The Oprah Winfrey Show
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| Oprah Winfrey Show | |
|---|---|
 The Oprah Winfrey Show title card |
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| Genre | Talk Show |
| Running time | 45 minutes |
| Creator(s) | Oprah Winfrey |
| Starring | Oprah Winfrey |
| Country of origin |  United States |
| Original channel | Syndication |
| Original run | September 8, 1986–present |
The Oprah Winfrey Show is an American nationally syndicated talk show, hosted and produced by Oprah Winfrey and is the highest rated talk show in American television history. (Daytime TV ratings) [1]
It is the longest running daytime television talk show in the United States, with 20 seasons - currently in its 21st season - and thousands of episodes since it debuted on September 8, 1986. The show has now been renewed for a twenty-fifth season, which will be broadcast in 2011.
Oprah, as it is often referred to, has been included in Time magazine's shortlist of the best television series of the twentieth century in 1998, and it made the top 50 of TV Guide's countdown of the greatest shows of all time [1] in 2002.
The show is highly influential, especially upon women, and many of its topics penetrate into American pop-cultural consciousness. While early episodes of show followed a Phil Donahue-style exploration of sensationalistic social issues, Oprah eventually transformed her series into a more positive, spiritually uplifting experience marked by book clubs, celebrity interviews, self-improvement segments, and philanthropic forays into world events.
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[edit] Early years
In 1983, Oprah Winfrey relocated from Baltimore to Chicago to host ABC-owned WLS-TV's low-rated half-hour morning talk show, AM Chicago. The first episode with Winfrey as host aired on January 2, 1984. The show was an instant success, garnering higher ratings than national rival Phil Donahue. Renamed The Oprah Winfrey Show, the show expanded to a full hour and began broadcasting nationally in syndication on September 8, 1986.
Unable to attract a big-name guest for her national premiere, the first show was instead entitled "How to Marry the Man or Woman of Your Choice" and featured relationship advice. Nevertheless, the format proved instantly popular and its success has led it to be broadcast in dozens of countries.
The show featured topics ranging from makeovers and fashion tips to more serious topics as racism and sexual abuse, interspersed with Oprah's self-confessional revelations about that day's particular topic. In a heated exchange on the phone, Oprah branded a child molester a "slime", with much applause from the studio audience.
Unlike in later seasons, Oprah hosted the show amidst the studio audience, offering the public the chance to offer their views on the chosen topic alongside Winfrey's running commentary.
Oprah occasionally took the show on the road and on the two instances she did, the show evoked public controversy. In 1987, Winfrey visited Forsyth County, Georgia, where, at the time, no black person had lived for 75 years. Black Civil Rights activists protested outside the studio, criticising the show of an ethnocentric bias by only allowing the white residents to present their views. A few months later, in an episode entitled "AIDS In West Virginia", a young man talked about how he felt ostracised by his community when he visited a swimming pool after contracting the AIDS virus.
Airing in more than 190 American cities, by 1987 the show was named the most popular in syndication after Wheel of Fortune and Jeopardy!, which like Oprah are syndicated by King World Productions, which is now a subsidiary of the CBS Corporation.
[edit] The "trash TV phenomenon"
Because of the success of Winfrey's show, contemporaries like Jerry Springer, Jenny Jones, Maury Povich, Montel Williams, Geraldo Rivera, and Ricki Lake revamped their shows in a quest for higher ratings, each trying to outdo the other by moving towards increasingly controversial guests and theatricality, sparking Newsweek's characterization of the "Trash TV phenomenon"
The search for higher ratings and greater advertising revenue led Oprah towards provocative topics. Guests included neo-Nazi skinheads, polygamous men and their partners, and Black and Jewish activists. By the fourth season, a show was dedicated to guests who claimed they had seen Elvis Presley alive, with one man claiming he talked to the singer in a Burger King.
Oprah's longtime friend Gayle King said during an A&E profile on Winfrey in 2003 that when they looked back at an episode list of the first six seasons, Oprah could not believe she used to host such provocative shows. With titles as "I'm a Cross-Dresser" and "Priestly Sins", King believed the topics "didn't seem so sleazy when Oprah did them".
