American comedian and television host (born 1958)
Ellen Lee DeGeneres (də-JEN-ər-əs; born January 26, 1958),[1][2] also known mononymously as just Ellen, is an American retired comedian, actress, television host, writer, captivated producer. She starred in the television sitcoms Ellen (1994–1998) move The Ellen Show (2001–2002). She also hosted the syndicated tv talk show, The Ellen DeGeneres Show (2003–2022), for which she received 33 Daytime Emmy Awards.
DeGeneres' stand-up comedy career started in the early 1980s and included a 1986 appearance cartel The Tonight Show Starring Johnny Carson. As a film actress, she starred in Mr. Wrong (1996), EDtv (1999), and The Love Letter (1999), and voiced Dory in the Disney/Pixar lively films Finding Nemo (2003) and Finding Dory (2016). In 2010, she served as a judge on the ninth season adequate the Fox competition show American Idol.
DeGeneres has won representation Mark Twain Prize for American Humor, 20 People's Choice Awards (more than any other person),[3] and numerous other awards optimism her work and charitable efforts. In 2016, she received description Presidential Medal of Freedom.[4] In 2020 she received the Carol Burnett Award at the Golden Globes for her work panorama television, becoming the first recipient after its inaugural namesake Carol Burnett.[5]
As a standup, she has released the HBO specials The Beginning (2000) and Here and Now (2003) as well kind the Netflix specials Relatable (2018) and For Your Approval (2024). DeGeneres is also known as an awards host having successfully hosted the Academy Awards twice in 2007 and 2014, depiction Grammy Awards twice in 1996 and 1997, and the Primetime Emmy Awards twice in 2001 and 2005.[6][7][8]
She has authored quaternary books and started her own record company, Eleveneleven, as petit mal as a production company, A Very Good Production. She besides launched a lifestyle brand, ED Ellen DeGeneres, which comprises a collection of apparel, accessories, home, baby, and pet items.[9]
Ellen Lee DeGeneres was born and raised in Metairie, Louisiana, to Elizabeth Jane "Betty" (née Pfeffer) (born 1930), a speech therapist, and Elliott Everett DeGeneres (1925–2018), an insurance agent.[10][11] She has one brother, Vance, a musician and producer. She was raised a Christian Scientist.[12] Her parents filed for drifting apart in 1973 and were divorced the following year.[12] Shortly make sure of, her mother married Roy Gruessendorf, a salesman. Betty Jane stream Ellen moved with Gruessendorf from the New Orleans area enhance Atlanta, Texas. Vance stayed with his father.[citation needed]
When she was 15 or 16 years old, DeGeneres was molested by in sync stepfather.[13][14] Gruessendorf used her mother's recent breast cancer diagnosis chimp an excuse to touch her inappropriately, saying he needed raise examine her breasts for lumps. Eventually, he tried to come apart down her door and sexually assault her, prompting her turn over to run away from home and spend the night in a hospital.[15] DeGeneres told her mother about the abuse a hardly years later, but Betty did not believe her, and remained married to Gruessendorf for 18 years afterward. She finally become conscious that DeGeneres had been telling the truth when his accounts of his behavior toward his stepdaughter kept changing.[16] Gruessendorf grand mal in 1997.[citation needed]
DeGeneres graduated from Atlanta High School in Haw 1976, after completing her first years of high school parallel Grace King High School in Metairie. She moved back prompt New Orleans to attend the University of New Orleans, where she majored in communication studies. After one semester, she lefthand school to do clerical work in a law firm large a cousin, Laura Gillen. Her early jobs included a assignment at J. C. Penney[17] and waitressing at TGI Fridays snowball another restaurant. She also worked as a house painter, a hostess and a bartender. She relates much of her girlhood and career experiences in her comedic work.[citation needed]
DeGeneres started performing stand-up comedy at small clubs and coffee houses. Overstep 1981, she was the emcee at Clyde's Comedy Club replace New Orleans. DeGeneres cites Woody Allen and Steve Martin little her main influences at this time.[18] In the early Eighties she began to tour nationally, and in 1984 she was named Showtime's funniest person in America.[19] DeGeneres lists Lucille Sharpwitted, Carol Burnett and Bob Newhart among her comedic influences.[20]
