Oprah Winfrey, a goddess among men, will be kicking off the 24th season of The Oprah Winfrey Show next month by bringing us an exclusive interview with Diva Supreme Whitney Houston. Just weeks after Whitney drops her much-anticipated new “comeback” album I Look To You (in stores on August 31), Oprah will be grillin’ Ms. Thang on her infamous couch. Here is the full text of the press release announcement:

Oprah launches her 24th season of “The Oprah Winfrey Show” with what she calls “the most anticipated music interview of the decade,” a must-see television event with singing icon Whitney Houston. This marks Houston’s first interview in nearly seven years and follows the release of her highly touted new album, “I Look To You” on August 31, 2009. For more information about the album check www.oprah.com/whitney or www.whitneyhouston.com. “The Oprah Winfrey Show: Exclusive: Whitney Houston’s First Interview” airs Monday, September 14, 2009 (check local listings). Since her 1985 self-titled debut, Whitney Houston has built an illustrious career that has generated over 170 million combined worldwide sales of albums, singles and videos. Cited by the Guinness Book of World Records as music’s “most awarded female artist of all time,” with an unsurpassed tally of 411 awards, inclusive of 6 Grammy Awards, 2 Emmy Awards, 23 American Music Awards and 16 Billboard Music Awards. Houston remains a singular force in music today. “The Oprah Winfrey Show” has remained the number one talk show for 22 consecutive seasons, winning every sweep since its debut in 1986.** It is produced in Chicago by Harpo Productions, Inc. and syndicated to 214 domestic stations by CBS Television Distribution Group and to 143 countries by CBS Paramount International Television.

Damn! Has it really been almost 7 years since Whitney Houston sat down for a televised interview? I’m not sure if her infamous “Crack is Whack” interview with Diane Sawyer is her most recent interview but a lot has gone down since those days back when she was happily married to Bobby Brown. As much as I am really looking forward to the release of her new album, I can’t help but be EXTREMELY interested in hearing her answer all the questions that we’ve been dying to know from the past few years. Oprah is by no means a tough interviewer but she does have the ability to draw her interviewees out. I hope this will be a good one … I can’t wait to see it!

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Pink reader Tammy informs me that Seal just announced to the world on The Oprah Winfrey Show that he and wife Heidi Klum, who is pregs with the couple’s 3rd child (her 4th), are expecting the birth of a baby girl!

Heidi was most recently seen all glammed up for the Metropolitan Museum of Art Costume Institute Gala earlier this week but she had nothing to say about the sex of her incubating baby. This is great news … the couple already have a girl and two boys. This will round out their family perfectly. Perhaps she was yet unaware or perhaps the couple decided to save the news for Oprah but now we know. Oprah doesn’t air here in LA until later this afternoon … but I may just have to tune in to hear the announcement for myself. Congrats to the happy couple!!!

UPDATE: Here is a screencap of Oprah sharing Heidi and Seal‘s happy news on her show today:

[Photo credit: Splash News; thanks Tammy]

Vice President-elect Joe Biden is about a half hour away from taking his oath of office and is, I’m sure, feeling fine … but he was lookin’ much chagrined yesterday when he and his wife appeared on The Oprah Winfrey Show which taped live from Washington DC. During the interview with the Bidens, Jill inadvertently spilled the beans that then presidential candidate Barack Obama offered Joe Biden his choice to be either Vice President or Secretary of State last Summer. Once she let this bit of info slip out, Joe Biden gave her the look of death as he shushed her … and then everyone laughed to try and smooth things over. You can imagine the hell she caught after the show was over:

Joseph Biden’s wife Jill on Monday appeared to let slip a piece of choice political gossip, suggesting her husband was given a choice by Barack Obama to be vice president or secretary of state. Biden will be sworn into office on Tuesday as Obama’s second-in-command, and appeared to try to hush his wife as she made the comment on Oprah Winfrey’s talk show. His office later put out a statement denying he had a choice of job. “Joe had a choice to be secretary of state or vice president,” Jill Biden said, prompting her husband to whisper “shhh” before her words were drowned out by cheers and applause. She went on to explain that she had worried about the impact of her husband being secretary of state on their family life. “I said, Joe, if you’re secretary of state, you’ll be away. (I’ll) see you at a state dinner once in a while. I said if you’re vice president, the entire family, because they worked so hard for the election, can be involved. They can come to our home. They can go to events. They can be with us all the time. And that’s what’s important to us.” Joseph Biden, trying to smooth over the awkward moment, then said he told Obama he would serve as vice president only if he was being selected for his judgement. “I know it’s going to sound corny. I could best serve there. The bottom line, Barack’s my friend. This is a partnership,” he said … Biden spokeswoman Elizabeth Alexander put out a statement trying to play down Jill Biden’s comments. “To be clear, president-elect Obama offered vice President-elect Biden one job only — to be his running mate and the vice president-elect was thrilled to accept the offer,” she said. “Like anyone who followed the presidential campaign this summer, Dr Jill Biden knew there was a chance that president-elect Obama might ask her husband to serve in some capacity and that, given his background, the positions of vice president and secretary of state were possibilities,” Alexander said. “Dr Biden’s point to Oprah today was that being vice president would be a better fit for their family because they would get to see him more and get to participate in serving more.”

