Oprah

by Kitty Kelley

  “The secretary was so frightened she couldn’t speak and she started shaking so hard her notebook bobbed up and down. This only incensed Oprah more. I thought she was going to swat the secretary and then decapitate me. Just as this was happening, a busload of kids passed by. They immediately recognized Oprah and started screaming. Then the most amazing thing happened: Oprah stopped hissing and spitting, and her serpent eyes softened as she waved and beamed. ‘Hi, y’all.’…She actually turned from screeching harridan to sweet goddess in less time than it takes to blink. I swear I thought I was in the middle of an alien attack….Then I marched her into my gallery, trailed by her pilot, her secretary, her hairdresser, her makeup man, and two big security guards. She walked through the front door and started waving her hands over her head like she was doing a very slow St. Vitus’ dance.

  “ ‘I just don’t feel it,’ she said, shaking her head. ‘I just don’t feel it. The vibrations aren’t right…they’re not speaking to me….’

  “ ‘You’ll feel ’em once you see the paintings we’ve assembled for you,’ I said, pointing up the stairs where the Court oils had been hung.

  “ ‘Oprah does not do stairs,’ she said. Before I could even respond to this one, my assistant let her have it.”

  “Yes, I’m afraid I did,” recalled Maureen Taylor. “She had been so impossible to deal with even before she arrived, and then after all the trouble she had put Peter to for that appointment, she came in here waving her hands like some kind of mumbo jumbo mystic, saying, ‘I just don’t feel it….I just don’t feel it.’ When she said, ‘Stairs? Stairs? Oprah does not do stairs,’ I lost it. I said, ‘Well, maybe you should try them, sister. You certainly could use the exercise.’ ”

  “That did it,” said Colasante. “Oprah flounced out of the gallery, and I followed her down the street to her limousines. She yelled at her pilot. ‘Get the plane…Get the plane. We’re leaving.’ And that was the end of Oprah Winfrey and her spirits and her vibrations.”

  To reporters, Oprah tried to dismiss the avalanche of criticism about her “Change Your Life” shows by suggesting it might be a matter of overexposure. “Was it too much Beloved publicity? Was the so-called backlash because I did the [theme] song the same year I was on the Vogue cover?” Most of that “so-called backlash” came from white male critics, who had trouble understanding the increasing “Oprahfication” of female America. As the comic Jimmy Kimmel joked when introducing The Man Show on Comedy Central, “We’re here because we have a serious problem in this country—and her name is Oprah. Millions and millions of women are under Oprah’s spell. This woman has half of America brainwashed.”

  Several critics, some within her own family, took Oprah to task when, in 2007, she promoted The Secret, a DVD and book by Rhonda Byrne, as the answer to living a good life. “I took God out of the box,” Oprah told her viewers before pushing The Secret, which describes Jesus Christ not as divine or as the son of God, but merely as one of the “prosperity teachers” in the Bible.

  “That is not the way I raised Oprah Gail,” said Vernon Winfrey, who was so disgusted by his daughter’s embrace of New Age beliefs that he no longer watched her show. “I need her show like a hog needs a holiday,” he said. “Besides, the show is not that good anymore.”

  Oprah’s “aunt” Katharine, who keeps a Bible by her bedside, was horrified by Oprah’s embrace of “that New Age nonsense,” as was Katharine’s daughter, Jo Baldwin, Oprah’s cousin, who was once vice president of Harpo. Baldwin now teaches English at Mississippi Valley State University and preaches in church on Sundays in Centobia, Mississippi. “I brought Katharine a copy of The Secret, and Jo wouldn’t get near the book—wouldn’t touch it,” said Jewette Battles.

  When Oprah introduced the self-help philosophy of The Secret to her viewers, she promised they would learn “the secret” to making more money, losing weight, finding the love of their life, and achieving job success, simply by visualizing. They could have it all, just like she had it all. She then introduced the author, who explained that The Secret espouses “the law of attraction”: If you think positively, you attract good things to yourself; if you think negatively, you attract bad things. She later cited, as an outrageous example, the massacre in Rwanda, and said the victims’ feelings of fear and powerlessness had led to the carnage.

