Get ready for Radio Oprah.
Talk show queen Oprah Winfrey was launching her own channel, Oprah and Friends, on Monday morning on XM Satellite Radio, with shows hosted by her and a collection of popular personalities from her television show, including her best friend, Gayle King, fitness expert Bob Greene and renowned poet Maya Angelou.
The station will broadcast 24 hours day, with highlights of the shows replayed every weekend.
Guests set for the first few weeks of programming include actresses Annette Bening and Julia Louis-Dreyfus, rocker Jon Bon Jovi, New York Times columnist Tom Friedman and real estate mogul Donald Trump. Winfrey will co-host a show with King, dubbed “The Oprah and Gayle Show,” on which they discuss the latest news and gossip. The two have known each other for 30 years.
Other shows will focus on finance, style, relationships and spiritual wisdom.
Winfrey and boyfriend Steadman Graham were to be the station’s first guests, appearing on the initial “Gayle King Show,” a solo program.
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Celebrity Sightings
Graham mentions a special pastrami and cheese sandwich that Winfrey makes him: “That’s the other side of Oprah that people don’t know about. She can cook.”
In February, Winfrey signed a three-year, $55 million deal with XM Satellite Radio Holdings Inc. to launch her new radio channel, which joins her nationally syndicated television show and her O, The Oprah Magazine.
XM Satellite Radio boasts more than 7 million subscribers.