Oprah's Lifeclass

Oprah's Lifeclass
Format	Self Help
Presented by	Oprah Winfrey
Country of origin	United States
No. of seasons	1
No. of episodes	25 (List of episodes)
Production
Executive producer(s)	Oprah Winfrey, Sheri Salata
Producer(s)	Jill Van Lokeren
Location(s)	Harpo Studios Chicago, Illinois
Running time	60 minutes
Broadcast
Original channel	OWN: Oprah Winfrey Network
Original run	October 10, 2011 (2011-10-10) – present
Chronology
Related shows	The Oprah Winfrey Show (Broadcast syndication; 1986–2011)
External links
Website

Oprah's Lifeclass is a American primetime television show hosted and produced by Oprah Winfrey, airing on OWN: Oprah Winfrey Network. The first episode premiered on October 10, 2011 at 8/7c. The show has been picked up for a second season, which will air weekly on OWN in Spring 2012.

Show Concept and Format

Oprah's Lifeclass is a self-help program that showcases "all of Oprah's lessons, revelations and aha moments over the past 25 years broken down to help make your life better, happier, bigger, richer - more fulfilling." ^[1]

The show features interviews with guests and audience members from episodes of The Oprah Winfrey Show that relate to each Lifeclass topic. Winfrey also shares new ideas, thoughts, and reflections about each class; these interviews are interspersed with clips from relevant Oprah Show episodes.

Webcasts

During the first week of Oprah's Lifeclass, Winfrey hosted nightly webcasts at 9/8c to complement each on-air lesson. She was joined by a spiritual teacher or self-help expert every night, with whom she would discuss each Lifeclass lesson. After the first week of shows, she decided to host a webcast every Friday night at 9/8c after Oprah's Lifeclass to rehash the week's lessons with relationship expert, Iyanla Vanzant.

Season One Webcasts

№	Original Airdate	Expert	Webclass Subject
1	October 10, 2011	Eckhart Tolle	The False Power of the Ego
2	October 11, 2011	Iyanla Vanzant	Letting Go of Anger
3	October 12, 2011	Cheryl Richardson	You Become What You Believe
4	October 13, 2011	Martha Beck	The Truth Will Set You Free
5	October 14, 2011	Iyanla Vanzant	Week One in Review
6	October 21, 2011	Iyanla Vanzant	Week Two in Review
7	October 28, 2011	Iyanla Vanzant	Week Three in Review
8	November 4, 2011	Iyanla Vanzant	Week Four in Review
9	November 11, 2011	Iyanla Vanzant	Week Five in Review

Reception

Critical Reception

Oprah's Lifeclass debuted to mixed but generally negative reviews. Alessandra Stanley of The New York Times stated that "Oprah’s Lifeclass is The Oprah Winfrey Show with the life sucked out of it." Stanley further declares that the new series lacks "Winfrey’s spirited interactions with guests and audiences" and fails to capture the tone of The Oprah Winfrey Show when the host "was irreverent, bold and even at times shocking."^[2]

Ratings

The debut of Oprah's Lifeclass was seen by 330,000 viewers on OWN: Oprah Winfrey Network. The series was also aired across Planet Green, TLC, Discovery Fit & Health and Investigation Discovery reaching a combined total audience of 1.2 million.^[3]

Overall, an average 302,000 nightly viewers watched Oprah's Lifeclass on OWN during the month of October. Online, Oprah’s Lifeclass live webcasts, hosted by Oprah as she interacts with viewers, have seen over 3.5 million video views to date on Oprah.com and via OWN’s and Oprah’s Facebook pages.^[4]

References

1. ^ 'Oprah's Lifeclass' Facebook November 8, 2011
2. ^ 'Among the Lectures, a Bit of Schtick' The New York Times October 14, 2011
3. ^ 'Rosie's viewers top Oprah on OWN TV launch' Chicago Tribune October 12, 2011
4. ^ 'OWN Fall Season Up Double Digits in Primetime for Month of October vs. Last Year' Zap2it November 1, 2011