Actor Frank Langella gave Barbara Walters a New Years hug, and that wasn't all; he also gave her the chicken pox.

The 83-year-old co-host of the View, Barbara Walters had to miss a month of work when she caught the disease. Langella had the shingles virus and didn't know it when he gave Walters that hug.

Shingles, according to Web MD, is a skin rash that comes from the varicella virus, the same one that causes chicken pox. People who have had chicken pox as children could get shingles as adults when the virus becomes active in the body again.

Shingles is not contagious but the virus that causes it is. Barbra Walters must not have had chicken pox as a child, so when she came in contact with Langella, she picked up the virus and contracted chicken pox.

When Barbra Walters returned to work at the View, she did not mention Franl Langella by name. She simply said she got the illness after "hugging a well-known actor who shall remain nameless."

Barbra Walters couldn't keep her mystery man a secret for long; she finally named Frank Langella as the one who gave her chicken pox.