Lance Armstrong Movie In the Works + Oprah’s Interview Draws 4.3 Million

The numbers are out for Oprah Winfrey highly talked about Lance Armstrong confessional interview on OWN’s ‘Next Chapter’. An average of 3.17 million viewers watched the 90-minute premiere, according to preliminary Nielsen ratings released. Another 1.12 million watched a repeat later in the evening, bringing the total to 4.3 million. So how does that fair, for other big interviews for Lady O? Her biggest, a prime-time interview with Michael Jackson, back in 1993 (on ‘The Oprah Winfrey Show’) drew 62 million viewers. And clearly, that’s not a fair comparison. However, her interview with Lance is the highest-rated telecast in OWN’s two-year history. Coming in a close second, was the interview of Whitney Houston’s daughter, Bobbi Kristina, and her family last March, one month after Houston died. That episode attracted 3.5 million viewers. And in more Armstrong news, reportedly, he’s headed for the silver screen. Paramount Pictures is planning a biopic about the cyclist. No director, writer, star or start date have been set.

[NYTimes, AP]