Rosie O’Donnell to exit ‘The View’ again as ABC show’s woes continue

Well, that was quick. Rosie O’Donnell is leaving “The View,” just seven months after announcing her return to ABC’s morning chatfest.

According to O’Donnell’s publicist, the exit is due to the brash comic’s stressful split from her wife, Michelle.

“I can confirm that Rosie and her wife, Michelle, split in November,” Cindi Berger wrote in a statement. “Rosie has teens and an infant at home that need her attention. This has been a very stressful situation. She is putting her personal health and family first.

“ABC has been wonderfully understanding and supportive of her personal decision to leave ‘The View,’” Berger added. “Next week will be her last.”

ABC confirmed O’Donnell’s exit in a statement: “When she told us that she wanted to exit ‘The View,’ we respected and understood her desire to put her well-being and her family first.”

This marks a quick end to O’Donnell’s second tenure on the show. She had a brief and much talked-about run as cohost in 2007.

Where this leaves “The View” remains to be seen. Producers tried to reinvent the show last year by adding O’Donnell as well as cohosts Rosie Perez and Nicolle Wallace to join Whoopi Goldberg at the table.

But ratings for the rejiggered version have been unimpressive and the show has been marred by some major gaffes, many of them made by Perez, an actress who had little hosting experience before getting the gig. Recently she suggested that Bobbi Kristina Brown, the daughter of late pop star Whitney Houston, was found unresponsive in a bathtub and is on life support due to a Lifetime biopic about her mother. In October she touched off an uproar after missstating the Catholic Church’s stance on divorce.

O’Donnell, meanwhile, was reportedly angry about reports that Perez had been fired and last month told viewers on-air that Perez would return to the show after she finished work on a play.

This week it was officially confirmed that Brian Balthazar, the co-executive producer who was steering the reinvention of “The View,” would leave to take a job at HGTV.

Indeed, with all the backstage drama, producers at “The View” might want to consider just pointing their cameras there.

But after next week, they would have to do it without Rosie O’Donnell.

Twitter: @scottcollinsLAT