OPRAH Winfrey wants to be as close to Barack Obama as possible. Insiders say Winfrey has started a preliminary search for a home in Washington, DC. A nine-bedroom Georgetown mansion she’s said to have asked about is listed at $50 million, but another source said, “She has never personally been to see it.” We’re sure Winfrey will try to swing by during Inauguration week. Her rep didn’t return calls.
When it comes to her weight, Oprah Winfrey has always been straightforward. The talk show queen continues the honesty, saying in the January issue of “O” magazine out Tuesday that she now weighs 200 pounds and has “fallen off the wagon” when it comes to healthy living.
“I’m mad at myself,” Winfrey writes in an article provided early to The Associated Press by Harpo Productions.
“I’m embarrassed,” she writes. “I can’t believe that after all these years, all the things I know how to do, I’m still talking about my weight. I look at my thinner self and think, `How did I let this happen again?’”
In the piece, Winfrey, 54, details her recent struggles with an out-of-balance thyroid and how the condition made her develop “a fear of working out.” She says she’s added 40 pounds to her frame since she weighed 160 pounds in 2006.
“Yes, you’re adding correctly; that means the dreaded 2-0-0,” Winfrey writes. “I was so frustrated I started eating whatever I wanted – and that’s never good.”
Winfrey also writes that her goal is no longer to be thin; instead, she wants to be strong, healthy and fit. She hopes to get started with her upcoming “Best Life Week,” starting Jan. 5 with an episode of “The Oprah Winfrey Show” during which she is expected to talk candidly about her weight.
Winfrey famously wheeled a wagon loaded with fat onto the set of her talk show in 1988 to represent a 67-pound weight loss while wearing a pair of size 10 Calvin Klein jeans. She had lost the pounds with a liquid protein diet.
“I had literally starved myself for four months – not a morsel of food,” Winfrey recalled in 2005. “Two hours after that show, I started eating to celebrate – of course, within two days those jeans no longer fit!”
Winfrey’s weight has yo-yoed to the delight of the tabloid press ever since. She weighed as many as 237 pounds and by late 1990 admitted she had regained most of the 67 pounds, saying “I’ll never diet again.”
In 1994, she finished the Marine Corps Marathon and by 1996 hired personal trainer Bob Greene, saying her roller-coaster weight saga was over.
But now, 20 years since the Calvin Klein jeans episode, Winfrey finds herself tipping the scales again, telling AP Television last week that she has yet to chose a gown for President-elect Barack Obama’s inaugural ball next month.
“I had a dress on the vision board, but I’m not sure that’s gonna fit,” Winfrey said. “So I have to work on something else.”
In the latest “O” magazine article, Winfrey writes that she hit rock bottom when she wanted to skip out on an April 26 taping with Cher and Tina Turner in Las Vegas.
“I felt like a fat cow,” Winfrey writes. “I wanted to disappear.”
Winfrey’s weight and height put her body mass index at 31.8, which is obese, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. The CDC says people who are obese are “at higher risk for chronic conditions such as high blood pressure, diabetes and high cholesterol.”
It seems Winfrey is aware of the health risks, inviting both Greene and Dr. Mehmet Oz to her show during the first week of January, along with spirituality experts, sex therapists and financial expert Suze Orman.
Winfrey also is expected to discuss her weight on her XM satellite radio station’s “The Gayle King Show” on Jan. 5 and will host interactive live Web casts at Oprah.com the week of Jan. 12 to 16 every night at 9 p.m. EST.
Winfrey, an admitted food addict, sounds almost apologetic in her article.
“I definitely wasn’t setting an example,” she writes. “I was talking the talk, but I wasn’t walking the walk. And that was very disappointing to me.”
All of Liz Lemon’s dreams are coming true – Oprah is guest starring on tonight’s episode of 30 Rock. To gear up for her special appearence, check out a sneak peak of Oprah’s appearence.
Oprah on 30 Rock!
Oprah is working O-vertime to get out the vote for her guy Barack.
Sen. Obama and the talk queen hooked up on a morning conference call Monday to strategize with prominent African-Americans, including Sean (Diddy) Combs, Donna Brazile, House Majority Whip Jim Clyburn and the Rev. Joseph Lowery.
Obama talked about being on the cusp of history and what it would say to the world to see his daughters play on the South Lawn of the White House, according to one participant. Oprah told everybody on the line they could make America “truly one nation indivisible,” Politico.com reports.
Oprah, who’s due to be with Obama Tuesday night in Chicago, is said to be devoting her entire show Wednesday to the election and, assuming things go according to plan, hosting a party Wednesday night.
Jay-Z and Beyoncé are also keeping their eyes on the prize. The star couple was stunned over the weekend to learn about the suicide of their friend Shakir Stewart, who signed Beyoncé early on and later replaced Jay as head of the Def Jam label. All the same, they joined Diddy, Mary J. Blige and Russell Simmons at Obama rallies in Florida on Sunday and yesterday in Pennsylvania and Ohio.
“We have to do it for our children. We have to do it for the people that died for us to have the right to vote,” said Diddy.
Here in New York, Sarah Jessica Parker, Matthew Broderick, Edie Falco, Lisa Loeb and John McEnroe are among the Obama supporters who’ve been getting out the vote at phone banks at Touch, 583 Park and Guastavino’s, among other venues.
