Although Anjelica Huston has acted in films as varied as The Addams Family, The Grifters, and The Royal Tenenbaums, there's one place she's never appeared in her more than 50 years in the limelight. The 71-year-old actor never promoted anything on The Oprah Winfrey Show, and she has said that it's all because the show's legendary host has been holding a grudge against her since the '80s. Read on for details on the 30+ years of silence between the two and why Huston has said she admires Oprah Winfrey despite it.
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Winfrey and Huston faced off at the Oscars.
The year was 1986, and the five actors nominated for the Academy Award for Best Supporting Actress—Margaret Avery, Huston, Amy Madigan, Meg Tilly, and Winfrey—were all first-time nominees. Winfrey was "the underdog of the season that seemingly everyone was gunning for" for her performance as Sofia in The Color Purple, according to W Magazine. But it was Huston, nominated for her part in Prizzi's Honor, directed by her father John Huston and starring her then-boyfriend Jack Nicholson, who walked away with the Oscar.
There were alleged "repercussions" for beating Winfrey.
More than 30 years after the win, Huston discussed what winning had done to her relationship—or lack thereof—with Winfrey. In a candid 2019 interview with Vulture, interviewer Andrew Goldman proposed that there had to have been "some repercussions for beating Oprah." Huston confirmed, "She never had me on her show, ever. She won't talk to me."
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Huston said Winfrey got between her and another star at an event.
Huston explained that she did come into contact with her one-time rival at a private Oscars party, but no reconciliation took place. Instead, she claimed, Winfrey made a point of snubbing her. "I was talking to Clint Eastwood, and she literally came between us with her back to me," she told Vulture. "So all of the sudden I was confronted with the back of Oprah's head." Huston felt it was personal and was evidently shocked by the apparent rudeness. "Nobody else would dislike me so much as to literally, physically come in between the person I was talking with that way," she added.
Winfrey wasn't the only big name Huston called out.
Huston was strikingly forthright in the same Vulture interview, naming other stars she encountered whose behavior she was not impressed by. Her list included her Daddy Day Care co-star Eddie Murphy, who she said demanded everyone else be on set before he arrived, even in the heat of the California summer.
"Frankly, a lot of male movie stars behave in an offhand manner, like they're just more important than you are," Huston said. She claimed that Bill Murray was "a [expletive]" to her during the filming of The Life Aquatic with Steve Zissou, inviting the rest of the cast out to dinner without her. (Although, she also shared that the Ghostbusters star later attended the 2008 funeral of her husband, sculptor Robert Graham.)
Huston said she admires the host anyway.
While 1986 may have been the year of Winfrey's Oscar loss, it would soon become memorable for something even bigger in her career. The Oprah Winfrey Show made its debut on Sept. 8, 1986. It went on to air for 25 seasons, with a book club, magazine, network, and other related projects to follow. Despite the apparent grudge, Huston acknowledged Winfrey's success, concluding her discussion with Vulture by saying, "But I admire Oprah. God knows, she's made some big steps."
Andrew Miller Andrew Miller is a pop culture writer living in New York.Read moreFiled Under1980s • Celebrities • Entertainment • FeudsRead This Next"Diff'rent Strokes" Stars Got in Fight on Set
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