Oprah Winfrey means ratings. But that doesn't mean Dr. Mehmet Oz will have the media queen on his new syndicated talk show just to boost his viewership.
"I'd love to have her on the show," Oz tells me during a break from shooting in his New York City studio. "But the big issue is, it's not for me, but for our audience. We have to have a reason to bring her onto the show. If we have a topic that can benefit from having her on the show, believe me, we'll all be thinking the same thing."
And not to worry—there are already plans for Oz to make return appearances on the Oprah Winfrey Show. But television isn't the only thing Oz is focusing on these days…
"We have to have a functional website that can answer all the questions people have about health," he says. "I'm not speaking theoretically. I really want to be able to get the top doctors in America answering questions on our site so that people who have questions get very detailed answers that they can print out to have them right in their hands...So the for the few moments I'm not focused 100 percent on the show, I work on the website."
It's not exactly an Oprah family feud, but Oz finds himself facing off in some markets against another one of Ms. Winfrey's spinoffs, Dr. Phil. "The information I'm going to be sharing is quite different, so from that perspective, we're not competing," Oz insists. "There are lots of opportunities out there for us to share this very big playing field."
And while the Oz show is a far cry from a celebrity talk show, that doesn't mean we won't be seeing some famous faces joining the doctor on a regular basis. Project Runway's Tim Gunn and fitness trainer Bob Harper from The Biggest Loser will be among his regular contributors. Plus, Oz said, expect segments inspired by celebrities in the news, such as Farrah Fawcett's death from anal cancer.
"That's a case where I'd probably want to tackle why she developed that type of cancer and other implications of that," he explains. "It's just more meaningful for the audience. I don't want to race to be the newsbreaking show. I want to put things in context, just like your doctor would if you went to see them."
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