‘Price Is Right’ Model Says She ‘Hates’ Host Bob Barker

Model Holly Hallstrom is opening up about her contentious exit from The Price Is Right as she speaks candidly about her hatred for host Bob Barker.

Hallstrom, who was one of “Barker’s Beauties” on the iconic game show from 1977 to 1995, goes behind the scenes on E!’s Dirty Rotten Scandals docuseries, claiming that while she was told she was being fired due to her weight, she was actually let go due to her unwillingness to defend Barker.

The tension began when Hallstrom’s former co-star, Dian Parkinson, sued Barker for sexual harassment following her affair with the game show host, and Hallstrom refused to come to Barker’s defense legally.

“I wanted nothing to do with it,” Hallstrom said in the documentary, which premiered Wednesday on E!. “I was the only one that was asked to give a deposition and did not. I didn’t want to commit felony perjury, which is exactly what it would have been if I gave a testimony.”

After Parkinson dropped her lawsuit against Barker, Hallstrom told PEOPLE she was on the host’s “s—t list,” and she was soon let go, with her weight being cited as the reason for her firing.

“I refused to testify in court, to commit felony perjury for him. That was the final straw, but it’s against the law to fire an employee for failing to testify on your behalf in a court of law. So they could not fire me for that,” she explained, adding, “So instead, Barker said I was overweight, and that’s why I was off the show. I was not surprised that he used that as the excuse, the reason, the justification for firing me, but when I was asked why I was fired, I told them, ‘I was told it was because my weight was a problem.’”

After being told about her “early retirement” because of her weight, Hallstrom remembered thinking for the first time, “I hate that man.”

After her exit from the show, Hallstrom took her story public, which resulted in Barker filing a defamation lawsuit against her that would take years and wipe the model out financially. Barker dropped the suit just days before it was set to go to trial in 2000, and in return, Hallstrom sued him for malicious prosecution, which resulted in a settlement.

“He filed a bogus lawsuit against me and dragged me through court for 10 years until I had nothing left,” she said of Barker, who died in 2023. “And that’s why I didn’t speak out for so many years, because he was alive. I didn’t speak out until he was dead because even though he lost, he would’ve done it again in a heartbeat.”

Being able to share her story now on Dirty Rotten Scandals was “so liberating,” Hallstrom said. “It was like the weight of the world was off my shoulders that I didn’t even realize I’d been carrying for 30 years,” she gushed, adding, “They say the truth will set you free. Man, it set me free. Absolutely, 100%.”