After years of relationship rumors, Oprah Winfrey sets the record straight about her relationship with Gayle King.
The 70-year-old producer is not married to her long-term partner Stedman Graham, but she is not in a romantic relationship with her best friend either. Nevertheless, there has been speculation for some time that Winfrey and King, 69, are more than just friends.
βFor years, people said we were gay, and we always had to fight back,β the former talk show host said in a recent podcast recording of Moments that shape us with Melinda French Gates.
Winfrey and Gates were also accompanied by King, who is currently not dating anyone. According to the CBS As a broadcast journalist, she always asked Winfrey to address the issue on her eponymous television show. She noted, “I always told Oprah, ‘You have to do a show about this.’ Because it’s hard enough for me to get a date on a Saturday night when people think we’re gay.”
“If we were gay, we would tell you,” King added bluntly. The media personalities believe it’s because so many people aren’t used to seeing two women having a close, platonic friendship.
Winfrey said, “One of the thoughts that occurred to me was that maybe people are not used to seeing women with this kind of honest commitment.”
But today, Gates believes that the friendship between Winfrey and King is an ideal example and model for society. The two have a “deep, real” relationship that many can look up to and learn from.
“Gayle is more happy for me, for every success, victory or challenge I overcome, than I am for myself,” Winfrey noted. “And I’m just as happy as she is. I couldn’t be happier than she is.”
The two influential A-list celebrities and activists have been friends since their teenage journalists in 1976, when both worked for Baltimore station WJZ. Nearly 10 years later, King made her first appearance on Winfrey’s show in a segment about celebrity friendships.
Over the years, the two have spoken positively about each other and praised each other for motivating and strengthening each other in times of need.
In the 2006 edition of O, The Oprah MagazineWinfrey admitted: “Something about this relationship feels out of this world to me, like it was created by a power and hand greater than mine.”
She continued: “Whatever this friendship is, it’s been a very fun journey – and we’ve taken it together.”
King was married to William Bumpus from 1982 to 1993 and had two children with him β Kirby and William Jr. β while Winfrey has been with Graham since 1986.