  “The message of The Secret is the message that I’ve been trying to share with the world on my show for the past twenty-one years,” Oprah told Larry King on CNN. She presented two shows on The Secret, sending the book to the top of the bestseller list, where it sold more than three million copies and spawned “Secret” clubs around the world. She was promptly ridiculed for peddling what Peter Birkenhead described on Salon.com as “minty-fresh snake oil.” Comedian/talk show host Bill Maher declared the book “insane,” and The Washington Post characterized it as “slimy.” Saturday Night Live poked fun at Oprah’s obsession with The Secret in a skit in which she interviewed a poor starving man in Darfur. Putting on a deep Old Testament voice, Oprah, played by Maya Rudolph, asked, “Why do you think things are going so bad?” When the poor man couldn’t answer, Oprah scolded him, saying the atrocities were the result of his negative attitude. “When we come back, John Travolta!”

  Shortly after, Oprah “clarified” her views on “the law of attraction.” She did not apologize for endorsing The Secret, but she now said it was not the answer to everything. “It is not the answer to atrocities or every tragedy. It is just one law. Not the only law. And certainly, certainly, certainly not a get-rich-quick scheme.” Interestingly, in 2009, Oprah declared in court papers that her “reputation depends, in part, on the quality of the products she recommends, which she does only after careful consideration and vetting to make sure such products meet her standards and approval.”

  She certainly paid attention to her critics, especially when they reported her viewers were complaining about her meddling with their religious beliefs. Stung by articles about “The Church of Oprah” and “The Gospel According to Oprah,” she dropped “Change Your Life” television and renamed it “Live Your Best Life” television. She changed “Remembering Your Spirit” to “Remembering Your Joy.”

  WHILE SOME CRITICS were writing her obituary in 1999, she was empire-building with a media move that would leave them all speechless. Joining with Hearst in April 2000, she launched O, The Oprah Magazine, which became the most successful start-up in magazine history. She put herself on the cover of every issue for the next nine years, which further inflamed her critics to produce long essays on her narcissism. They carped about “The Cult of Oprah,” because each issue of O carried “The O List” of things Oprah liked (e.g., Burberry dog collars, Fendi sunglasses, Ralph Lauren mules, Rocket e-books), plus two pages titled “Oprah: Here We Go” and “Oprah: What I Know for Sure,” in addition to recipes by Oprah’s personal chef, diet tips from Oprah’s personal trainer, and advice from Oprah experts such as Dr. Phil and Suze Orman, plus ads for upcoming Oprah personal growth summits. In addition, there is an Oprah interview with a high-profile celebrity such as the Dalai Lama, Madeleine Albright, Jane Fonda, Phil Donahue, Laura Bush, Muhammad Ali, Meryl Streep, Martha Stewart, Ralph Lauren.

  In her interview with Nelson Mandela, he talked about how he had changed himself in prison and learned to train his brain to dominate his emotions so that he could negotiate with South Africa’s racist white leadership. That interview, published in April 2001, should have been hailed as a journalistic coup for Oprah, but one Chicago critic saw it only as Oprah crowing.

  “Sometimes self-esteem can look a lot like pathological narcissism,” wrote Carina Chocano in the Chicago Sun-Times. “The cover of this month’s O reads: ‘OPRAH talks to HER HERO, the awesome, inspiring, noble NELSON MANDELA.’ (OPRAH and HER HERO are [in] noticeably larger [type] than NELSON MANDELA.) Other articles include ‘O: What I Know for Sure,’ ‘Oprah on Setting Yourself Free,’ and ‘Five Things Oprah Thinks Are Great.’ (These include faux apples and p
ears, $18 each; a set of Murano glasses, $40 each; and a book called ‘Spiritual Literacy: Reading the Sacred Truth in Everyday Life,’ which helps Oprah ‘see the extraordinary in ordinary experiences.’)”

  Editorially, the magazine presented Oprah’s commandments for Living Your Best Life:

  Keeping It Off Forever: 10 Rules

  12 Strategies for Getting the Best Health Care

  9 Rules for Writing a Good Ad

  12 Things a Stepmother Should Never Say

  10 Easy Food Switches for an Extra 10 Good Years

  9 Things Weight Loss Winners Know (that you don’t)

  Once again David Letterman took a poke at Oprah on his late-night show by announcing “The Top Ten Articles from Oprah’s New Magazine”:

  No. 10. P, R, A and H. The Four Runner-up Titles for This Magazine.

