Walters recovered from surgery

NEW YORK - Barbara Walters says she is "fully recovered" just two months after open heart surgery.

Walters made her first TV appearance Monday since the procedure in May to replace a faulty valve. She checked in with her fellow panelists on ABC's "The View."

Walters said from her Manhattan apartment that she was never in serious discomfort from the surgery. In the studio, her co-hosts marveled at her robust appearance.

Joy Behar said, "You look fine."

The 80-year-old Walters will take the rest of the summer off. She says she will rejoin her comrades when "The View" begins its new season in September.

"The View" also stars Whoopi Goldberg, Elisabeth Hasselbeck and Sherri Shepherd. It airs weekdays at 10 a.m. Pacific.

Santana proposes onstage at concert

NEW YORK - Carlos Santana is smooth: The guitar god has gotten engaged after proposing onstage to his girlfriend, drummer Cindy Blackman.

The proposal came during a tour stop Friday in Tinley Park, Ill., outside Chicago. His representatives say he popped the question four songs into the concert after a Blackman drum solo.

She said yes, and they sealed it with a kiss, which was met with cheers from the crowd.

The multiplatinum-selling Grammy winner ended a 34-year marriage to Deborah Santana in 2007.

Blackman is a top drummer who has worked with the likes of Lenny Kravitz and Cassandra Wilson.

Santana says that he and Blackman are blessed to have found each other and says being in love "is a gift from the universe."

Winfrey TV biopic planned

NEW YORK - Oprah Winfrey's quarter-century run on daytime TV may be accompanied by a TV film dramatizing her life.

Veteran producer Larry A. Thompson said Monday the planned two- or four-hour Winfrey film will be based on Kitty Kelley's tell-all biography. Thompson says he has optioned it for six figures.

The TV project is expected to air in September 2011, which would coincide with the end of Winfrey's weekday talk show.

Thompson has produced TV biopics about Lucille Ball and Desi Arnaz, and Sonny and Cher.

He calls himself "a huge fan" of Winfrey and says he's shopping the project to networks he declined to specify. An unknown will likely be cast to play Winfrey.

A spokesman for Winfrey's Chicago-based Harpo Productions declined to comment.

The project was first reported by the E! News Web site.