Oprah_ A Biography - Kitty Kelley [147]
She expected her friends to abide by her dictates on not photographing her without her permission, and most did, with the exception of Henry Louis Gates, Jr., known as “Skip,” who could not resist the temptation to sneak snapshots of her on his cell phone. “He likes to come into the faculty room and show us the pictures he’s secretly taken of Oprah without her knowledge,” said a professor at Harvard University.
Professionally, 1994 was the worst year of Oprah’s life. She had driven her staff to exhaustion, and when her senior producers threatened to walk out because they no longer could endure the demands of Debra DiMaio for bigger and better ratings, she had to allow her dear friend to resign. By that point Oprah believed she had evolved beyond what Debra could deliver into a more exalted realm than a mere talk show host. She saw herself as a God-inspired missionary with a divine message to deliver. She no longer wanted to lead the trash pack. Instead, she sought the kind of respect that does not come from tabloid programming. With the exodus of DiMaio, Oprah decided to raise her show out of the gutter. She had read a report in The Journal of Popular Culture written by Vicki Abt, professor of sociology at Penn State, titled “The Shameless World of Phil, Sally, and Oprah.” Now encouraged by her senior producers, she decided to chase her glory with a softer focus.
Professor Abt was surprised by Oprah’s sudden about-face, but not filled with admiration. “I’m glad she has changed, but it’s ten years and $350 million later. I think a lot of what these people do is self-serving. They do the dirty deed and then they cry mea culpa.”
The year ended with a sucker punch when the December 1994 issue of Redbook hit the stands. The article, titled “Christmas at Oprah’s,” by former Harpo producer Dan Santow, looked like a frothy recollection of how Harpo employees honored their boss at Christmas and how she generously reciprocated. In between the lines was a searing X-ray of wretched excess and unimaginable extravagance in the workplace. Most damning was the fawning obeisance to the multi-millionaire boss and the slavish time and attention spent purchasing and presenting her gifts. This office ritual later evolved into the annual holiday show called “Oprah’s Favorite Things,” in which sponsors donated thousands of dollars’ worth of merchandise that Oprah selected throughout the year as one of her favorite things (e.g., HDTV refrigerators, diamond necklaces, BlackBerrys, digital video cameras, flat-screen televisions) and then gave to her audience, complete with a list of retail prices.
Prior to that time, Debra DiMaio had organized the yearly Christmas luncheon, which lasted eleven hours so that Oprah and her senior producers could exchange presents. “The actual presentation of the gift at this luncheon was [extremely] important,” recalled Santow, who was new to the staff and could not believe that Oprah really cared about how a gift was wrapped.
“She notices everything,” he was told. The year before, Debra had given Oprah an antique porcelain