As you can read on the cover above, Ellen DeGeneres is Out Magazine’s Entertainer of the Year in their Out100 issue. Most people know Ellen’s story by now and that’s because Ellen took a very brave step of coming out while she was at a peak in her career. For those less familiar, Ellen was a popular stand-up who had successfully crossed over to television. She came out both personally and on her sitcom in 1997. That act has since opened the door for many aspiring LGBT entertainers. But she paid a price for it and in her Out100 interview, she described just how much. The once in-demand comedienne found herself without a job or money after her show was abruptly cancelled. In addition, Ellen, who is against mean comedy, found herself the butt of most others’ jokes.
Ellen DeGeneres revealed in a new interview that she hit “rock bottom” after coming out in 1997.
“I was the punch line of lots of jokes. I laughed at some, but I realized there’s somebody on the other side of them. It’s cruel,” DeGeneres told Out.
“I’ve never liked mean comedy, but that became even more important to me after I was the brunt of it.”
“I wasn’t sure if I was going to work again, and although I was out, I was still trying to alter myself — not dressing the way I wanted to dress or wearing my hair the way I wanted to,” the comedian shared.
But slowly, things began to change. She landed a gig as a talk show host on the now-incredibly successful “The Ellen DeGeneres Show.” She also met her now-wife, Portia de Rossi, in 2004. The pair married in 2008.
“Time is a strange thing. I was at rock bottom and out of money, with no work in sight, but one step at a time, it gets better,” she shared. “It gets much better than better.”
I realize this is not the first time Ellen has chronicled her journey after she came out but I think it’s important to remind people how much of a hit she took. Some like to knock successful trailblazers because they receive so much fame for it. However, their journeys come at great personal cost, just as Ellen recounts. I remember how surprised (and happy) I was when she hosted the 2001 Emmys because I’d assumed her star had burned out. Then of course came Finding Nemo followed by her talk show. And for the most part, she kept her head held high. Plus, she’s paying it forward, giving other LBGT personalities, like Tyler Oakley, a chance on her Ellentube online video channel.
In the article, Ellen also addresses why she has become much more political than ever before. Ellen has supported Hillary Clinton since her 2008 bid but doesn’t usually get very political on her show. That changed during her October 14th interview with Hillary when Ellen said that the debates came off as Hillary, “debating with a teenager.” Ellen said the reason for her sudden political outspokenness is due to Trump. As Ellen said, “it’s easy to see what kind of human being he is.”
Photo credit: Gavin Bond/Out Magazine and WENN Photos
Funny that she talks about meanness because I’m always reading blinds about her being less-than-nice behind the scenes of her show.
She’s against mean comedy, specifically. Doesn’t mean that she herself has a Pollyanna personality.
I’m not a huge fan of Ellen as a host ( her humour is a bit too bland for me and she sometimes comes off as mean-ish to her non-celebrity audience), but what she did then is incredibly brave and important and I’m so happy everything worked out so well for her.
I agree. Nothing REALLY against her, but I was in the audience for one of her tapings and was extremely underwhelmed. She barely engaged with the audience at all. I was actually in the row that she dances down while shaking hands. No smiles, eye contact, anything. However, I am aware that people have bad days and that may not be the norm. Heck, no one is perfect, especially ALL the time. Also, I too, do admire her bravery, which is more important. The impact she has made for the LGBT community is great? large? fantastic? (using the word “huge”, that is so associated with you know who, just seems wrong somehow)
@Locke Lamora,
yeah, I don’t watch her show regularly, so I’ve mostly seen snippets with celebrities I like, and they were fine. But I started searching for a good segment to show a boy I’m tutoring and watched a lot of her pranks on non-celebrities, and a lot of them came across just mean and quite unfunny, so I was a little floored by that part of her statement. But you’re right, that’s not to take away what she has accomplished elsewhere.
She is not my cup of tea. Her comedy seems forced and hardly spontaneous. If anyone makes me laugh are her guests. You don’t have to be mean to do comedy well. She has a habit of saying “that is funny” a lot, which funny people never use. You either are or not. Graham Norton, James Cordon, Craig Ferguson are all funny and hardly ever mean. Also any time she has a guest on that is funny and entertaining, she feels intimidated and threatened. Her brand is bland.
They are all British. The British do comedy differently, I think. Dare I say better?
She is not my cup of tea. Her comedy seems forced and hardly spontaneous. If anyone makes me laugh are her guests. You don’t have to be mean to do comedy well. She has a habit of saying “that is funny” a lot, which funny people never use. You either are or not. Graham Norton, James Cordon, Craig Ferguson are all funny and hardly ever mean. Also any time she has a guest on that is funny and entertaining, she feels intimidated and threatened. Her brand is bland.
l-o-v-e
she just LOOKS like a nice person and a nice person to be around…like that awesome aunt you always look forward to seeing or something lol.
She just seems like she could be really mean if you crossed her.
I think she is hilarious. Her humor is different though, a lot of it seems to do with the absurdity of social interactions, especially embarrassing ones (like when she makes a celebrity go into a store and do inappropriate things as instructed by her in an earpiece). I also thinks she has guts for coming out before it was okay to do so. The only thing that gets to me, is I wonder if she has a bit of a mean streak. Isn’t the rumor that she is not nice to her staff and can be vicious? I hope its not true, but…
I can’t even watch when she does that earpiece thing! It makes me so uncomfortable.
Can we take a moment and remember how terrible Ellen’s sitcom was? Some of it was because they were trying to shoehorn her into a role that did NOT fit her, but it was also because it was just plain bad. Ellen is a lot of things, but she is not an actress and chameleon, and she does best in a talk show format where she can just play herself. It’s interesting to wonder how much of her ‘nice’ personality is to counterbalance how hard it was to come out when she did – as though she had to be as inoffensive as possible so as not to give people more to criticize her about. I respect a lot about Ellen and how brave it was for her to come out, and what a huge gamble that was for her career. For a long time, she was one of the only gay people that folks ‘knew’.
She opened the door for so many people. She went through a lot, took a lot of hits…..and then the love of her life Anne Heche decided she wasn’t a lesbian after all, ugh. Ellen was devastated, so glad she found Portia. She is corny funny and at her age now, that’s cool. I’m a fan, she’s a ground breaker who looks great in a suit!!
Ellen is supposedly an incredibly controlling, not nice unless you are politically or career wise important person. Bottom line there are numerous stories about how conniving she was before she made it. Let’s also talk about Portia (who I thought had changed her name but is now Portia again) who has only dated uber wealthy lesbians. How was she “broke” after her tv sitcom?? It had been in syndicAtion for years etc. One persons broke is Another person’s wealth. Celebs love to exaggerate and tout the rags to riches story.
You mean her TV sitcom that was on for like 2, maybe 3 seasons? That thing was definitely not in syndication. It was terrible.
I like Ellen. I think she is really funny. 🙂