JAY-Z granted a rare interview to Gayle King and CBS News last month at his Book of HOV exhibit, but one media deity didn’t think she’d land the chat.
King revealed to Access Hollywood last week in Las Vegas that Oprah Winfrey doubted the rare interview would actually happen; but her persistence prevailed.
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“Even Oprah said, ‘You’re making a damn fool of yourself! Stop asking him. He doesn’t want to do it.’,” King explained. “But I couldn’t let it go because he never said, ‘No, no, no.’ He just kept delaying, delaying, delaying.”
She continued: “Oprah said, ‘He’s being polite because he doesn’t want to tell you, ‘No.’ I kept coming back. I don’t know why he said yes or why he changed his mind but I’m forever grateful.”
Gayle King went on to say that she is forever grateful the Brooklyn rap legend agreed to sit down with her at the Brooklyn Public Library’s “The Book Of Hov” exhibit celebrating his decorated career.
“I’m still floating from that interview honestly. I was really buzzing after because you don’t know and you know he doesn’t like to do interviews,” she continued.
“I had an older woman who was not the JAY-Z demographic and she came up to me saying, ‘You know, I never listened to that kind of music. But after listening to his interview, I’m going to go to the library and I want to listen to his music.’ And I said, ‘You should get ’99 Problems’ mam, you’d enjoy that!'”
While King was grateful for the interview, not everyone else was. After watching the sit down, N.O.R.E. expressed his disappointment, saying that he’d rather see Jay grant that access to more cultural staples like his Drink Champs platform or Joe Budden’s podcast.
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“I love JAY-Z,” he began. “He sat down with Gayle King, it’s a great relationship … would I rather him sit with the People’s Party? Would I rather him sit with Joe Budden’s podcast or Drink Champs or Million Dollaz Worth of Game? Of course.”
He explained: “Because we’re finally in the space of us owning our own everything, and podcasts is help for that.”
