O! Another entry in Oprah's empire

REVIEWS BY PAT H. BROESKE

Guess she didn't have enough to do. How else to explain Oprah Winfrey's continued expansion of her empire -- in publishing, cable, and on the Internet.

After shaking up book sales for more than three years with the success of her TV show's book club, Winfrey is making her way to the magazine racks -- with a namesake publication. O, subtitled The Oprah Magazine, will debut April 17 with a distribution of 850,000 copies.

As for the cable-Internet foray: the media mogul, who is only the third woman in history to own her own production company (she was preceded by silent era superstar Mary Pickford and TV maven Lucille Ball), is also a partner in Oxygen, the new women's cable channel/Internet network.

Of course, the heart of her conglomerate remains "The Oprah Winfrey Show." As its 22 million weekly viewers can attest, it seeks to entertain, enlighten, and empower. As will the new O. Editor-in-chief Ellen Kunes (previously with Cosmopolitan), says the magazine "will be the women's personal growth guide for this new century, inspired by Oprah's vision."

If you know Oprah's vision, you can aptly surmise that O will explore spirituality, health and fitness, beauty, fashion, and relationships. And it will offer advice. From Hearst Magazines and Oprah's own Harpo Entertainment Group, it will kick off with two double issues before going monthly in September.

Oxygen began rolling out in February, initially available to just 10 million homes. (By comparison, the femme-oriented Lifetime reaches 75 million homes.) Reflecting the synergistic times, there is also an Oxygen website. Check out oxygen.com, where Winfrey hosts a step-by-step guide to navigating the net.

Meantime, Winfrey continues to guide her fans to her favorite books with her Oprah's Book Club -- which has revved up the book biz, as well as the careers of a number of authors. Among the titles that have benefited from the Oprah boost: I Know This Much Is True; A Virtuous Woman; A Lesson Before Dying; The Deep End of the Ocean; White Oleander; and Cross My Heart. In what has become a routine turn of events, Oprah's January book club selection -- Gap Creek by Robert Morgan -- shot to the top of the best-seller lists shortly after being chosen.

The woman Time magazine cited one of the 100 most influential people of the 20th century has, fittingly, been the subject of a number of books herself (authorized and otherwise). And she has written/participated in a number of them.

Briefly, the Oprah book oeuvre includes: The Uncommon Wisdom of Oprah Winfrey: A Portrait in Her Own Words, in which she details her battle with weight, the illegitimate child she lost, her early drug use, and more; Andre Talks Hair!: With a Special Message from Oprah Winfrey, a how-to by Oprah's personal hairstylist for the past decade; and Make the Connection: Ten Steps to a Better Body -- And a Better Life, by Winfrey and exercise physiologist Bob Greene. And lest anyone disputes the woman's entrepreneurial status, there is Masters of Enterprise: Giants of American Business from John Jacob Astor and J.P. Morgan to Bill Gates and Oprah Winfrey. After all, money talks. As does Oprah.


Pat H. Broeske is an associate producer on the Court TV series, "Anatomy of Crime."

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