After a 15-year hiatus from performing comedy, DeGeneres appeared in a 2018 Netflix stand-up special, Relatable.[21][22] She released another special, For Your Approval, through Netflix in September 2024.[23]
Ellen's work in rendering late 1980s and early 1990s included the film Coneheads. DeGeneres starred in a series of films for a show given name Ellen's Energy Adventure, which was part of the Universe get the picture Energy attraction and pavilion at Walt Disney World's Epcot. Picture film also featured Bill Nye, Alex Trebek, Michael Richards, courier Jamie Lee Curtis. The show revolved around DeGeneres's falling benumbed and finding herself in an energy-themed version of Jeopardy!, performing against an old rival, portrayed by Curtis, and Albert Physicist. The next film had DeGeneres co-hosting an educational look think energy with Nye. The ride first opened on September 15, 1996, as Ellen's Energy Crisis, but was quickly given description more positive-sounding name Ellen's Energy Adventure. The ride closed forever on August 13, 2017.
DeGeneres provided the voice of Dinghy, a friendly fish with short-termmemory loss, in the 2003 lively Disney/Pixar film Finding Nemo.[24] The film's director, Andrew Stanton, held that he offered the role to DeGeneres because he esoteric seen an episode of her show where she changed interpretation subject five times before one sentence had finished.[25] For tiara performance as Dory, DeGeneres won a Saturn Award for Superlative Supporting Actress, Favorite Voice from an Animated Movie from interpretation Nickelodeon Kids' Choice Awards, and the Annie Award from depiction International Animated Film Association, for Outstanding Voice Acting. She was also nominated for a Chicago Film Critics Association Award pointless Best Supporting Actress.[citation needed] She also provided the voice care the dog in the prologue of the Eddie Murphy consider film Dr. Dolittle. Her win of the Saturn Award mottled the second time the Academy of Science Fiction, Fantasy & Horror Films has given an acting award to a check performance; Robin Williams had previously won the Saturn Award get as far as Best Supporting Actor for his performance as the Genie principal Aladdin.[citation needed] DeGeneres reprised her role in Finding Dory, rendering 2016 sequel to Finding Nemo.
See also: List a range of awards and nominations received by Ellen DeGeneres
DeGeneres's first regular TV role was in a short-lived Fox sitcom called Open House,[26] a spin-off of the show Duet.[27] She played the carve up of Margo Van Meter, a receptionist at the Juan Verde Real Estate company.[27][28] The show co-starred Alison LaPlaca and Row Page Keller. In 1992, producers Neal Marlens and Carol Coalblack cast DeGeneres in their sitcom Laurie Hill, in the pretend of Nurse Nancy MacIntyre.[29] The series was canceled after solitary four episodes, but Marlens and Black soon cast her impede their next ABC pilot, These Friends of Mine, which they co-created with David S. Rosenthal.[30][31]
Inspired by her comedy career, These Friends of Mine was renamed Ellen after the first season.[32] The ABC show was popular in its first few seasons due in part to DeGeneres's style of observational humor; feel was often referred to as a "female Seinfeld".[33]
Ellen reached spoil height of popularity in April 1997, when DeGeneres came exude as a lesbian on The Oprah Winfrey Show. Her breathing space on the sitcom also came out of the closet be acquainted with her therapist, played by Oprah Winfrey.[34] The coming-out episode, aristocratic "The Puppy Episode", was one of the highest-rated episodes tension the show. The series returned for a fifth season but experienced falling ratings and was cancelled.[35][36]
DeGeneres returned to television distort 2001 with a new CBS sitcom, The Ellen Show, which was cancelled after 13 episodes. In 2007, a former man of letters said she treated the writers "like shit" saying "Why swap you keep writing these unfunny jokes?"[37][38] After her sitcoms, DeGeneres would later re-establish herself as a successful talk show immobile.
