On the back porch of his East Hampton house, Sean Combs beams as he tells me his news: Just weeks after his first album in five years, Press Play, hits stores, he'll become the proud father of twin girls, with his longtime girlfriend, Kim Porter. Sean's Hamptons retreat is resplendent in white: bleached wood floors, cream-colored chaises, ivory orchids in full bloom. It's a place of peace and quiet for the 37-year-old record producer (of such huge talents as Aretha Franklin, Mariah Carey, and Mary J. Blige), fashion mogul (his Sean John label's flagship store is on Fifth Avenue), restaurateur (he owns Justin's, a soul food–Caribbean eatery in Manhattan and Atlanta), and rapper-writer (his debut album, No Way Out, won a Grammy in 1998). It's also the place where he hosts some of his famously spectacular bashes.

"If you could invite any person—dead or alive—to a dinner party, who would it be?" I ask.

He leans forward in his rocking chair before venturing an answer. "Billie Holiday, Coretta Scott King," he finally says. "Malcolm X. I would ask him what he experienced at Mecca that so completely changed his life."

A moment later, the catchy refrain of Yung Joc's "I Know You See It" is piped in, and we're both snapping our fingers. For the next hour, the man who's gone by Puffy, Puff Daddy, P. Diddy—and now Diddy—is simply Sean with me.
 
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This interview appeared in the November 2006 issue of O, The Oprah Magazine.