Beyonce makes a cameo in an article about Oprah

I was reading an article by Caitlin Flanagan on Oprah, “The Glory of Oprah,” in December’s Atlantic. It was one of those articles you don’t plan to read, but you’re avoiding brushing your teeth or whatever, so you might as well read another paragraph.

There are hyperbolic superlatives, which increasingly have become the norm in such articles: Why Oprah “understands women and the power of television better than anyone else.” Yeah, yeah.

Here are a couple of moments that will have caused me minor tooth decay. The first:

One of the highlights of [Oprah’s] finale [was] a dazzling performance by Beyonce of her song, “Run the World (Girls).” …[F]or all her sophistication and sexuality, one of Beyonce’s great talents is her ability to exude the breathless innocence of youth itself. To the accompaniment of “Pomp and Circumstance,” in an outfit of leotard and high heels that somehow managed to signal that her remarks were in the style of a commencement address, she announced: “Oprah Winfrey, because of you, women everywhere have graduated to a new level of understanding of what we are, of who we are, and, most importantly, who we can be…Oprah—we can run the world!” There was a quivering, building excitement, because you knew she about to burst into the number, and after a few tension-filled moments, she did. A team of gorgeous backup dancers in black hot pants and red stilettos marched onstage, and Beyonce handed each one a diploma, then launched into the exciting song.” (111)

To YouTube we go:

What a scene of contradiction. That’s not quite a complaint. No, watching it again as a man, I don’t suppose I’m complaining at all. But you can’t watch it with a straight face: it’s that fine line between entertaining and ridiculous. Somehow the mind can’t accept it as both, so you go back and forth: it’s entertaining, no, it’s ridiculous, but I like it, but I’m ashamed of myself, but look at her, but I'm a chauvinist hog, etc.

The second moment considers Oprah’s appeal to her female fan base more directly, despite the slightly annoying provocative rhetoric (“There are certain things about women that men will never understand, in part because they have no interest in understanding them”). Oprah is being interviewed in a lightning round series of questions and the moderator asks her, “What is your favorite Favorite Thing?”

Oprah sat back, clearly aware of the implications her answer would have; it seemed she was preparing a way of evading the question—but she wasn’t. She leaned forward in her chair and said—in all seriousness and sincerity, and in tones of great certainty—“The Breville panini maker.” […] The appliance— “which can also be used for bacon,” Oprah said, “and can be used for fish”—was the clear favorite, and she said its name again, a coronation: “The Breville panini maker.” (118)

My first take on that confession was, Wow, Oprah’s so down-to-earth. She could have said a car or the iPad or whatever else she had given away [cough, promoted] to an audience of screaming women, but then within the same second, I thought, Wait, panini maker? Who has a panini maker? And it hit me that Oprah, like Beyonce, like any successful American empress, thrives because they traffic in desire. She brings you so close to a noun, using herself as the reference point, that you begin to enjoy her world as if it were your own, or to say it more precisely, as if it could be your own. When Beyonce is convulsing, part of you thinks you can do that (check out all the imitation videos for “Single Ladies”).

Almost (here’s that journalistic flourish I was complaining about) is one of the most powerful motivators. Only is another.