How Oprah Became Queen of Entertainment

Oprah: A Profile of an Entertainment Empress

Oprah Winfrey rose from obscure origins in the Southern United States to become one of the most iconic and influential women in the world. Her journey was one that brought her in connection with dynasties like the Kennedys and it was one which attracted interest from journalists of all walks of life. She capitalized on her image and her talent to become a media maven and today her name is as much a brand as Pampers or Coca-Cola. How did she do it? Kitty Kelly has written that she did it in much the same way that all powerful people do it as they go on to become titans, moguls, global czars of industry: she was both admired by fans (Jones, 2011) and feared by those in her employ (Kelly, 2011).

Kitty Kelly's unauthorized biography of Oprah reveals the real woman behind the iconic image of suburbian idealism: beneath the straightened hair, the rich smile, and the confident attitude is a woman who has been able to sell herself to the public because she has been successful at burying that which she never wanted the public to know. As she said to her cousin Jo Baldwin, "She told me if I ever opened my mouth she'd sue my pants off," there are some secrets that are not meant for public consumption (Kelly, 2011, p. xiv).

While every public person has a private life that he or she would just as soon prefer to keep that way, what makes Oprah so intriguing for the public is her spic-and-span image which is so mass-marketed and sculpted to perfection that it seems as though her public profile where her private profile (Harris, Watson, 2007), as though the woman presented to us on television and magazine rack, in her philanthropy and in her giveaways, were a friend that every woman could trust, admire, look up to, depend upon, and take at face value. The truth, as Kelly shows, is that Oprah stands atop an Empire -- the Oprah Winfrey Empire -- which includes foundations, multi-media industries, political groups, and a South African school. Protecting that Empire means protecting the Oprah Winfrey brand name, the Oprah Winfrey image. And that means protecting Oprah from the past -- at all costs.

What Oprah has been able to do -- rise from humble origins and maneuver her way to the top of the entertainment industry -- is nothing short of remarkable. The way she catapulted to fame following her job as host of A.M. Chicago in 1984 was like a Cinderella story. She was large (over 200 pounds) and in charge (already dominating the ratings from the get-go, appearing on The Tonight Show, and landing an Oscar-nominated acting role in Spielberg's The Color Purple). As though overnight, she was everywhere. Oprah knew an opportunity when she saw one: and this was the opportunity of a lifetime. The wisest of people in such circumstances have generally figured out how to capitalize on their instant celebrity -- and that is what Oprah did. "I'm going to be huge," she told Spielberg (Kelly, 2011, p. 2). How she did it was by taking a motif from her own life -- overcoming adversity -- and turning it into a populist one-hour talk-show, featuring "victims" who overcame their victimhood. She saw her television show as her "ministry" and herself as "the instrument of God" (Kelly, 2011, p. 3).

Part of her ministry and her appeal was her willingness to divulge her own victimhood and her own overcoming of adversity: on a show in which a victim of rape was a guest, Oprah comforted the woman and confessed to the national public on her own show that she too had been a victim of rape and molestation in her childhood. It caused a sensation -- but more than that, she hit the ratings bonanza. She began booking guests whose stories were made for headline fodder and Oprah used them to rise to the top. Her cousin Jo Baldwin rode with her as a speech writer -- until she was fired for talking too much about her faith in Jesus, and for asking for a raise to pay the taxes on the luxury items that Oprah had been giving her as "payment," according to the IRS.

Oprah, the celebrity darling of the late 20th century, could accept just about any sort of "freak" on her show -- but not a "Jesus freak" or a naive relative who failed to understand the ins and outs of federal tax laws. The message of Jesus was not the message that Oprah wanted to sell nor were handouts given -- unless they could boost ratings. Oprah was selling upper-class luxuries to middle-class people with middle-class values. No one could get in the way of that.

Oprah operated like a linebacker who runs for daylight: she had her eyes on the prize all the way -- and in the war for ratings, for celebrity, for Empire -- there is not always time for compassion. Oprah is, after all, a businesswoman with business on her mind. For that reason, she is the envy of capitalists everywhere who dream of rising out of their ordinariness and into the limelight. She did it -- why can't others? In a way, that is the dream that Oprah offered throughout her career: she had overcome difficult, even horrific, moments in her own life, and look where she ended up. That was her message. It sold.