I have the DVD of "Life of Reilly" which I watch frequently. I love and miss CNR so. Feeling that way about him, I am very curious about the identity of that woman. Mr. Reilly said that the woman in question was extremely rude to the hair and makeup people at the studio; "really snotty" he said. I remember Virginia Graham's show "Girl Talk" in the '60's. Was she mean? Mr. Reilly assigned her role to Dr. Laura.

Looks like
the likely culprit is Virginia Graham
http://www.imdb.com/name/nm0334344
on 15 May 1972. Her bio matches the description Charles Nelson Reilly gave in his one man show.
Oprah Winfrey is not a candidate on several counts, not the least of which is that it would seem entirely out of character for her. In years such as 1974 when Reilly was in his heyday and was a frequent guest on "The Tonight Show" Winfrey would have been no more than 20 years old. Her TV debut on the Chicago breakfast show, "A.M. Chicago," didn't occur until 1984.
Charles Nelson Reilly appeared just twice on "The Tonight Show Starring Johnny Carson" during the 1980s: once in 1981 and then his last appearance on 23 May 1984. (He never appeared after Carson left "The Tonight Show.") Winfrey's first and, according to imdb, only appearance on "The Tonight Show Starring Johnny Carson" was 13 September 1985, a year and a half after Reilly's last appearance. If Winfrey and Reilly ever encountered one another, it was not on "The Tonight Show."

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Couldn't be Oprah as she was on the ABC affiliate

Okay, it's been a few years so I'm sure I'll never get a response but I just have to ask,
why in the world would Oprah think that Charles wasn't qualified to talk about Shakespere?
Charles was on Broadway, Oprah hosts a tv show, if anything he should be saying that to her.
I'm surprised she would be so rude to him.
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OK makes sense snippy thing for her to say! It's just I am not into daytime tv so the reference didn't mean anything to me. Thanks! Nice to know. Glad he put her in her place!

I don't know that it was Oprah for sure. Charles said himself that the woman had a show on the NBC affiliate in Chicago. Who else could it be but Oprah?

Do you know that for sure? Did you see it? I'm not challenging you, just curious. Barbara Walters DID have a habit of promising not to bring up certain things during interviews, and then doing it anyway I saw an interview with another quite famous actress that said the would never do another interview with Barbara because of a stunt she pulled like that.
Thanks for the info!

Barbara Walters wouldn't be so crass and pretentious to say to anybody "What would someone like you know about Shakespeare?" It was Oprah, of course !!

Okay I am dense. Barbara Walters?

Charles speaks of this incident in his live performance which was recorded and is now playing on the big screen. He said it was the host of a NBC show in Chicago. And a woman. Guess who???

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There's a clip of him doing a re-creation of it on YouTube from his one man show. The poster said the original Carson tape had been destroyed (taped over) long before anyone thought keeping stuff would be better and before DVD, but it's FANTASTIC.

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I take that as a no. Oh well.