Talk show icon Oprah Winfrey admitted ''101 mistakes'' in starting her own TV channel with moments of wanting to give up – and she revealed that it is similar to how hard it was establishing her South African school for girls which she also at times felt to abandon.
Meanwhile O, The Oprah Magazine in South Africa is working on a stellar five star 10th birthday party set to take place in May in Cape Town for readers and a source told me Oprah Winfrey who is closing in on almost her 100th visit to South Africa since she opened her school, might possibly show up as a surprise guests for the big birthday.
Oprah Winfrey who launched the Oprah Winfrey Network (OWN) eight months ago told the CBS This Morning show in America today that her struggle with her new TV venture is similar to her South African school and that during starting both ventures she had moments where she wondered whether she wanted to continue.
''The idea of creating a TV network was a great idea; had I known it was this difficult, I might have done something else. I didn't think it was going to be easy bit if I had known then what I know now I might have made different choices. I can say that if I was writing a book about it, I would call the book 101 Mistakes.''
She said it was a mistake ''launching when we weren't ready to launch – and doing that because we announced that we're going to do it. It is like having the wedding when you know you're not ready. Looking back I should have waited until I’ve actually finished The Oprah Winfrey Show.''
Interviewer Charlie Rose asked Oprah Winfrey how she felt about all the unflattering stories about her OWN network not being an instant success after being ''such an icon and when you could do no wrong''.
''There's something you have to know,'' Oprah Winfrey said. ''No matter what anyone writes about you – and I learned this when I was doing The Color Purple with Steven Spielberg. At the time he was on the cover of TIME and he said he wasn't going to read it. And I said 'How can you not read it? You're on the cover of TIME magazine.' And he said 'because if you believe all the good stuff, then you have to believe it when people write things which are not flattering.'
''So you're right,'' said Oprah Winfrey, ''I've live in this sort of glow – for the past 10 years at least – but the climb up was also not as easy which a lot of people don't remember. Last week I saw one headline which sort of knocked me off centre – a USA Today headline saying ''Oprah Winfrey not quite standing on her OWN'' and that was uurgh''.
Oprah Winfrey said she wouldn't give up. ''I'm a very driven person. I believe I'm here to fulfil a calling. I'm a female, who's African American, who's been so blessed in this world. I will never quit. I will die in the midst of doing what I love to do and that is using my voice and using my life to try and inspire other people to live the best of theirs.''
Of all the stories about OWN not getting viewers fast enough she said ''it's just negative press''. ''Just because a thing appears to not be doing well, because you've failed – and we haven't failed – because something fails, doesn't make you a failure. And when you know that, you can keep trying. Actually I feel better about OWN today than what I ever have. The most painful thing for me was to have to let people go. I had to lay off 30 people.''
''Our strategy for the channel is to now do what we should have done from the beginning, which is to build one show, one hour, one night at a time – and then move to the next night. I said from the beginning this channel can't be based upon me. It has to be based on my philosophy and my ideas. What I want to create and will create is a platform where people can come and not waste their time and where its always meaningful.''
''Two of my girls from The Oprah Winfrey Leadership Academy for Girls in South Africa were competing in the United Nations Conference at Cornell this weekend – they were part of the South African debate team,'' said Oprah Winfrey. ''To see girls who, five years ago, some of them carrying buckets of water on their head, now sitting at Cornell debating about Cambodian civil war is simply extraordinary. To keep running the school was also hard because lots of people said it wouldn't work, its 8 000 miles away, and there's times when I wanted to give up on that too. The payoff is having girls now – 100% of the first class – all going to colleges.''
Meanwhile O, The Oprah Magazine in South Africa is working on a stellar five star 10th birthday party set to take place on Wednesday May 2 at The Table Bay hotel in Cape Town with 100 readers as well as celebrities who will be attending. Rumours are now swirling that Oprah Winfrey herself, who is fast closing in on 100 trips since she opened her school, might possibly attend her magazine's 10th birthday as part of a big surprise.
South Africa is the only country that has it’s own customized version of her international magazine. The 100 lucky readers will be the ones who find a golden ticket in the April issue of the O Magazine. ''Let's just say you really want to one of the lucky people who is there,'' an insider told me. ''I can't believe a decade has come and gone so fast,'' says O Magazine editor, Samantha Page.