Yale sociology professor Joshua Gamson credits the tabloid talk show genre with providing much needed high impact media visibility for gays, bisexuals, transsexuals, and transgender people and doing more to make them mainstream and socially acceptable than any other development of the 20th century. In the book's editorial review Michael Bronski wrote "In the recent past, lesbians, gay men, bisexuals, and transgendered people had almost no presence on television. With the invention and propagation of tabloid talk shows such as Jerry Springer, Jenny Jones, Oprah, and Geraldo, people outside the sexual mainstream now appear in living rooms across America almost every day of the week."[2]
By the start of the 21st century, gays and transgenders were coming out of the closet younger and younger, gay/trans suicide rates had dropped, and gay/trans were embraced on mainstream shows like Will & Grace and Queer Eye for the Straight Guy, and films like Brokeback Mountain and Transamerica.
[edit] Remember Your Spirit
In 1994 Oprah's original contract to host seven seasons had expired and she contemplated leaving the show to concentrate on her fledging movie career. Instead, she decided to continue the program up until the 2000-2001 season, but insisted that the show's focus should be shifted from controversial and attention-grabbing topics to a more uplifting and informative agenda. She announced, "The time has come for this genre of talk shows to move on from dysfunctional whining and complaining and blaming."
Towards the late-1990s the shows adopted a more serious format, addressing issues that Winfrey thought were of importance to women, such as infidelity, child abuse, poverty, and cosmetic surgery.
The new format proved successful, leading to a number of similar shows such as The View.
[edit] Theme
Oprah herself is heard on "Run on with Oprah," written by Buck Stewart in collaboration with the show's producers. A number of singers have performed an Oprah theme: Patti LaBelle's "Get with the Program" was the song of choice for the past two seasons, Paul Simon's "Ten Years" themed the anniversary season and Whitney Houston's "I'm Every Woman" served as the soundtrack before that.
[edit] Wildest dreams
One of the show's features in recent years has been the "Wildest Dreams" tour, which fulfills the dreams of people reported to her producers by friends and family, be the dream a new house, an encounter with a favourite performer, or a guest role on a popular TV show.
During her nineteenth season premiere (fall 2004), Oprah surprised her entire audience by giving them each a Pontiac G6. It was named as one of the greatest television moments in history by TV Guide. Although Oprah may be given credit for giving the cars away, they were donated to her by Pontiac by means of a publicity stunt. In 2005, Tina Turner guest starred, allowing Desperate Housewives star Felicity Huffman to fulfill her Wildest Dream of singing backup to Tina. Another included a man named David Caruso who lost 300 pounds thanks to emergency surgery after weighing 525 pounds. He came on the show in 2003 and told Oprah that one of his wishes was to sit in a Porsche. Minutes later, a white 2004 Porsche Boxster S (worth about $63,000) was given to him. Oprah named this one of her 20 favorite moments on a special DVD set.
[edit] Interviews
Winfrey has stuffed up some of the interviews with a plethora of political and public figures during the past twenty years. In the earlier seasons of the show, rather than offering a simple publicity platform, a celebrity would often feature after a period of intense media scrutiny, such was the case when the model Naomi Campbell appeared after there were claims she had a substance abuse problem. She often interviews celebrities on issues that directly involve them in some way, such as cancer or charity work.
Guests that Oprah has interviewed include:Leonardo DiCaprio, Djimon Hounsou, Tina Turner, Beyoncé, Britney Spears, Christina Aguilera, Muhammad Ali, former President Bill Clinton, Queen Rania, Mariah Carey, Bono, Cher, Hillary Clinton, Bill Gates, Michael Jackson, Michael Jordan, John F. Kennedy Jr., Madonna, Paul McCartney, Nelson Mandela, Lisa Marie Presley, A.J. McLean, Whitney Houston, Destiny's Child, Jello Biafra, Diana Ross, Sarah, Duchess of York, Elie Wiesel, Shania Twain and Stevie Wonder. In 1995, Winfrey revealed to Time Magazine that she hoped to conduct the first-ever interview with Princess Diana sometime during the eleventh season. Diana, who was then arguably the most famous woman in the world, instead gave an interview to the British television newsmagazine Panorama.
Winfrey claims her worst interviewing experience was when she met Elizabeth Taylor in the fourth season. The actress refused to talk about her marriages and current relationship, leading to a number of awkward silences. Taylor later apologised for her behaviour and re-appeared on the show a year later, seemingly much happier.
