Oprah Winfrey Once Revealed She Was Devastated After Starring in ‘Beloved’
Oprah Winfrey was already one of the world’s richest media moguls, but she hoped to translate some of her success over to Hollywood.
But when a film she was passionate about ended up sinking at the box-office, she found herself more hurt than ever.
Oprah Winfrey always wanted to be an actor
Winfrey’s passion has always been broadcast journalism. Her dedication to the field and her work ethic eventually led her to host AM Chicago, where she proved her value as a journalist. The talkshow went from declining ratings to being more watched than it’d ever been after Winfrey was brought on board. But apart from AM Chicago being the beginning of Winfrey’s rise, it also gave the mogul her first onscreen role.
AM Chicago offered Winfrey the opportunity to star in The Color Purple. This was a special moment for the talk show host, as she was already a fan of the movie’s source material. So when she heard a movie was being filmed based on the novel, she wanted to be a part of it.
“People were saying, ‘Somebody’s going to make a movie about that.’ And I say, ‘God, you’ve got to get me in that movie.’ Now, I had never been in a movie. I didn’t know anything about movies. But, I started praying to be in the movie. I was going to try to get in that movie,” she once told Collider.
She’d ended up getting the part after Quincy Jones, who produced and wrote the soundtrack for the film, saw her on AM Chicago.
“He had taken a red eye and he was getting out of the shower, and he turned on the TV in his hotel room. I was on AM Chicago and Quincy Jones saw me on that, and he said, ‘That’s Sofia,’” she recalled.
Oprah Winfrey once felt ‘devastated’ after starring in ‘Beloved’
Winfrey had a few credits in TV movies and shows after her successful role in The Color Purple. But perhaps Beloved was the host’s first true major movie role after the Spielberg feature. Beloved was based on the Toni Morrison novel of the same name about a spirit haunting a dysfunctional family.
After reading the book, Winfrey approached the author personally to ask if she could make Beloved into a movie. Although Morrison had her doubts that the book could become a film, eventually she approved of Winfrey’s request.
Beloved received positive reviews, but didn’t do as well at the box-office as she would’ve hoped it would. Winfrey confided that Beloved’s box-office performance sent her into a deep funk.
“I was all excited. I didn’t know that you only had one weekend, and then it’s over. So, it came out on a Friday, and that Saturday morning I got a call and they said, ‘That’s it,’” she said. “I got the call at like 8:30 in the morning, and by 10:30, I had my face in a bowl of macaroni and cheese. Literally, I went into a numbing depression about it, and I was like that for a long time. It was 1998 and I remember thinking, ‘I think I’m depressed, but who can I go see?'”
Winfrey decided to try and turn to her faith to cheer up her spirits.
“I remember saying to myself, ‘I’m going to pray myself out of it. And if I can’t and I’m not better in a month, then I’m going to try to figure out how I can get myself some help.’ I still had to go to work, every day. I was devastated by it,” she said.
What Oprah Winfrey learned about the film industry after ‘Beloved’
Winfrey stayed in that mind state for six weeks before she’d finally recovered from it. Her remedy was to focus on everything good in her life instead of putting so much attention on her box-office debacle.
“That’s when the gratitude practice became really strong for me, because it’s hard to remain sad if you’re focused on what you have instead of what you don’t have,” she once said in an interview with Vogue.
The Butler star also learned an important lesson regarding movies and box-office results.
“It taught me to never again, never again, ever, put all of your hopes, expectations, eggs in the basket of box office,” she said. “Do the work as an offering, and then whatever happens, happens.”
