WHOOPI: Oh, no.

LIZ: But, you know, I was so impressed with what you wrote.

WHOOPI: Well, you know, it’s funny, it was hitting me all at the same time, because it was a realization that my mom, who had walked with her head up, walked with her head up, walked with her head up, always had a little suitcase, just in case. And it had never dawned on me. It had never dawned on me that, you know, there are things that go into being a citizen. Part of that is the idea that you could be president of the United States. All of these things which make you —

LIZ: That you’re really equal.

WHOOPI: Yes. And finally is. I put the suitcase down.

LIZ: Well, I’ve been mulling over this ever since election, because I looked back in my memoir and I saw that all of my first memoirs were of my childhood astonishment that there was a difference between white and black people. And I was being raised by black people, of course. And they were the ones who really loved me and cared for me and all of that. So I’ve been trying to think how to write that ever since. But maybe we don’t need to keep going on about it.

WHOOPI: I think, though, that it’s almost like the stories of the Holocaust, all these stories have to be told. We need to say them. We need to say, "Listen," because people were jubilant about what happened. Black and white people are jubilant. And so people should share their stories to say, "You know what? The first people I knew as people, as how to behave as a human being, were not my parents."

LIZ: Exactly.

WHOOPI: So it’s OK. Because I think it will help all of us in this generation. You know the generation after me doesn’t have those issues. They don’t have any of those issues.

LIZ: They have other issues, the poor things.

WHOOPI: Well, yeah, but you know they don’t have little kids. If you put ‘em in a backyard, they’re going to play. They are not looking at you going, "Eww, you’re Jewish," or "You’re …" They’re like, "Who’s got the checkers?" That’s all they want to know. I’m running after you and I’m going to jump you because I can chase you.

LIZ: Well, Whoopi, I see that Variety says that you and your partner, Mr. Tom Leonardis, are making a deal with Discovery. Is that the Discovery and Science Channel?

WHOOPI: Yes, that is.

LIZ: I guess you wouldn’t like to tell us about anything you’re about to sell them.

WHOOPI: No. We can’t tell you what we’re about to sell them yet, because we don’t actually know. But we have put together, within our corps, three or four things that we think they’ll have a good time with.

LIZ: This is a production deal?

WHOOPI: Yeah.

LIZ:  For you all to produce into shows for them? Would you ever appear in any of those things?

WHOOPI: Oh, yes.

LIZ: As a host?

WHOOPI: Yes. See, I walk all corners now.

LIZ: You’re the universal person.

WHOOPI: I’m the universal person.

LIZ: I think this is your moment. It has been your moment for 20 years now.

WHOOPI: Isn’t that funny?

LIZ: Since I first saw you onstage in Mike Nichols’s production of yourself.

WHOOPI: I have one of the luckiest lives ever. And certainly one of the luckiest careers.

LIZ: I always feel that I have, too. And, you know, the other day Cynthia McFadden was quoting Thomas Jefferson when she said, "The harder I work, the luckier I get. And I thought that was such a great quote.

WHOOPI: It’s the truth. It’s the truth.

LIZ: Well, thank you darling.

WHOOPI: Thank you, as always.

LIZ: I love you. 

WHOOPI: Good to see you.

LIZ: Everybody loves you.

WHOOPI: But you always loved me.

LIZ: And that’s a good thing. Yes, I did. Always.

WHOOPI: You never changed. You never changed toward me, never.