Writer Dominick Dunne, who’s been battling bladder cancer at New York Hospital, asked his doctors to postpone his surgery so he could vote today for Obama. “This is a momentous time in American history,” said Nick, 82. “And I’m not going to miss it.”
And pretty Amy Flynn at Disrespectacles optical shop on West Broadway turned down the morning shows that did stories on demand for Sarah Palin’s Kawasaki eyeglasses. “Actually, women have been asking me not to give them anything rimless that looks like her style,” Flynn says. “What they are asking for are Tina Fey glasses – the kind she wears in real life.”
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The season 3 premiere of 30 Rock is rapidly approaching (10/30 at 9:30pm to be exact and 10/23 online) and this season, Oprah’s coming!
30 Rock returns to NBC Thursday, 10/30 at 9:30pm but for those who can’t wait, the show will have its online premiere 10/23.
A high-end clothing shop isn’t the only creditor to have taken Oprah Winfrey’s mother to court.
The Valentina boutique in Brookfield, Wis., sued Vernita Lee last week, saying she owes the store $156,000 for purchases and interest and failed to make the minimum monthly payment of $2,000 on her charge account. Lee said she doesn’t feel she owes them the money.
But six years ago, John Kowske had to took Lee to court in Milwaukee, where she lives, after she failed to pay him the $4,304.90 she owed him, according to papers posted on webofdeception.com.
“Vernita was a co-signer on a loan for her daughter Pat,” a source tells us. “Sadly, Pat died of a drug overdose.”
A judge ordered Lee to pay the debt, according to the papers.
Kowske could not be reached, and Lee’s lawyer, Steven Gistenson, wouldn’t comment on either case. “I’m not going to address [the boutique case] in the media – it’s going to be addressed in the courts,” he told us. “And I wasn’t involved in the previous case.”
A spokeswoman for Harpo Productions would not comment as to whether Winfrey will pay off her mother’s alleged debt.
But chances are good that the talk-show titan retained Gistenson, a prominent in lawyer in Chicago, where she lives, for Vernita. While Oprah seems to have forgiven her mother, Vernita did leave her behind with grandparents after giving birth to her at 18. Winfrey lived with her as an older child in Milwaukee, when she was sexually abused by a cousin and other male relatives. It is not known whether Vernita was aware of the abuse.
Winfrey ended up living with her father, a stern disciplinarian, in Tennessee. “No one ever told me I was loved,” Winfrey once said. “Ever, ever, ever.”
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OPRAH Winfrey is super-busy, so it’s no surprise she’d want to delegate her more tedious duties. One source said, “Oprah has told the editors at O magazine she’s tired of being on the cover every month. It’s a pain. It takes a lot of time and energy and she’s sick of it. She’s given them six months to figure out what to do without her.” Meanwhile, the magazine’s newsstand sales are down 17 percent from last year and circulation is down 1.7 percent. A rep for the monthly said, “Oprah Winfrey has appeared on the cover of O . . . since its launch in 2000, and she will continue to do so. In fact, shoots for three upcoming covers will take place in early September.”
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Oprah Winfrey earns a whopping $385 million a year.
Simon Cowell banks $50 million.
David Letterman? $32 million!
They’re among the stars who appear in TV Guide’s annual star salary survey, based on information from TV industry insiders and published sources.
Who else brings in the big bucks?
According to the magazine, newlywed Charlie Sheen is the highest-paid comedy star on primetime television, with $825,000 per episode.
CSI’s William Peterson — who is leaving the show this upcoming season — is the highest-paid actor in a prime-time drama, earning $600,000 per episode.
With $400,000 an episode, Law & Order: SVU star Mariska Hargitay is the highest-paid actress in a drama. Kyra Sedgwick takes home $275,000 per episode of TNT’s The Closer, making her top- earning actress on a cable network drama.
Some stars make serious money without appearing on TV at all.
Family Guy creator Seth MacFarlane, who supplies the voice of lead character Peter Griffin, just signed a deal with Fox that will net him $100 million through 2012.
And The Simpsons cast — Dan Castellaneta, Julie Kavner, Nancy Cartwright, Yeardley Smith and Hank Azaria — each earn $400,000 per episode.
For the complete list of star salaries, pick up the new issue of TV Guide, out August 7.
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BILL Clinton gave the cold shoulder to Barack Obama’s biggest supporter, Oprah Winfrey, at Nelson Mandela’s 90th birthday in London. A source at the dinner in Hyde Park, catered by Gordon Ramsay, told us, “There was a very cold reception between them.” When Winfrey went over to Mandela’s table, where Clinton was seated, “Oprah and Bill, who used to be very close, barely acknowledged one another,” the source said. But insiders in the Clinton and Winfrey camps claim the two spoke to each other at a private reception before the dinner. Other guests included Robert De Niro, Elton John, Neil Diamond, Kim Cattrall, Pierce Brosnan and Uma Thurman. And despite rumors that Naomi Campbell – who calls herself Mandela’s goddaughter – was denied presenter duties at tonight’s concert for Mandela’s 46664 AIDS charity, the cellphone-hurling catwalker was seen “hugging everyone” at the party.
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