Howard Stern Ended A Friendship Over Personal Comments About His Wife Beth Ostrosky

Throughout Howard Stern’s lengthy career as a shock jock, he built a massive fortune by doing horrible things. After all, Howard got Jay Leno to walk off The Tonight Show, one of his interviews “hurt” a celebrity, and he tricks stars into saying things they regret. Howard also said things that were so insensitive that a celebrity held a grudge against him for years.

When Howard isn’t busy offending people, he also tends to share with his audience when something makes him angry. For example, Howard was angry about having a speech cut off, being called predictable, and because of Joe Rogan’s past statements. On top of that, Howard was once so furious that a pal publicly commented on his marriage to Beth Ostrosky that he ended their friendship.

Even though Howard Stern is used to people talking about him, everyone has their line when it comes to what they are willing to accept from others. As it turns out, one of Howard’s lines that he won’t let other people cross is extremely personal.

Not long ago, Howard revealed that a personal relationship he’d had for years hit a major stumbling block. As Howard explained, he ended his friendship with Bill Maher over comments he made about his marriage to Beth Ostrosky Stern.

Howard and Bill’s relationship has been complicated over the years. After previously being pals before going through strife, Bill and Howard had been on good terms for years before 2023, when things fell apart again.

As a September 2023 Entertainment Weekly article reveals, Howard revealed on his radio show that he heard Bill calling him out during an episode of his podcast.

He took a big shot at me.

Howard went on to describe what Bill said during an episode of his “Club Random with Bill Maher Podcast.”

Since Howard became the most famous radio show host in the world, he has said and done many things worth criticizing. In fact, based on everything that Howard has done, it is staggering that his career is still going strong.

Not only has Howard Stern been wildly popular, he has been paid a fortune for years. In December 2020, a Screen Rant article focused on Howard signing a 5-year deal with SiriusXM that reportedly was worth as much as $100 million.

Considering everything that Howard has done, it is surprising that Howard revealed that Bill called him out for how he talks about his marriage.

“Basically, he says, ‘Howard Stern always gets on the radio and says he loves his wife.’ I’ve never been criticized for this. He goes, ‘Haven’t we had enough of that? What about his first wife? I feel really bad for her.'”

As a part of his radio show, Howard has regularly spoken about his relationships with his wives over the years. Howard has also spoken about his personal life during some interviews.

In March 2011, Howard Stern was interviewed by Rolling Stone about his life and career. During that discussion, Howard revealed he devastated after his first marriage ended. “My marriage ending blew my mind. I was upset that I failed and let down my family, my kids, my ex-wife. It was all very painful.”

Still, it is different when someone else talks about your personal life. In response to his pal talking about his marriage, Howard stated that his friendship with Bill was over.

I think I’m no longer friends with him.

Howard also stated how messed he thought it was that Bill made assumptions about his divorce. “What a sexist thing to say. What a convoluted, nutty thing to say. He says it must hurt [my ex-wife’s] feelings that I’m in love with a different woman. It’s assuming that he knows something about my first marriage. That of course the man must be leaving the woman and the woman must be devastated and be sitting around pining away for her famous man.”

Bill made the comments during an episode of “Club Random with Bill Maher” that featured Julian Lennon as a guest, which can be heard on Apple Podcasts. During the episode, Bill spoke about how Howard went on about his wife when he appeared on Real Time with Bill Maher.

“[Howard’s] saying to me, like, you know, ‘But, Bill, you know, you’re successful, but you don’t want to settle down?’ You know, and he goes on about how much he loves his wife, Beth, which he has been doing on the air for, like, ten years.”

Bill then stated that Howard’s comments about Beth made him think about the radio show host’s first wife. “But we know Howard had this other wife before Beth. So he’s trying to make me seem like I’m the slightly immoral one because I wouldn’t settle down. And all I could think of is, ‘How does this gushing about the second wife, how does that make the first wife feel?’ You know? Could we just not gush about the person while the other person still can hear it?”

Bill finished his comments by stating that he found Howard gushing about Beth when his first wife could hear it gross.

I don’t care. It’s still gross. It’s still mean in a way.

Howard Stern And Bill Maher Made Peace After Their Falling Out

After Howard Stern called Bill Maher out for commenting on his marriage to Beth Ostrosky Stern, he gave an update on their relationship. As a September 2023 New York Post article revealed, Howard explained during an episode of his radio show that Bill Maher apologized.

While giving an update on the situation, Howard revealed he told Bill how shocked he was that he commented on his marriage. More importantly, the New York Post’s article revealed that Howard stated Bill tried to make amends.

“I spoke to him over the weekend and I told him about my shock at this commentary and he was apologetic.”

While still talking about making peace with Bill, Howard explained that he felt their friendship would be fixed.

“We talked for a while, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah. I said, ‘Okay, you know, listen, we’ll move on. We’ll move on.’”

Howard then explained that he wasn’t going to go into detail about his conversation with Bill. However, Howard did reveal that their conversation about what Bill had done was blunt. “I’m not going to go into the details of the conversation, but I was pretty blunt.”