Oprah still reigns
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Getting on Oprah.
You've got a better chance of getting struck by lightning, or getting into Harvard.
Daniel Marsula, Post-Gazette
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In the 20 years since Oprah's daytime television show went national --and that anniversary is today, by the way -- people have found that even the slightest mention from her can change lives, as long as they can figure out how to get one of her producers to return their calls.
Pittsburgh's own Jack Horner, a Downtown public relations expert, is one of the lucky ones. In 1989, he landed a coveted spot on her show -- about kids with funny names -- and that, in turn, landed him his first job.
Book authors, fashion designers and makers of bubble bath have also found fame and fortune -- or at least a big bump in sales -- when Oprah gave them a plug.
"Oprah is the gold standard when you want to publicize something," says Andrea Fitting, of The Fitting Group, a Downtown marketing company. "She's the person we all think of first."
But getting the Queen of Daytime TV's attention is about as easy as getting the president of the United States to return your calls.
"There have been times when some of our researchers have wanted their programs to be featured on Oprah, and we've tried our best to give them a realistic picture of how unlikely that's going to be," says Lisa Rossi, a spokeswoman for the University of Pittsburgh Medical Center. One psychologist recently commended Ms. Rossi for getting his work mentioned in The New York Times, "but then he said, 'but I didn't get on Oprah.' Of course, he was joking, or at least I hope so," she recalled with a laugh.
What accounts for the extraordinary influence Oprah commands over American culture and commerce? Perhaps because as an African-American woman who overcame a poor childhood, she has successfully managed to become all things to all people: a billionaire businesswoman, movie mogul, dietician, magazine publisher, actress, philanthropist, self-improvement guru, celebrity Best Friend, consumer advocate, literature professor and all around fairy godmother.
Let Oprah's gaze fall onto a product or a person, however fleetingly-- whether via her show or her magazine, with its avidly read "O List" and the annual "My Favorite Things" TV show before the Christmas holidays -- and sales will spike, stocks will rise, calls will be returned, child molesters will be arrested and hurricane victims will find housing.
Oprah is unique because "she's so sensitive to where people are and what people are feeling. She's got the cultural temperature down pat," adds Judith Safern, the Dallas-based head of Leading Thinkers, a public relations firm. "She knows how to be trustworthy and inoffensive without being a milquetoast."
Yes, but, how, O, how to get Oprah's attention? She has an army of fiercely loyal producers and staff at her Chicago headquarters -- she once took all 400 of them on a trip to Hawaii -- but they're impossible to reach by phone or e-mail, Ms. Safern said.
Oprah's Web site lists topics that producers are researching, but doesn't provide contact information beyond that. "You have to fax them your idea, and you pray to God you've picked the right producer," she said.
Ms. Fitting has tried in vain for the past three years to alert Oprah's producers to the plight of Amy Katz, a Mt. Lebanon girl who needs a bone marrow transplant, as well as others who never find a donor match largely because so few people register as donors.
"I'm completely shocked by the lack of awareness of how easy it is to get on the donor registry.," said Ms. Fitting, who has helped organize donor drives for "Amy's Army" and who organized an extensive letter-writing campaign to Oprah's producers.
"But we've never heard anything back," she sighed.
A spot on Oprah's show or an endorsement in her magazine is considered such a coup that it's spawned a cottage industry of publicists who specialize in getting clients a mention.
One of them is Ms. Safern. Over the years, she's placed a number of authors on Oprah, including John Gray, author of "Men Are From Mars, Women Are From Venus."
The secret, she says, is to frame the pitch not in terms of the client's individual story but as part of a bigger issue or trend. "You don't call up and say, 'I want to talk about the fact that I raised 17 foster children and the show should be about me, me, me,' but it could be a fax that says, 'Dear producer, if you ever do a show on foster children and how they're doing in their 40s and 50s, I have a story to tell."
It had better be a true story, as author James Frey found out. After his book, "A Million Little Pieces" was praised by Oprah, it topped best-seller lists. But after the story's veracity was challenged, she berated him. The incident tarnished not only his reputation but -- temporarily -- her own.
Moreover, pitching authors to Oprah's show has become more difficult because "it's a more celebrity driven show today," says Stephanie Mayabb, manager of media relations for Phenix and Phenix Literary Publicists in Austin, Texas, whose company has had several authors appear on Oprah. While Oprah focuses on her own charitable efforts in between visits from Tim McGraw and Faith Hill, "it used to be much more about bringing more issues to light. We just don't see as many opportunities there as we used to."
For those who insist on trying, a great pitch, or an orchestrated campaign, won't do the trick. "There has to be a grass-roots buzz going on already," Ms. Mayabb says, noting that her client, Marshall Stewart Ball -- a developmentally challenged child -- was invited on Oprah after his book, a collection of inspirational writings, "The Kiss of God," became so popular at the local level that an Associated Press reporter wrote a story about it.
Sometimes, though, even just a bright idea from an oddly named college student will do it.
Jack Horner was a student at Penn State University in 1989 when he penned a letter to Oprah suggesting that she do a show on "how parents don't think long term when they give silly names to our children."
He didn't hear back right away, but one day, there was a message on his answering machine from Oprah's producers inviting him and his mother to Chicago, where he ended up appearing on the show with such other unfortunately named folks as Crystal Chandelier, Harry Pitts, Florette Flowerboom and Chiquita Banana.
Oprah commiserated as Mr. Horner told of one unforgettable childhood trauma: when his fellow students at Forest Hills Middle School all purchased little snack pies marketed under the name Little Jack Horner, "and when I got on the bus they just winged them at me."
A highlight of the show came when Mr. Horner's sister, Jill Horner Rangos, now a judge in Allegheny County's Court of Common Pleas, secretly wangled a ticket to the show.
"And when I told Oprah I had a sister named Jill, she was totally taken aback, and even more so when I pointed out Jill. It was a very funny moment."
Best of all, though, was what came afterward. Call it an early version of the magical Oprah "effect" that would later touch the lives of countless book authors.
"I had just interviewed for a job at Ketchum Communications," Mr. Horner said, "and they saw the show and figured, if he can get himself on Oprah, he can probably get our clients on it, and so they hired me."
First Published September 8, 2006 12:00 am
