George Burns/OWN
Oprah Winfrey just revealed how she got the highly-anticipated and highly sought-after interview with the disgraced cyclist and drug cheat Lance Armstrong which South African viewers will also be able to see on TLC (DStv 172 / TopTV 453) on Friday 18 January at 19:30 (South African time) as part of her new talk show Oprah's Next Chapter.
Oprah Winfrey calls it "the biggest interview I've ever done" and revealed that she in fact snagged the Lance Armstrong interview at the end of last year during the December holiday while she was vacationing at her home in Hawaii and while some of the girls from her Oprah Winfrey Leadership Academy for Girls in South Africa was visiting and actually staying with her.
South Africans who can't wait for Friday evening to see Oprah's Next Chapter will also be able to watch the first of what is now going to be a two-part episode online at oprah.com at 04:00 in the morning (South African time) on Friday 18 January when it will be streamed online simultaneously as it is being shown on Oprah Winfrey's OWN network in America.
Part two, a brand-new additional episode, will be streamed on Saturday 19 January also at 04:00 (South African time). Oprah Winfrey decided on Tuesday to expand her interview with Lance Armstrong to two episodes on television following a marathon interview recording session on Monday at Lance Armstrong's home in Austin, Texas which lasted more than two and a half hours.
George Burns/OWN
Discovery Networks International (DNI) has not yet indicated how today's decision regarding the expansion to two episodes for Lance Armstrong of Oprah's Next Chapter will now impact TLC's programming schedule further for South Africa beyond Friday evening's first installment, but it is highly likely that the schedule will be updated to also accommodate the second episode.
I just watched CBS This Morning, one of America's morning shows, on which Oprah Winfrey appeared Tuesday morning to discuss the upcoming interview. She explained how it came about that she got the interview multiple media outlets have been pursuing the past few months.
"How I got the interview? I had sent him an email a couple of months ago, just hoping that he would talk to me," Oprah Winfrey explained. "He emailed back and said he wasn't ready to talk but that he would be in Hawaii for the holidays and he knew that I had a place in Hawaii and maybe we could get together for lunch. 'Okay, like that's going to happen,' I thought," she said.
"So, during the holidays I emailed and said 'What about that lunch?' He said he can't do it on these days, because he had his kids. Meanwhile I had a bunch of my kids - girls from my school in South Africa with me. So I stayed over an extra two days in order to accommodate his schedule."
"He came to visit me in Maui. He lives on another island, and so he flew over. I had guests in the house so I cleared out the house and said 'Go to the beach, go to the beach, now! And stay there for at least four hours!' "
"So I had nobody in the house, including people who are usually there for help and even the people who usually do the lawn. I removed all those people. Also I had a person go to the airport to pick him up who doesn't normally pick me up at the airport so that he wouldn't be recognised as being connected to me," said Oprah Winfrey.
"Lance comes to me and says, 'Where is everybody?' and I say "I've sent everybody away' and he goes: 'But you didn't clear the road. There was a biker on the road who recognised me."
Biggest interview
"In terms of my career it's certainly the biggest interview I've done in terms of its exposure," said Oprah Winfrey. "Of course back in 1993 I did Michael Jackson Live Around the World, this is going to be live streamed around the world."
"Because it's going to be around the world - and I believe it should be around the world because so many people want to hear what he has to say - the number of people who will have exposure to it makes it the biggest interview I've ever done," said Oprah Winfrey.
"I would say that for all the people who are wondering does he actually go there and answers, I think that you will come to understand that he brought it. He really did."