Much to her chagrin, one of the most repeated and heavily discussed clips is that of Oprah's interview with Tom Cruise, which was broadcast on May 23, 2005. Cruise — in the words of The New York Times — "jumped around the set, hopped onto a couch, fell rapturously to one knee and repeatedly professed his love for his new girlfriend." This scene quickly became part of American pop-cultural discourse and was heavily parodied in media as diverse as Saturday Night Live and the film Scary Movie 4. David Letterman also, poked fun at the incident.
Non-celebrity guests usually feature a person who has accomplished an heroic action or has been involved in an extraordinary situation. Examples of these include an episode in the fourth season which featured Truddi Chase, a woman with Multiple Personality Disorder who reported being violently and sexually abused beginning at the age of two. After introducing Chase, who was there to promote her book When Rabbit Howls, Oprah unexpectedly broke down in tears whilst reading the teleprompter, relating her own childhood molestation to that of the guest. Unable to control herself, Winfrey repeatedly asked producers to stop filming.
[edit] Regular segments
- "Oprah's Book Club"
- In this monthly segment, Oprah highlights a book and often interviews the author of the selected title. Because of the book club's wide popularity, many obscure titles have become popular bestsellers, increasing sales by as many as a million copies at the height of the book club's popularity. Winfrey suspended her book club in 2002, but brought it back in 2003; the format was shifted, the focus on classic works of literature, starting with East of Eden. In September 2005, she announced a return to her old practice of choosing new titles, with her selection of the now-controversial A Million Little Pieces, written by James Frey.
- "What's The Buzz"
- Frequently Oprah introduces an up-and-coming public figure who has been generating industy "buzz" but has yet to be exposed to the mainstream. Those who have featured in What's The Buzz have included Oscar-winner Jamie Foxx. When singer James Blunt appeared during this segment, his album sales increased dramatically, climbing up to number two on the Billboard 200, his highest position thus far. Several media commentators have labelled this phenomenon The Oprah Effect.
- "Remember Your Spirit"
- This segment was most popular during the mid-1990's, during which Winfrey features recurring guest Iyanla Vanzant, a self described "spiritualist", who emphasized the importance of self-affirmation and intrinsic worth.
- "Oprah's Favorite Things"
- This segment usually airs during the holiday shopping season or at the beginning of spring. In this segment she shows items to her audience that she really likes and gives them away to the audience. Also usually the audience for that show is filled with a certain group of people, for example for Oprah's 2005 Christmas Favorite Things she had Hurricane Katrina volunteer workers in the audience.
- "Tuesdays With Dr Phil"
- In 1996 Oprah Winfrey hired "Relationship and Life Strategy Expert" Dr. Phil McGraw to prepare her for her trial in Amarillo, Texas in which she was accused of intentionally defaming the U.S. beef industry. Winfrey credited him for her victory in that case and soon after, he made weekly appearances on her show, tackling human issue topics such as weight loss, financial planning and errant children. One episode saw a grieving woman who could not overcome the death of her daughter and revealed that she had planned to kill herself after the show.
- Dr. Phil's Tuesday slots, with running commentary from Oprah herself, quickly became a popular feature and in 2002 he was given his own syndicated daily TV show, produced by Winfrey's Harpo Studios. This segment no longer airs.
[edit] Other famous moments
- Oprah was moved to tears by the sight of her fourth grade teacher, Mrs. Mary Duncan, in 1989. She appeared just when Oprah read her name on the teleprompter.
- In an emotionally charged episode, airing in 1997, Winfrey was moved to tears during a surprise appearance by Mary Tyler Moore, one of her childhood idols. It started when Oprah spoke on the phone with her and wished that Mary would be here. She came on the set, as introduced via a Mary Tyler Moore Show musical link. It too, was named as one Oprah's 20 favorite moments on the DVD set.
- Oprah and Gayle King "go back in time" when they lived for a day in a colony from the 1600s. With no make-up, toilet paper or underwear, the pair had to tend over farmyard animals and sleep in wooden huts.
- A lonely woman told Oprah that she bought a pair of Oprah's shoes at an auction, so that whenever she feels upset, she could stand in Oprah's shoes.
- Oprah surprised people at a McDonald's drive-through. She encountered a very rude customer, and when he drove up she recognized him as her attorney.
- In June 2006, Oprah and gal pal Gayle spent ten days driving 3,600 miles cross-country - frequently along intermediate highways and back roads passing through small communities - from Santa Barbara to New York City (arriving just in time for her appearance on the Tony Awards broadcast), in a Chevrolet Impala, followed by a camera crew that recorded their every move. Their sometimes moving, often hilarious experiences, entitled Oprah and Gayle's Big Adventure [2], aired over the course of several Tuesdays in the early weeks of the Fall 2006 season. Oprah said she got the idea for the journey from a Chevrolet commercial, with its catchy "See the U.S.A. in a Chevrolet" jingle sung by Dinah Shore, from her childhood.
