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Oprah Winfrey continues to face backlash over her claim that Whitney Houston’s had relapsed by the time of her final appearance on her legendary talk show.
The 2009 appearance was supposed to herald the singer’s comeback after a stint in rehab.
But Winfrey claimed this week that Houston was high and fell off the stage during the taping.
Winfrey was met with a swift rebuke from, among others, Houston’s estate, which said she fell not because she was on drugs but because the stage was too dark.
Now the “I Will Always Love You” singer’s hairstylist, Tiffanie Dixon, says it’s baloney.
“It’s not true. She fell because they did not rope off the stage… I was standing right there,” Dixon said online.
Houston appeared in a two-part interview for Winfrey’s big season premiere that year.
The former talk show told her version of event at Cannes Lions this week.
Oprah had added she “begged” her studio audience not to blab about the fall because, “I knew that if the story got out… she would be destroyed by that.”
Dixon said Winfrey had people sign NDAs and also threatened, “she’ll fire her staff if it gets out.”
But she maintains Houston “was not high.”
Houston appeared on Winfrey’s show to promote her final studio album “I Look to You.” She was also there to address her highly publicized battle with addiction and divorce from Bobby Brown.
Dixon spoke out because she said Winfrey’s words about Houston “disturbed me.” “It’s not true… There’s not truth and no validity… It’s a lie… She’s got a lot of nerve,” she said.
A source familiar with the situation also told Page Six Houston was “not on drugs” that day and described her as “upbeat and happy.” The estate also shut down Winfrey’s claims this week, explaining, “Whitney absolutely fell off the stage, but it was during a sound check, and it was due to the darkness of the area and her unfamiliarity with the stage. She was absolutely not high.”
Veteran journalist Roger Friedman of entertainment site Showbiz 411 also called out Winfrey’s story, recalling a 2021 zoom with Clive Davis, where Winfrey herself said “it was not drugs” that made Houston slip.
“Oprah knows her Cannes Lion statement is not true. I know where the video is, and will produce it if necessary. But every person who was on that Zoom heard it, too,” he wrote.
“She’s done herself no favors by exploiting Whitney Houston in Cannes just to get headlines. I’m very disappointed,” he added.
A rep for Winfrey did not respond to comment.
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