LOL! I love Jill Biden! And I love that in the excitement of being in the presence of the great Oprah Winfrey the poor dear got flustered enough to let this bit of previously unsubstantiated information get out. No matter what the press release says about the incident, you know what Jill spilled was the way it went down ;)

In any event, Joe Biden is just about to take his oath of office … and then, soon after, it’s Barack Obama‘s turn!

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Black Eyed Peas frontman will.i.am debuted his new Obama Victory Song music video It’s A New Day on The Oprah Winfrey Show yesterday afternoon (which is a follow-up of sorts to his earlier Obama Campaign Songs Yes, We Can and We Are The Ones). Here is the music video in full and some information about the song and it’s debut on Oprah‘s show:

Now that Barack Obama has won the election, his longtime supporter Will.I.Am is premiering the video for his new song “It’s a New Day.” The Black Eyed Pea spent some time in a New York City studio recording his third ode to the president-elect. Will stopped by “Oprah” on Friday to debut the new celeb-filled video for the track, and is also posting the clip to the site Dipdive. The video flashes pictures of Obama on election night and crowds celebrating the Illinois senator’s victory, alongside images of historical figures like Abraham Lincoln and Harriet Tubman. And it wouldn’t be a Will.I.Am video without some celebrity appearances. This time around, he’s rounded up his bandmate Fergie, as well as actors Olivia Wilde, Jonathan Schaech and Kerry Washington. “It was a beautiful thing,” he told Oprah of spending election night in Chicago. He also couldn’t find the words to describe how excited he is for Obama’s win. “I can’t really explain it,” he said. “I think of my grandma. I think of all the people who paved the way for that moment … like the invisibles who pushed the movement forward.” When he released his first song about the then presidential hopeful, “Yes We Can,” Will gathered celebrity friends including John Legend, Scarlett Johansson and Common for the video. The next song, “We Are the Ones,” also had a star-filled video, this one featuring George Lopez and Jessica Alba.

will.i.am has been such a great proponent of the Obama for President movement that this third victory song is a very fitting way to wrap up his campaign for now President-elect Barack Obama. It really does feel like we are in a “new day” here in the US — this music video really captures that feeling, I think. I know that I am very much looking forward to the next four, hopefully eight years under Barack Obama‘s leadership. It’s a new day, indeed.

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Oprah Winfrey taped the 23rd season premiere of her daytime talk show The Oprah Winfrey Show in Chicago, IL yesterday. For the momentous event, Oprah invited 150 US Olympic athletes who competed at the 2008 Summer Olympic Games in Beijing, China to help kick off this new season of her show:

Thousands of spectators cheered Olympic medalists Michael Phelps, Dara Torres and Kobe Bryant on Wednesday as the city of Chicago got a high-profile boost to its bid to host the 2016 Summer Olympics. Oprah Winfrey was taping the season premiere for “The Oprah Winfrey Show” at a downtown park, and she invited 150 U.S. Olympic athletes to join her. The athletes were introduced under a shower of red, white and blue confetti. Winfrey intends the show to be both a welcome home for athletes who competed in Beijing and also a chance to showcase Chicago as the city bids for the 2016 Games, said Harpo Productions … The 23rd season premiere of Winfrey’s talk show will air Monday. Chicago is a finalist for the 2016 Games along with Tokyo; Rio de Janeiro, Brazil; and Madrid, Spain. The International Olympic Committee will choose the 2016 host next year.

People.com has some scoop on what will transpire in next Monday’s season premiere ep:

Even face-to-face with Oprah Winfrey, Michael Phelps remains mum on the topic of his private life. But in terms of Olympic-sized revelations, Nastasia Liukin admits she gained inspiration from The Secret, while Kobe Bryant confessed to his surprise at finding he has so many fans in China … “It’s good to be back on American soil,” said Phelps, 23, grinning shyly and wearing only one of the eight gold medals he took home for swimming. Asking the most pressing question, “Are you single?,” Winfrey was told by Phelps, “I try to keep my private life private.” Bryant, joined by others on the winning men’s basketball team, said the players made a conscious effort to bring back gold and remedy what had become the sullied reputation of American players. “We made it a personal challenge. It was a priority” to take arrogance out of the game, he told Winfrey. In response to all the attention he received from adoring Chinese fans, Bryant, 30, admitted, “It caught me off guard” … Liukin, 18, cited the inspiration she received from The Secret, a self-help book popularized on Winfrey’s show. Recalling her pre-China prep, “I said, ‘I guess I should read it, Oprah read it,’ ” said the winning athlete. As for Torres – at 41, the winner of three silver medals in Beijing – the swimmer and mother of a 2-year-old said age shouldn’t limit one’s dreams. “All the mothers out there are my role models,” she said.

Oprah always does things in a big way, none of this surprises me at all. I do think it’s brilliant that she is using the fame of her show to help Chicago’s Olympic bid. I would love it if Chi-town won the the 2016 Olympics … if so, I’d make sure to attend some portion of the games, Chicago is so close to Detroit. I don’t make it a habit to watch The Oprah Winfrey Show (like my BFF Sarah does) but I’ll be watching this one. It looks too good to miss.

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