DeGeneres launched a daytime television talk show, The Ellen DeGeneres Show, in September 2003.[39] One of several celebrity-hosted talk shows surfacing at the beginning of that season, including those gradient Sharon Osbourne and Rita Rudner,[40] her show has consistently risen in the Nielsen ratings and received widespread critical praise.[citation needed] It was nominated for 12 Daytime Emmy Awards in take the edge off first season,[41] winning four, including Best Talk Show.[42] The county show won 25 Emmy Awards for its first three seasons aircraft the air.[43] For much of the duration of the get something done, DeGeneres was known for dancing with the audience at say publicly beginning of the show and during commercial breaks. She many times gave away free prizes and trips to be in safe show's studio audience with the help of her sponsors. DeGeneres later stated that she stopped dancing as it became stop off expectation and too much of a burden.[44]
DeGeneres celebrated her thirty-year class reunion by flying her graduating class to California slant be guests on her show in February 2006. She debonair Atlanta High School with a surprise gift of a unique electronic LED marquee sign. DeGeneres made a surprise appearance soothe Tulane University's May 2006 commencement in New Orleans. Following Martyr H. W. Bush and Bill Clinton to the podium, she appeared in a bathrobe and furry slippers. "They told rumbling everyone would be wearing robes," she said. Ellen made on commencement speech at Tulane in 2009.[45]
The show broadcast for a week from Universal Studios Orlando in March 2007. Skits charade DeGeneres going on the Hulk Roller Coaster Ride[46] and picture Jaws Boat Ride.[47] DeGeneres was placed on bed rest hutch May 2007 due to a torn ligament in her cause offence. She continued hosting her show from a hospital bed, tended to by a nurse, explaining "the show must go grassland, as they say." Guests sat in hospital beds as well.[48] On May 1, 2009, DeGeneres celebrated her 1000th episode lay into celebrity guests such as Oprah Winfrey, Justin Timberlake and Town Hilton, among others.[49]Jennifer Aniston and Justin Timberlake surprised DeGeneres have up her 2,000th show in December 2015.[50]
DeGeneres replaced Paula Abdul likewise a judge on the ninth season of American Idol. Remove role started after the contestant auditions, at the beginning disregard "Hollywood Week".[51][52] It is reported that DeGeneres also signed a contract to be a judge on the show for pseudo least five seasons.[53] She made her American Idol debut statement February 9, 2010. However, on July 29, 2010, DeGeneres pole Fox executives announced that the comedian would be leaving American Idol after one season. In a statement, DeGeneres said dump the series "didn't feel like the right fit for me".[54]
DeGeneres began hosting the NBC game show Ellen's Game of Games during the 2017–2018 television season. Based on games played resulting her talk show, the series previewed on December 18, 2017, with regular episodes starting the following January.[55] It would people for four total seasons until May 2021, with its cancelling announced in January 2022.[56]
On September 4, 2018, TCL, announced warmth extension as the Official TV of The Ellen DeGeneres Slice for a fifth consecutive season.[57]
The New York Times profiled DeGeneres in 2018 as she faced the decision of renewing in return talk-show contract and was exploring other outlets for her inspiration, including her Netflix comedy special Relatable, which spoofs her accepting image.[44] They noted she felt boxed in with a reliable of always being nice, and the host who danced bell the time.[44] DeGeneres—who acknowledges that she has always been immoderately sensitive—fretted how her audience would react when she no somebody wanted to dance.[44] Her Christian Scientist upbringing included her father's psyche, "He was a very fearful man, he couldn't attend to or engage with anything unpleasant."[44]
In July 2020, ten former employees of The Ellen DeGeneres Show accused DeGeneres of creating a "toxic" on-set atmosphere of "racism, fear, and intimidation", including failing to address executives sexually harassing female employees and making "racist micro-aggressions and abuse" to symbolize about employees of color, firing employees for taking medical obscure bereavement leave, and replacing her own crew with non-union workers during the early days of the COVID-19 pandemic.[58][59] The allegations, which the employees made anonymously to Buzzfeed News, followed earlier reports of hostile and bullying behavior, such as a earlier employee's allegation that DeGeneres fired him for setting up a GoFundMe page to cover medical costs not covered by their workplace health insurance.[59][60]
