Whoopi Goldberg reveals how Maggie Smith helped her after mother’s death

Actor Whoopi Goldberg has talked about how Sister Act costar Dame Maggie Smith helped her through a difficult moment in her life.

The View co-host was in London in 2010 for the West End musical adaptation of the 1992 film Sister Act when she took a call from her late brother, Clyde K Johnson, who said their mother had an aneurysm and was on life support.

“I’ll get on the first plane I can find,” Goldberg said, writing about the incident in her memoir, Bits and Pieces: My Mother, My Brother, and Me.

“Don’t rush. She’s not here anymore. It’s okay, Sis,” her brother had replied.

Smith was attending the show and had stopped by the dressing room for a chat when Goldberg took the call.

Goldberg recalled Smith’s comforting presence while she was in a daze and how Smith “went from being my backstage company to being my friend through the rest of the night”.

“She decided she would stay with me until I was on my way to the airport,” remembered Goldberg.

“For the next five hours, Maggie sat with me and let me talk her ear off, telling stories about my mom, my growing-up years, and my brother. We laughed a lot,” she wrote.

“I don’t know if I was in shock. I had never been in shock before. I don’t think I cried. I didn’t feel anything except a big wave of kindness from Maggie.”

“I’ve got to say, she is one of those people for whom I would do anything. Anything Maggie Smith needs, I got her covered.”

“Having Maggie Smith be there, and being able to fall apart and having her say, ‘Listen, my friend. We’ll get you through this. We’ll get you through this. We’ll get you to the hospital so you can get her. Get you back to Berkeley so you can get home,’” Goldberg told People magazine.

“We were up all night, just laughing and talking about stuff.”

“And she had met my mom a couple of times. Just having somebody who got it, who understood, it’s everything.”

In a recent interview with CNN’s Anderson Cooper for his talk series All There Is, Goldberg revealed how far the loss of her mother and brother, who died in 2015, had pushed her.

“There were three of us,” she said.

“I once flirted with, I once flirted with thinking about leaving.”

Goldberg describes her healing process, realising that it was not her time.

“The answer to that is ’cause we have stuff we got to get done, that’s why,” Goldberg said.

“And we’re not supposed to, this is not our time. It’s not our time. We got kids and grandkids, and they need to know us. They need to know us, that’s why. That’s my belief.”

Last year, Goldberg had said while there was talk of a Sister Act 3 film, she wouldn’t do it without Smith.

“You know, one of the things that I want to make sure I do while I'm here is… I want to let Maggie Smith know that I'm holding the part of Mother Superior for you. Because I just can't do it with anybody but you,” she said.