Whitney Houston’s estate is refuting the late Oprah Winfrey’s recollection that she got high and fell off the stage during an appearance on her talk show.
A statement on Houston’s official Instagram page read: “Whitney’s first complete fall from the stage since her interview on The Oprah Winfrey Show in 2009 was during sound check, the darkness of the area and her unfamiliarity with the stage.” “She was never high.”
In a conversation at the Cannes Lions conference in France, Winfrey claimed that Houston had relapsed by the time she arrived for what would be her final appearance on the show. “She fell off the stage,” Winfrey said.
Winfrey asked audience members with cameras not to release any photos of the incident. “I knew that if that story got out…it would destroy her,” Winfrey said. “So even though there was an audience and they had cameras, I begged them not to release that photo because it would ruin her life, and they wouldn’t release it.”
Houston’s estate acknowledged that the Grammy winner “faced personal struggles, but it would be inaccurate and unfair to link those struggles to any performance or chapter of her life.”
“What the studio audience witnessed on stage was the result of discipline, talent, and dedication, not the imagination of someone else’s plans,” the statement continued. “Whitney’s humanity included triumphs and struggles, but on that day she emerged as the professional and talented artist she always strived to be. We owe her the dignity of speaking the truth and not repeating myths.”
Winfrey did not comment on the estate’s statement.
Her conversation took place after she won the Cannes Lions Lionheart Award at the Lumière Theater.