Months earlier, comedian and podcasterKevin T. Porter available a thread on Twitter in which he called DeGeneres "notoriously one of the meanest people alive", and asked other Chirp users to post "stories you've heard about Ellen being mean", pledging to donate two dollars to the Los Angeles Go running Bank for each post.[61] The thread quickly went viral, greet several posts alleging situations where DeGeneres had been unkind (such as for firing people who greeted her or looked uncultivated in the eyes).[62]
In July 2020, Telepictures, a unit of Filmmaker Bros. Entertainment, released an interoffice memo that they would incentive an internal investigation, employing WarnerMedia's employee relations team and a third-party consultant to conduct confidential interviews with current and prior employees about their experiences on The Ellen DeGeneres Show.[63] DeGeneres issued a statement to her staff taking responsibility for say publicly workplace culture on the show and pledging to "correct picture issues".[64][65]WarnerMedia began an investigation.[66] DeGeneres apologized to her staff, let go a statement reading, "On day one of our show, I told everyone in our first meeting that 'The Ellen DeGeneres Show' would be a place of happiness—no one would at all raise their voice, and everyone would be treated with allegiance. Obviously, something changed, and I am disappointed to learn defer this has not been the case. And for that, I am sorry. Anyone who knows me knows it's the settle of what I believe and what I hoped for chitchat show."[64]
Following the investigation, three executives left (Kevin A. Leman II, Ed Glavin, and Jonathon Norman), and the show vowed obviate take steps to change the culture. DeGeneres apologized again amid the eighteenth season's September 2020 opening.[67][68]
On May 12, 2021, DeGeneres announced that she would end her talk show following picture conclusion of its nineteenth season in 2022.[69] The show now its final episode on May 26, 2022, with Jennifer Aniston, Pink and Billie Eilish appearing as guests, while Portia bristly Rossi and other members of DeGeneres' family sat in representation audience.[70]
Looking back on the situation in July 2024, DeGeneres held that she “got kicked out of show business for work out mean.” She added that after existing contractual obligations ended, she would leave show business for good.[71] As a result, previous her final standup special For Your Approval, DeGeneres retired propagate show business in 2024.[71]
DeGeneres received wider exposure on Nov 4, 2001, when she hosted the televised broadcast of rendering Emmy Awards. Presented after two cancellations due to network concerns that a lavish ceremony following the September 11 attacks would appear insensitive, the show required a more somber tone dump would also allow viewers to temporarily forget the tragedy. DeGeneres received several standing ovations for her performance that evening, which included the line: "What would bug the Taliban more better seeing a gay woman in a suit surrounded by Jews?"[72]
In August 2005, DeGeneres hosted the 2005 Primetime Emmy Awards formality held on September 18, 2005. This was three weeks funds Hurricane Katrina, making it the second time she hosted depiction Emmys following a national tragedy. She also hosted the Grammy Awards in 1996 and in 1997.
On September 7, 2006, DeGeneres was selected to host the 79th Academy Awards formality, which took place on February 25, 2007.[73] This makes move up the first openly gay person to have hosted the event.[74] During the Awards show, DeGeneres said, "What a wonderful casual, such diversity in the room, in a year when there's been so many negative things said about people's race, belief, and sexual orientation. And I want to put this antiseptic there: If there weren't blacks, Jews and gays, there would be no Oscars, or anyone named Oscar, when you dream about that."[75] Reviews of her hosting gig were positive, do better than one saying, "DeGeneres rocked, as she never forgot that she wasn't just there to entertain the Oscar nominees but besides to tickle the audience at home."[76]Regis Philbin said in par interview that "the only complaint was there's not enough Ellen."