  No. 9. Do What I Say or I’ll Make Another Movie.

  No. 8. Funerals and Meetings with the Pope: Occasions Not to Use “You Go, Girl.”

  No. 7. While You’re Reading This, I Made 50 Million Dollars.

  No. 6. The Night I Nailed Deepak Chopra

  No. 5. The Million-Dollar Bill: A Convenience That’s Long Overdue

  No. 4. My Love Affair with Oprah, by Oprah

  No. 3. You Suckers Will Never Know What It’s Like to Live in a Solid Gold Mansion

  No. 2. Ricki Lake’s Home Phone Number and How She Hates 3 A.M. Calls

  No. 1. The Time I Had to Wait 5 Minutes for a Skim Half-Decaf Latte

  Oprah filled her “personal growth guide,” as she called her beautifully produced magazine, with advice pages from some of her “Change Your Life” gurus, to give “confident, smart women the tools they need to reach for their dreams, to express their individual style and to make choices that will lead to a happier, more fulfilling life.” She advertised O, The Oprah Magazine, on her website, Oprah.com:

  O offers compelling stories and empowering ideas stamped with Oprah’s unique vision of everything from health and fitness, careers, relationships and self-discovery issues to beauty, fashion, home design, books and food.

  Within a year she had a paid circulation of 2.5 million and had raked in more than $140 million in annual revenues. Her critics were dumbfounded by the spectacular success of her new venture, which enlarged her media conglomerate. But when Chicago reporters tried to interview her about her new magazine, she turned them down cold, still smarting from their negative coverage of her “Change Your Life” television. “I flew to New York for the magazine launch,” said Tim Jones, the business reporter for the Chicago Tribune, “and I was desperately trying to get an interview with her. After all, we are her hometown newspaper….She wouldn’t talk to me, but she sure as hell talked to The New York Times.” In fact, Oprah called the Times’s media reporter, Alex Kuczynski, at home to thank her for a story about the success of O magazine. “It was about seven A.M. and I said, ‘Oprah. Wow. This is like getting a phone call from Jesus Christ or Santa Claus,’ ” joked Kuczynski.

  Soon Oprah would put herself well beyond the reach of all her critics by becoming an international philanthropist whose giving would enshrine her as a global icon.

  Eighteen

  WHEN OPRAH appeared on the Forbes list of the world’s 476 billionaires in February 2003, she became what she had set out to be: the richest black woman in the world. “From the very beginning—as early as 1985,” recalled her friend Nancy Stoddart, “she always said she was going to be a billionaire.”

  Two years earlier Robert L. Johnson, founder of BET (Black Entertainment Television), had become the first African American man to make the Forbes billionaire list. Interestingly, he and Oprah were both born in Kosciusko, Mississippi, eight years apart, and both made their fortunes in television. Beyond that and their dreams, there is no logical explanation for the extraordinary coincidence of these two individuals, born poor in Attala County during segregation, defying all odds to become media titans. Mr. Johnson fell off the billionaire list the year he divorced and split his fortune with his ex-wife, Sheila Crump Johnson. Oprah has remained on the list.

  She reveled in her riches as a blessing from God. When she returned to Kosciusko in 1998 to promote Beloved and to dedicate a house that she had financed through Habitat for Humanity, she quoted Psalms 37:4 to the hometown crowd: “Delight thyself in the Lord and he shall give thee the desires of thine heart.” Her visit was trumpeted by The Star-Herald with a front-page headline: “Oprah Comes Home.” Wearing a brown turtleneck sweater, a long tweed skirt, and high-heel boots, plus a big gold Rolex watch and a pinkie ring, she stood in the rain to address the crowd while her bodyguard held an umbrella over her head. “I’m most proud of the fact that I’m one black woman from Kosciusko, Mississippi, with my hand still in God’s hand,” she said. During that visit she told reporters that being one of the most powerful people in television and having great wealth was no problem for her. “You receive in proportion to how big your heart is and how willing you are to extend yourself to other people.”

  Deconstructing that statement might lead some to conclude that Oprah believed she was a billionaire because she had more humanity than most, but she softened the impression, if not clarifying it, by adding, “It is why you have to give that comes back to you.”