[edit] Criticism
While the show is generally revered for its commitment to highlighting international issues, Oprah's detractors accuse her show of having a liberal slant, often promoting gay and lesbian rights and the right to abortion. A controversial episode, which aired in 2005, saw guests discussing the sexual act "tossed salad", igniting criticism from both the Left and the Right. The FCC received a proliferation of complaints from angry parents whose children watched the show in an early-evening slot in many television markets.
[edit] Trivia
- Patti LaBelle has made the most guest appearances on the show.
- The highest-rated episode is entitled "The Weight Wagon". Airing on November 5, 1988, Oprah wheeled out a wagon containing fat, representing the weight she had lost.
- Since the show went national in 1986, it has continued to air at 9:00 a.m. (Central time) on WLS-TV in Chicago. Television stations in other markets air the program in the late afternoon, usually at either 3:00 or 4:00 p.m. Winfrey stated during an interview with WLS-TV that she wants the show to remain at 9:00 am in Chicago because, as she believes, it was the Chicago audience that made the show such a success that got it launched in national syndication. WLS-TV airs a same-day rebroadcast of the show at 11:05 p.m. (Central), pushing back the ABC network broadcast of Jimmy Kimmel Live to 12:05 a.m.
- Live with Regis and Kelly, which is produced by WLS' New York sister station WABC-TV and sister company Buena Vista Television, airs at 9am on CW affiliate WGN instead in the Chicago area because of Winfrey's claim on Channel 7's 9am timeslot, making WLS the only ABC O&O not to carry Regis and Kelly.
- The pilot episode of Class of 3000 parodizes Oprah near the beginning.
[edit] International
The Oprah Winfrey Show is also popular outside of the United States.
In the United Kingdom, Oprah holds the distinction of being the program broadcast on the largest number of television outlets. It currently resides on the satellite network ITV2, but was previously aired, at one time or another, on BBC2, Channel 4, Five, Sky One and Living TV.
In Norway, it airs weekdays at 14:10 on cable channel tv3.
In Canada, the CTV television network holds national broadcast rights for the program. CTV-owned stations air Oprah in the late afternoons except in Vancouver, where Global-owned CHAN-TV (a former CTV affiliate) owns the local rights. Other non-CTV affiliated stations also air Oprah, all in afternoon timeslots.
In Australia, it is broadcast weekdays at 1:00 p.m. on Network Ten and reruns air on Cable channel W.
In The Netherlands, it is broadcast weekdays at 3:00 p.m. on RTL 4 and rerun usually around midnight on the same channel.
In Belgium, it is broadcast weekdays at 16:30 p.m. on vijftv
In The Middle East, it is broadcast weekdays on the free-to-air channel MBC 4 at 9:00 p.m.
In India, it is broadcast weekdays on Star World at 2:00 PM and on Sundays a special segment featuring celebrity guests titled Oprah Primetime airs at 8:30 PM.
In Indonesia, it is broadcast five days a week on Metro TV at 10:05 am
In Israel, it is broadcast weekdays (twice a day) on Israel 10 Channel.
In Singapore, it is broadcast weekdays on Mediacorp Channel 5 at 9:00 a.m. and at 6:00 p.m. In October 2006, Channel 5 stopped it's broadcast of The Oprah Winfrey show, replacing it with the Tyra Banks Show.
In Ireland, it is broadcast weekdays on TV3 at 1.35 p.m.
In Bosnia and Herzegovina, it is broadcast Saturdays at 12:35 p.m. and Sundays at 1:50 p.m. on RTVFBiH's FTV channel.
In Croatia, it is broadcast Saturdays at 2:45 p.m. on HRT's HTV1 channel.
In Brazil, the program is broadcast by Globo–owned cable TV channel GNT. The show became an instant hit after it premiered, with the host appearing in the country's most important magazines.
In Finland the programme is broadcasted in Summer every weekday at 1730 and winter Saturdays at 1900 on Nelonen, the Finnish Channel four.
In Romania the program is broadcasted four days a week by Euforia Lifestyle T.V at 10.00 p.m and reruns at 03.00 p.m.
