Oprah Winfrey to return to acting with 'The Butler'

Talk show queen Oprah Winfrey is mulling a return to acting with the film 'The Butler' about Eugene Allen, a black man who worked as butler in the White House, serving eight presidents from 1952 to 1986.


Oprah Winfrey

The Lee Daniels directed film would be her first live-action movie since 1998's "Beloved", the Hollywood Reporter said. Actors Hugh Jackman, Mila Kunis and John Cusack are names that have surfaced to play real-life figures. Daniels also wants David Oyelowo to portray the butler.

Winfrey would play Allen's wife. Kunis would play Jackie Kennedy and Cusack would play Richard Nixon. It's unclear who Jackman, who was to have appeared in Daniels' stalled Selma project, would portray.

Winfrey also has attached herself to an untitled Universal dramedy set at a home shopping network to be directed by Michael Patrick King and co-starring Meryl Streep and Sandra Bullock, but development on that project has stalled.

The 58-year-old, who scored an Oscar nomination for 1985's "The Color Purple", has voice-acted in films such as "The Princess and the Frog" and "Charlotte's Web". She also has appeared as herself on television, most notably on NBC's "30 Rock", and is the co-owner with Discovery Communications of the Oprah Winfrey Network.