Watch: Oprah Winfrey Shocks Keke Palmer by Revealing Her Real Name
Oprah Winfrey wants to run on away from one moment in her career.
The former talk show host jokingly shared why she regrets her short-lived stint as a singer, during which she recorded a rendition of the Black spiritual “Run On” as a theme song for season 13 of The Oprah Winfrey Show in 1998.
Indeed, after Keke Palmer brought up the track during Winfrey’s appearance on the July 21 episode of her podcast Baby, This is Keke Palmer, singing the lyric, “I think I’m gonna run on,” Winfrey playfully chimed in.
“Girl, please,” she said as Palmer laughed. “That is one of the mistakes of my career.”
While the Nope actress emphasized that it was “no mistake,” Winfrey—whose Emmy-winning talk show ran from 1986 to 2011—doubled down, sharing the story behind the song.
“It is a mistake,” the entertainment mogul noted. “So, what had happened was I was trying to decide, ‘Am I gonna end the show or not end the show?’ And then I had a little talk with Jesus, and Jesus said, ‘You gotta keep going.’ And so I said, ‘There’s this song. It’s an old spiritual.'”
Winfrey sang the iconic line that fans surely will never forget, “I think I’m gonna run on,” to which Palmer cheered, before jokingly adding, “You got to give them a little slave hymn sometimes.”
After the pair laughed, the 72-year-old explained why the song was not a hit. After all, “Run On” was only featured on one season of Winfrey’s 25-season run of her talk show.
“We realized, I can’t sing,” she told Palmer, “even though I took the singing lessons.”
While the One of Them Days actress emphasized that the song “wasn’t bad,” Winfrey playfully pushed back, “You know it was bad. You’re just saying that ’cause you’re looking at me. It was pretty bad.”
The TV personality added that although they brought in a church choir into the recording as backup vocals to make it better, “it didn’t work.”
Winfrey may not be a fan of “Run On,” but its legacy continues to live on with many fans, including one of the theme song’s known mega fans: the late Whitney Houston, who created a viral moment when she appeared on The Oprah Winfrey Show in 1999 and started singing “Run On” in response to Winfrey asking her to name her “favorite” song.
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Yet, Winfrey’s thoughts on her brief time as a singer weren’t the only revelation she made during her conversation with Palmer.
Indeed, the Color Purple star revealed that “Oprah” isn’t actually her real first name.
“It was Orpah from the Bible,” Winfrey shared. “Ruth, first chapter, 14th verse. It’s that whole Ruth and Naomi story. And you know, Ruth said, ‘Wherever thy goest, I will go.’ And then Orpah said, ‘I’m going back. I’m sorry. I can’t. Too long. The road’s too long.’”
“Nobody knew how to spell it,” she explained. “So, it turned out on my birth certificate, it’s Orpah. And then people started calling me Oprah. And so it’s just the difference between the P being before the R or after the R. So once they started with Oprah, that’s it.”
For more celebrity confessions, run on and keep reading…
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