Complete List of Harpo Productions Feature Films and Television Movies

Harpo Productions, Inc. was founded by Oprah Winfrey. It is a multimedia production company that includes Harpo Films, the company's film production company, Harpo Radio, Inc., the company's radio division, Harpo Print, LLC, which publishes Oprah Magazine, Harpo Studios (the company's TV production studio), and ONN (Oprah Winfrey Network). The corporation is based in Chicago. The name Harpo is Oprah's name spelled backwards.

Harpo Films is the biggest division of Harpo Productions and has produced many motion pictures for television and for the big screen. The television movies were presented as a long running series under the title "Oprah Presents" on ABC.

The company has signed a pact with HBO where future productions will be shown.

This 1998 feature film is based on the 1987 novel by Toni Morrison which is also called Beloved. Oprah Winfrey stars as Sethe, a former slave living in the outskirts of Cincinnati. A poltergeist has chased her two sons away, and she now lives with her remaining daughter, Denver, played by Kimberly Elise, and an old friend from the plantation, Paul D., played by Danny Glover.

A woman named Beloved moves in with them, and turns out to be another one of Sethe's daughter who has been reincarnated. This movie provides some valuable insight to a side of slavery I hadn't considered.

The Great Debaters is a 2007 film based on the true story of Melvin B. Tolson. It is played by Denzel Washington as a professor at the historically black Wiley College Texas who he inspired students to form the school's first debate team in 1935. The team deals with the Jim Crow laws of the southern United States, witnesses a lynching, and other acts of discrimination. Although the movie does not depict this, the team went on to challenge Harvard in the national championship.

Precious is a 2009 feature film that is based on the 1996 novel Push by Sapphire. In the movie, and obese and illiterate girl named Clareese "Precious" lives in Harlem with her abusive mother, played by Mo'Nique. Precious, played by Gabourey Sidibe, was raped by her father, and has a son Mongo, who lives with her grandmother. When it is discovered that she is pregnant again, she is taken out of school.

She goes to an alternative school and learns to read and write, and finally gets the help she needs to get out of her abusive situation.

This 2001 television movie about a mother-daughter relationship is set in Maine in 1971. Isabelle, played by Elizabeth Shue, is an overprotective mother and her daughter Amy is being seduced by her math teacher. Amy and her friend discover the body of a dead girl in the trunk of a car, and the rumors start flying around in the small town of Shirley Falls. The secrets of Isabelle's past are revealed to

Before Women Had Wings is a 1997 television movie set in the 1950's. It is about a young mother, played by Ellen Barkin, who is dealing with alcoholism and abuse and learns to form a deeper relationship with her daughters. She meets a wise and tender-hearted woman, played by Oprah Winfrey, who has her own secrets that shroud her in mystery.

David and Lisa is a 1998 update to the 1962 movie with the same name. It is about two teens who are living at a school for troubled youth. Sidney Poitier stars as the psychiatrist who helps them find the power to rebuild their lives.

This television movie, which premiered in December 9, 2007 on ABC, is based on Mitch Albom's bestselling novel, One More Day. In the film, Chuck Benetto, played by Michael Imperioli, is a former baseball player who is broken down and an alcoholic. He is granted one more day with his departed mother Posey, played by Ellen Burstyn.

This 2005 film was adapted from a 1937 novel by Zora Neale Hurston. In it, Halle Berry starred as Janie, a half black, half white woman in Their Eyes were Watching God. Janie was raised by an ex-slave who married her off as early as possible. Her husband made her work very hard. She ran away with Joe, who became a mayor, and together they had a wealthier community, but she was still his helpmate and felt lonely. After he died, she finds love and passionate romance with a young man named Tea Cake.

Tuesdays with Morrie is a 1999 television movie that is based on a true story. In it, former student Mitch (Hank Azaria) learns his beloved professor, Morrie Schwartz, played by Jack Lemmon, is dying of ALS (Lou Gehrig's disease). Mitch is an accomplished journalist who doesn't have much time or energy for anything else. From his weekly meetings with his former professor, he learns about life and love.

In the 1998 movie, The Wedding, Halle Berry stars as Shelby Coles, a woman who is deciding whether to marry a penniless white musician she is already engaged to marry, or a successful black man.

The Women of Brewster Place is a 1989 television miniseries that was an adaptation of a novel by Gloria Naylor. It features a star studded cast that chronicles the lives of seven women, (one of which is played by Oprah Winfrey), who live at Brewster Place as they go through their triumphs and heartaches.

This movie is not listed on the Harpo Films page on Oprah.com, but I am including it here because Oprah does star in it.

Harpo Films has produced three feature films and eight television movies thus far.

Feature Films

• Beloved

• The Great Debaters

• Precious: Based on the Novel Push by Sapphire

Television Movies

• Amy & Isabelle

• Before Women Had Wings

• David and Lisa

• Mitch Albom's For One More Day

• Their Eyes Were Watching God

• Tuesdays with Morrie

• The Wedding

• The Women of Brewster Place

Additional movies are in production and are expected to be shown on HBO in the future.