Ellen returns for final season
‘The Ellen DeGeneres Show’ returns for its final season amidst recent backlash
The show has been a happy place and it continues to be a happy place. And I hate that it would be remembered in any other way.”
ELLEN DEGENERES Talk show host
Ellen DeGeneres has a lot of ground to cover in the 19th and final season of her talk show, which she promises will be a “huge celebration.” She intends to salute longtime viewers, stroll down memory lane to revisit early appearances by fledgling stars such as Rihanna and Justin Bieber and celebrate the show’s achievements.
“This is going to be a ‘thank you’ to everybody, because the show doesn’t happen without the support of fans,” DeGeneres said during a production break on The Ellen DeGeneres Show, which returns Monday in the US.
Also to be spotlighted: The show’s philanthropy, which included far more than product giveaways.
“We’re going to check in with people that we’ve helped through the years [and] people that have paid it forward,” DeGeneres said. That includes a Las Vegas educator who opened her own wallet for students in need and whose school was rewarded by the show with a new library and other resources.
“I want people just to really remember what the show has been,” the host said. “It’s been a happy place and it continues to be a happy place. And I hate that it would be remembered in any other way.”
That DeGeneres voices such a concern over the legacy of her greatest career success to date should be surprising for the host-comedian whose motto is “be kind.” But it’s inevitable given allegations last year that the show was a toxic workplace. Three of its producers exited amid claims of an environment that harbored misbehavior, including sexual misconduct and racially insensitive remarks. DeGeneres, who made an on-air apology for “things that shouldn’t have happened,” also defended herself as being the same genuine person — if an imperfect one — on- and off-camera.
In a recent phone interview, she said she was reluctant to address the situation further, and that it had been dealt with by the Warner Bros. studio.
DeGeneres faced blowback before. In 1997, six years before the talk show’s 2003 launch, she and the character she played on her sitcom, Ellen, had come out as gay. Amid falling ratings and criticism, it was canceled by ABC in 1998.
The project that revived her career was considered an uncertain bet, said syndication-market analyst Bill Carroll.
“There are two things she had to deal with,” he said. One was Oprah Winfrey’s status as the queen of daytime talk, the other was a painful truth: Compared to today, more Americans in that period were unaccepting of or hostile toward LGBTQ individuals, on the air or off.
“But she won over the audience and she won over the industry,” Carroll said. He credits her relatable comedy and a well-produced format that included putting DeGeneres among her studio guests — often dancing alongside them — for helping viewers to embrace her as “just this fun person.”
Honors have come her way, including multiple Emmys and the Kennedy Center’s Mark Twain Prize for American Humor in 2015.