When it comes to friends, actress and former television talk show host Oprah Winfrey believes in quality over quantity.
The star from “The Color Purple” recently revealed that she only had three close friends and had never thought to expand her circle outside of her group of journalists pals Gayle King and Maria Shriver and personal trainer Bob Greene.
“I don’t have a lot of friends,” the “Selma” star admitted. “Everybody knows Gayle. There’s Gayle, there’s Maria, there’s Bob. And that’s about it, you know? Gayle and Maria, I met around the same time; Gayle and I 42 years, Maria and I 42 years.”
Winfrey added, “I never really expanded that circle until recently. You know, I had become friends with a couple of people in my later adult life in the past five years.”
The revelation came during an appearance on the “Making Space with Hoda Kotb” podcast, where Winfrey and Shriver opened up about their longtime friendship, which Winfrey described as a “spiritual connection” between them that existed since the moment they met.
The producer detailed initially meeting Shriver in the bathroom while working at WJZ-TV. “I was coming in to do the morning cut-ins and she was doing evening magazine and had been up all night. [She] was in the bathroom, literally, splashing water on her face, and we started a conversation,” Winfrey explained to Kotb.
She added, “I forever think that that was, like, a divine moment that happened because she was one of my true, grounded friendships that carried me through my entire career.”
Recently, members of the famed musical girl group Destiny’s Child — Beyoncé Knowles-Carter, Kelly Rowland and Michelle Williams — reached out to Winfrey and Gayle for some advice on how they’ve maintained their friendship over the decades.
The ladies were met with a couple of helpful tips, including one from the CBS host, who told the women, “You have to make time for your friends. For us, it happens very organically. How do you do it? You just do it.” She later advised them to “stay connected” and “tell each other the truth and certainly be there for each other.”
