Whoopi Goldberg's mother was a "remarkable woman," so Whoopi decided to scatter her ashes on her favorite Disneyland ride — only to later realize that there's a reason why you're not supposed to do that.
On Late Night With Seth Meyers on July 11, 2024, Whoopi told the story of what she did with her mom's ashes. Before getting to the story, she warned everyone that it's not something that they should try. "No one should do this. Don’t do it," she advised.
The View cohost, who wrote a memoir called Bits and Pieces: My Mother, My Brother, and Me, said her mom loved Disneyland.
Her mom loved the ride, It's a Small World, in particular, Whoopi, 68, explained. Whoopi decided to take her mom's ashes on the ride with her, and tried to be discreet about it, even though she later confessed to scattering her mom's ashes at Disneyland.
She revealed that she attempted to hide what she was doing on the ride by pretending to sneeze. "So in the Small World ride, periodically, I’d scoop some of her up and I’d do this," Whoopi said before faking a dramatic sneeze.
"I said, 'My God, this cold is getting worse and worse,'" she explained.
Whoopi spread her mom's ashes by the flower beds at the Disneyland entrance as well, she admitted, and she used the same trick to do so — "I was like, 'Oh look at that!'" then she faked a sneeze again, she explained.
Though she tried to be fairly subtle about what she was doing, she ultimately was concerned about safety, which is why she told the park what she did in the end.
"I told them I did it," she admitted. "I wanted to make sure, actually, that I hadn’t done something that was dangerous 'cause it hadn’t occurred to me, but there’s a reason they don’t want ashes just floating around."
More from LittleThings: Teacher Allegedly Pretends To Have A Daughter & Invites 12-Year-Old Student To A Sleepover
When speaking to Seth Meyers, Whoopi also told the story of how she took on the stage name "Whoopi Goldberg." Initially, she wanted to call herself "Whoopi Cushion," but it was her mom who advised against it.
Whoopi was in her 30s at the time that she posed the idea to her mom, and her mom reacted with, "Are you crazy?"
Whoopi also explained her mom's reasoning: "You’re diminishing your abilities, and if you call yourself by Whoopi Cushion, they’re not going to really appreciate what you can do," her mom said to her.
Her mom suggested "Goldberg" as a last name because it was a family name that she liked. Whoopi appreciated how her mom never criticized the name "Whoopi."
"It gives me great pleasure to tell that story about her because she never said, 'that’s a ridiculous name, Whoopi,'" Whoopi explained. "It was the other name. She didn’t like the 'Cushion.'"
