When The See Us' "The Exonerated Five" fulfill their dream of Oprah interviewing them on stage

Variety

Oprah, an executive producer on When They See Us, interviewed the five men formerly known as "The Central Park Five" -- Antron McCray, Kevin Richardson, Yusef Salaam, Raymond Santana and Korey Wise -- Sunday night in Hollywood for Netflix's Emmy For Your Consideration event, which will be shown Wednesday on the streaming service and OWN. “It feels like this movie has brought, not just a sense of recognition to exonerate the Five, but it feels like something is happening in the whole country. That this art has now elevated the conversation to the point that we at least are willing to look at the injustices,” Oprah said toward the end of the emotional taping. “You won.” Before the event, When They See Us creator and director Ava DuVernay told Variety that it had always been a dream for the five men to be on stage with Oprah. “At one point, one of them had said to me a couple of years ago during the research period, that when they were young, they’d wished that they could just get to Oprah," DuVernay said. "(They thought) if they could get to Oprah and tell their story, maybe then people can hear their side because they knew how powerful she was, how much people listen to her. And it didn’t happen at the time they were incarcerated, they were guilty, people threw them away, and now it is their time. And so the fact that they get to sit down with her and finally tell her — her specifically– their story is so emotional to me, so moving.” Salaam said of spending the weekend with Oprah in events Saturday and Sunday: “Korey said once that they put a bounty on our heads by taking out these full-page ads calling for our deaths. And in many ways, this is life after death. And for Oprah to be here, to be whispering our names — I mean, of course she’s shouting it — but to be whispering our names, it is just magnificent.”

ALSO:

• Oprah Winfrey asked if seeing When They See Us had been cathartic: “No, ma’am,” Antron McCray responded. “Not for me, ma’am.  I appreciate it, though.”
• When They See Us producer: Linda Fairstein refused to consult if we spoke to the five men
• Oprah asked Ava DuVernay to respond to Fairstein calling When They See Us a "basket of lies"