  Always generous, she began giving in earnest in 1997, donating $12 million to the Oprah Winfrey Foundation and forming Oprah’s Angel Network to collect donations from her viewers. “I want you to open your hearts and see the world in a different way,” she told them. “I promise this will change your life for the better.” She started by asking for spare change to create “the world’s largest piggy bank” to fund college scholarships for needy students. In less than six months her viewers had donated more than $3.5 million in coins and bills to send 150 students to college, 3 students from every state. Even the White House contributed, and First Lady Hillary Rodham Clinton flew to Chicago to appear on Oprah’s show with a piggy bank full of coins she had collected from employees.

  Deeply affected by the 1997 death of Diana, Princess of Wales, Oprah wanted to assume her humanitarian role. “We are…grieved by Princess Diana’s death,” she said on The Today Show, explaining Oprah’s Angel Network, “and the world was talking about what she did charitably—and I wanted people to know, you can do that yourself in your own space where you are in your life….You can be a princess…by taking what you have and extending it to other people.”

  Oprah partnered her Angel Network with 10,000 volunteers from Habitat for Humanity to build 205 houses, one in every city whose local television station broadcast The Oprah Winfrey Show. When Habitat for Humanity built a house for Oprah’s Angel Network, they called the project Oprah’s Angel House, and after the tsunami of 2004 and the 2005 hurricanes Katrina and Rita, Oprah Angel Houses sprang up like mushrooms. She took her show to New Orleans, pledging $10 million of her own money, and from 2005 to 2006 she raised $11 million more through her Angel Network for rebuilding. She paid the operating expenses of Oprah’s Angel Network so that all donations went directly to the charities she selected. By 2008, her viewers had contributed more than $70 million to 172 projects around the world that focused on women, children, and families; education and literacy; relief and recovery; and youth and community development—all selected by Oprah and donated in her name. She fully understood the goodwill that accrues to those who give, and so when she gave, she did so very publicly. Her philanthropy was not quiet or anonymous.

  “She certainly makes an effort to do good deeds,” Steve Johnson wrote in the Chicago Tribune, “even if there is often an accompanying effort to make the effort known.” It is true that most of Oprah’s giving was followed by an Oprah press release, plus mentions on The Oprah Winfrey Show, but perhaps she was setting an example for others to follow and not just being self-aggrandizing.

  In recent years she tried to position her initial efforts as unheralded. “Early on in my career, when I first came to Chicago, I had my own Big Sisters club where myself an
d the producers would go into the projects,” she told TelevisionWeek. “Didn’t tell anybody about it. It wasn’t publicized.” Actually, she mentioned the Big Sisters club in almost all of her interviews at the time.

  That effort began with a 1985 show taped in Cabrini Green, a low-income housing project on Chicago’s Near North Side, known as one of the most dangerous bullet-strewn ghettos in the country. Mary Kay Clinton, the associate producer of the show, was so moved by the young girls she met that she started a Little Sisters program in conjunction with a Cabrini Green counselor, and Oprah and her staff participated as Big Sisters. There was great enthusiasm at first as the Harpo group met with the youngsters, ten to thirteen years old, every two weeks. Arriving in her limousine, Oprah would gather the girls from their ghetto apartments to go shopping or to the movies or out to dinner. When Mike Wallace came to Chicago to do a 60 Minutes segment on her, Oprah invited the Little Sisters for a slumber party at her condominium.

  WALLACE: Oprah doesn’t just make speeches to young people. She wanted to do more to help young black girls, so she and the women on her staff formed a “Little Sister” group with youngsters from one of Chicago’s housing projects. In order to be able to stay in the group, there are two basic rules: You must do well in school and you can’t get pregnant.

  Camera shows Oprah with the group in pajamas, giggling and talking.

  WALLACE: They get together several times a month. This night at a pajama party in Oprah’s living room….Along with the laughing, there is always something serious, something new to learn, some way for the kids to stretch their horizons….And always there is mention of God.

  Oprah tried to do with the Cabrini Green girls what Vernon had done with her: take them to the library and make them read books. She gave them dictionaries and ordered them to learn five new words a day. She lectured them: “I was like a lot of you. I was a hot little momma.” She told Ms. magazine, “I shoot a very straight shot. ‘Get pregnant and I’ll break your face! Don’t tell me you want to do great things in your life and still not be able to tell a boy no. You want something to love and to hug, tell me and I’ll buy you a puppy.’