise, and Smokey Robinson will share the couch with Wendy.

The guest I’m most looking forward to watching on The Wendy Williams Show is Nicki Minaj, who will appear on the Nov. 18 edition.

Look out for The Wendy Williams Show next month. Ya’ll give it up for Wendy. She’s got something for me, my mama, my great uncle and your lil’ cousins. Now if you’ll excuse me, I’m about to complete my stan deed of the day with a spirited rendition of her show’s theme song.

Yesterday, Wendy Williams kicked off Monday’s edition of “Hot Topics” by noting that she had become one herself given her newfound “feud” with LeAnn Rimes.

The country music star took to Twitter to air her frustrations over Wendy’s comments about her comments made to Shape magazine. For those unaware, LeAnn Rimes cheated on her husband with a married man.

Wendy noted that the children of LeAnn Rimes’ boyfriend, Eddie Cibrian, already had a mother so it’s not best for Rimes to refer to them as “her boys.”

LeAnn did make note that her mama got some of Wendy’s comments confused. It wasn’t Wendy who sent her to hell for adultery. It was actually some host on an HLN’s Showbiz Today.

Anyway, a little bit of old Wendy crept in as the toned down television personality responded to LeAnn’s diatribe.

Wendy dismissed LeAnn’s cries of her being judgmental, saying with a smile that everyone is.

She also took a jab at her mother – asking was she so concerned for LeAnn when the singer emancipated herself from her parents at 14.

However, no earrings were removed, no Vaseline was brought out, and no one had to hold anyone back so it wasn’t that serious.

It was just a reminder to people that Wendy can get with you if need be.

During this segment, Wendy also revealed that her friend is friends with LeAnn’s boyfriend’s ex-wife, who invited Wendy out for lunch after hearing about her comments.

Wendy made it clear that lunch isn’t happening given she doesn’t want to become a regular hot topic. She did invite LeAnn to the show, though.

Check out the video here:

I guess all’s well that ends well. The moral of the story is: Wendy Williams’ wig was hot. She should keep that one for at least three days.

Those of you who remember the real meaning of “How you doing?” also know how Wendy Williams used to get down back in her radio days.

As in her being blunt and spilling tea – often drawing the fire of various celebrities.

But on The Wendy Williams Show Wendy is softer, gentler so one would expect infamous on-air fights like that between Wendy and Whitney Houston to be a thing of the past.

Not completely.

It seems country singer LeAnn Rimes is mighty mad at Wendy for her comments in a Shape magazine interview in which she tried to justify why she cheated on her husband, Dean Sheremet with actor Eddie Cibrian.

In the interview Rimes went as far to refer to Cibrian’s sons as her “boys.”

So on her show, Wendy said: “It’s all very sloppy. The boys have a mother, and her name is Brandi [Glanville].”

Following the show, Rimes took to Twitter to write:

“All I know is Wendy Williams done pissed my mamma off! I don’t wanna be in her path. To say, ‘I’ve reserved myself a place in hell?!’ I’m incredibly disappointed to see someone with that kind of platform use it for such negativity and could be so mean and judgmental about a situation they know nothing about…I don’t like how it happened either, said it a million times, but this is out of control.”

Mean and judgmental? Please. You’re lucky she’s still not on WBLS!

In any event, Wendy will be responding to LeAnn’s Twitter rant today on her show.

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Those of us who have been fans of Wendy Williams since her radio days when she would drink champagne with Mariah Carey, made Jennifer Lopez squirm, and get cursed out by Whitney Houston know that she’s heavily toned down her persona in wake of her daytime talk show.

Will she have to take it down even further?

Possibly according to Page Six, who reports execs want Wendy even lighter than she already has become.

They report:

To appeal to middle-America moms, executives dumped producer Rob Dauber and even told the hair-and-makeup team to tone down Williams’ look, a source said. A show rep denies there will be changes starting Monday. Dauber said through his rep: “I look forward to watching it . . . while I move on to start new shows with new personalities.”

Uh, I don’t know, ya’ll. I know Wendy’s look is over-the-top, but she’s already toned it down. For example, when is the last time you’ve seen her in a big blond wig? She’s already given so much for ratings. Does she have to get more?
If I see her in black hair or –gasp – her real hair, I might flip.

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Now that Wendy Williams’ talk show is already confirmed to air until at least 2012, it’s clear that the media personality formally referred to as a ‘shock jock’ is flying high in the latest facet of her media career.

As someone who kept with her back in her radio days, I often find it funny how the phrase “How you doing?” has morphed over the years. Much of that has to do with much of Wendy’s TV audience not knowing about her radio days.

Wendy had this to say about being discovered by such new demographics:

“Absolutely! I have all kinds of people who are just now discovering me through television. I hear all the time: ‘I didn’t know about your radio show, but I love you on television.’ They talk about my interviews with Toni Braxton and Fran Drescher — and then they talk about how I tilt my wig and how the show is so colorful and full of personality. I love it. I feel like I’m really giving people what they want, and that’s a great feeling. Especially when you can be yourself while you’re doing it. Television of course has a much bigger range than radio, and I have to say this is the first time I’ve felt like an actual celebrity. I’ve always been known in the New York radio market. But folks in Tallahassee didn’t know me from the radio. Now they do.”

With both Oprah and Tyra Banks both leaving daytime TV, many assumed Wendy would be giddy with the possibilities of even having less competition.

But, the still fresh talk show host reminds fans that she has plenty of competition left out there:

“It’s not like I have no competition. The playing field is still there. If it’s not them, there will be someone else. There won’t be a shortage of talk show hosts. Their exit only means that they have paved the way for me. I can only dream of having that kind of run. Give me five years, and I’m ecstatic.”

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Many were surprised to see Whoopi Goldberg on The Wendy Williams Show on Monday.

That’s because those that remember Wendy Williams back in her radio days (and what “How You Doin’?” really meant) recall that Wendy and Whoopi have a longstanding beef. Their previous rift stemmed from Wendy basically referring to Whoopi as an ugly monkey and allegedly that her daughter was using drugs.

As you can tell from the video Wendy seemed genuinely remorseful for the bad blood and it was big of her to apologize and even bigger for Whoopi to show up despite her admitting that her own daughter was against it.

While it was great to see these two forgive and forget, I wonder whether Wendy’s radio past will continue to plague her present daytime talk show. I loved her radio show, but the tone of that show is a far cry from where she is today.

Wendy gained her biggest pre-talk show headlines after Whitney Houston cursed her out during their now infamous interview. Wendy tried her best to get Nippy to appear on the show, but as of now no such luck.

But with Tyra Banks quitting her show and Oprah retiring from daytime, there won’t be that many big names in daytime besides Ellen DeGeneres and perhaps the women of The View.

Will stars still sour over something Wendy may have said back on New York and/or Philly radio eventually give in and appear on what’s becoming one of America’s newest obsession or will they try to throw shade at the new daytime queen?