Oprah identifies this as 'the thing that really matters' and it's not fame or fortune

If you’re wondering if Oprah-needs-no-last-name Winfrey is tired, she is, she admits clad in purple PJs at her Montecito, California, estate at 2 p.m. on a Tuesday.

This month alone, the legendary talk show host has appeared on "CBS Mornings" co-hosted by “the friend that everybody deserves” Gayle King, Sherri Shepherd’s eponymous talk show, “The Late Show with Stephen Colbert,” “The Jennifer Hudson Show” and “The Drew Barrymore Show” (where she felt comforted by the host’s arm stroking, OK!) to promote a musical version of “The Color Purple” in theaters Christmas Day. Winfrey describes the 1985 Steven Spielberg film as life-altering, and her turn as Sofia earned Winfrey her first Oscar nod. A producer on the revival, she acknowledges in an interview, “We were out there in those ‘Purple’ streets, honey.”

Winfrey, who turns 70 in January, also unveiled her 6-foot-10 inch by 5-foot-8-inch likeness at National Portrait Gallery earlier this month. The busy schedule reminds her of the days of “The Oprah Winfrey Show,” which filmed more than 4,500 episodes in 25 seasons.

“In the old days of ‘The Oprah Show,’ I would not even look at my itinerary because I'd get so overwhelmed by looking at it,” she remembers. “So I would wait until I was done to look at where I had been.”

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But there’s another project she’s passionate about so an interview in her pajamas it is. Winfrey is an executive producer on Hulu’s “Black Cake,” a dramatic series adapted from Charmaine Wilkerson’s 2022 novel of the same name in which Caribbean-born Covey (Mia Isaac) reveals secrets to her children that she’d kept hidden from them in audio recordings played after her death. A teenage Covey flees her native Jamaica after her much older groom from an arranged marriage mysteriously dies on their wedding night. She adopts the identity of an acquaintance following a fatal train incident and informs her son and daughter they have an older sibling. The eight-episode first season (streaming now) debuted prior to the resolution of the actors strike in November. The finale was released Dec. 6.

“I would have had a big party for it and celebrated all the cast members,” Winfrey says. “But couldn't speak a word. My ‘Black Cake’ lips were sealed and not able to really give it the kind of support that it deserves and needed.”

Series creator Marissa Jo Cerar pitched a three-season arc after reading the manuscript in October 2020. She says producers felt excited about presenting their version of “Big Little Lies,” HBO’s mystery series which stars a predominately white cast save for Zoë Kravitz.

“We don't really get those projects, those big, splashy, big-budget, aspirational stories where it's Black women as the main characters,” Cerar says. “They're usually the supporting characters in white women's stories.”

Executive producer Carla Gardini hopes to richen the backstories of the main characters if Hulu greenlights a second season. The streaming service has not revealed the show's fate yet.

“We haven't even touched on Covey’s relationship with her father Lin (Simon Wan),” says Gardini. “There was so much in Lin's story and so much that (Cerar) started to think about that goes beyond the edges of the book that I know we would love to continue to explore. ... There's a lot of interpersonal relationships that we didn't get to and more secrets and mysteries.”

Winfrey adds, “The power of secrets and the way they affect you personally and the way you pass that on to your family and how then everybody is affected because of those secrets was also a driving force of interest for me." Anyone who has followed her career knows keeping things in is not her M.O. “There ain't nothing left to hear or find out,” she says. And being so open in her personal life and on a public stage provides liberation.

“Living without a secret actually sets you free,” says Winfrey. “We've always heard that you were as sick as your secrets, sick meaning harboring the sadness, the grief, the fear, the shame. All of that manifests in your life. And so you're not allowed to live your life freely as long as you're holding on to a secret that holds you back.

“The thing that shaped my life the most is 25 years of sitting in that seat (on her talk show stage) listening to people's stories,” she adds. “And I will tell you that over the years, the thing that I have noticed, the experiences that caused the greatest amount of grief and pain and shame are when secrets are held in families.”

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In the short time since its release, “Black Cake” has already profoundly impacted at least one life, Cerar shares. She says she received an email from someone informing her that their family member, a new mom recently diagnosed with terminal cancer, began recording messages for her daughter after watching “Black Cake.”

“That slayed me,” says Cerar. “It made me tell my parents things I've been holding on to for nine years, and I hope that it just makes people open up and reach out really.”

Winfrey’s serving of "Black Cake" also offers a satisfying serving of wisdom.

“The thing that that really resonated with me is loving more deeply, more profoundly the people who are close to you while you can,” she says. “I think certainly the older you get, you understand that that is the thing that really matters."

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