The queen of television is expanding her empire.
Oprah Winfrey and Discovery Communications Inc. said Tuesday that they were forming a company with a flagship cable channel to be called OWN: The Oprah Winfrey Network. The channel is expected to debut in mid-2009, taking the place of the underperforming Discovery Health Channel.
The venture could be Winfrey's encore once she exits daytime television. Winfrey's show is scheduled to air through May 2011, but the talk-show host said Tuesday that she had an option that would allow her to end her show a year early, in May 2010.
"I've lived my television life in competition with myself, working to get those numbers, those daily ratings," Winfrey, 53, said in an interview. She said that she would decide in September when to end her show and that after 22 years in daytime television she was open to something new.
"The thing that keeps me coming to work every day with a smile on my face is the ability to affect the way people see themselves," she said. "That's why I do it."
That's the concept that Discovery Chief Executive David Zaslav pitched to Winfrey eight months ago when he traveled to her headquarters in Chicago and proposed that they team up to build a cable channel with Winfrey's brand of programming. Zaslav said he was inspired after his wife, Pam, showed him a copy of O, the Oprah Magazine. He said he was impressed by its depth of information and stories.
Zaslav said he figured that as TV networks filled their schedules with reality shows chockablock with C-list celebrities and wannabes, there would be a market for Winfrey's uplifting lifestyle programming.
"Oprah Winfrey is the most powerful person in the world as far as influence goes," said S. Mark Young, a professor at USC's Annenberg School for Communication. He said the channel would have a marketing advantage because of Winfrey's ready-made audience.
"She comes across as being a very thoughtful and caring person, someone with great empathy. I guess the only real question is whether Oprah might be getting a little overexposed," Young said.
He noted that Winfrey is seemingly everywhere, including jumping into presidential politics to support Democratic Sen. Barack Obama of Illinois.
Winfrey will be the creative force, chairwoman and president of the 50-50 venture between Discovery and her Harpo Productions Inc., the producer of "The Oprah Winfrey Show," which is distributed through King World Productions, a unit of CBS Corp.