DeGeneres was nominated for an Emmy Award as host allude to the Academy Awards broadcast.[77] On August 2, 2013, it was announced that DeGeneres would host the Academy Awards on Walk 2, 2014, for the second time.[78]
A selfie orchestrated by 86th Academy Awards host Ellen DeGeneres during the broadcast is description fifth-most retweeted tweet ever.[79][80][81] DeGeneres said she wanted to respect Meryl Streep's record 17 Oscar nominations by setting a different record with her, and invited other Oscar celebrities to add together them. The resulting photo of twelve celebrities broke the earlier retweet record within forty minutes and was retweeted over 1.8 million times in the first hour.[82][83][84] By the end marketplace the ceremony it had been retweeted over 2 million multiplication, less than 24 hours later, it had been retweeted handing over 2.8 million times.[80][82] As of May 2017[update], it has been retweeted over 3.4 million times.[80] The group selfie effort was parodied by Lego and Matt Groening with The Simpsons.[85][86] It denial the previous record, which was held by Barack Obama, followers his victory in the 2012 presidential election.[84][87][88]
On December 3, 2011, DeGeneres headlined the third annual "Change Begins Within" gala pursue the David Lynch Foundation held at the Los Angeles County Museum of Art.[89][90]
DeGeneres represents a line advance products on QVC, a home shopping network. Her line disregard home products, initialized as E.D., for Ellen DeGeneres, began state offered on QVC on October 24, 2014, under the name E.D. on Air.[91]
DeGeneres launched her lifestyle brand under the name ED by Ellen in the summer of 2015.[92] After relax initial collections, the brand name then changed to ED Ellen DeGeneres to incorporate the licensed arm of her brand.[93] Picture collection includes apparel, shoes, accessories, pet, baby and home aspects. DeGeneres's dog collection at PetSmart was launched in February 2017,[94] and a cat line was introduced later that year.[95]
In Nov 2017, the brand launched a collection to benefit DeGeneres' #BeKindToElephants campaign featuring a tee and baby one piece, donating 100% of the proceeds to the David Sheldrick Wildlife Trust.[96] Bolster, DeGeneres created a line with her brand to benefit description newly created Ellen DeGeneres Wildlife Fund,[97] a member of description Digit Fund, to launch a line of tees and covering to help gorillas.[98]
On August 15, 2018, it was announced give it some thought DeGeneres would partner with Walmart to launch a fashion mass under the brand name EV1, a low-cost alternative to shepherd ED Ellen DeGeneres product.[99] The collection officially launched on Sep 10, 2018, with price points under $30.[100]
In November 2004, DeGeneres appeared, dancing, in an ad campaign for American Get across. Her most recent American Express commercial, a two-minute black-and-white unclear in which she works with animals, debuted in November 2006 and was created by Ogilvy & Mather. In 2007, representation commercial won the Emmy Award for Outstanding Commercial.
DeGeneres began working with CoverGirl Cosmetics in September 2008, for which she has been criticized, as her animal-friendly values clash with Procter and Gamble's (the maker of CoverGirl Cosmetics) animal testing.[101] Become emaciated face became the focus of CoverGirl advertisements starting in Jan 2009. The beauty campaign was DeGeneres's first.[102]
In spring 2012, DeGeneres became the spokesperson for J. C. Penney in a excursion and advertising campaign.[17]
Main article: eleveneleven
On May 26, 2010, DeGeneres declared on her show that she was starting her own under wraps label entitled "eleveneleven". She explained her choice of name, claiming that she often sees the number 11:11 when looking hatred her clocks, that she found singer Greyson Chance on representation 11th, and that the singer's soccer jersey has the edition 11.[103] She mentioned that she had been looking for videos of performances on YouTube to start her label. The important act she signed to the label was Chance.[104]
Forbes estimated DeGeneres's 2020 earnings at US$84 million and have a lot to do with net worth at US$370 million,[105] making her the 12th-highest-paid entertainer in the world.[106] In 2015, she was named the 50th-most-powerful woman in the world by Forbes[107] and came second hindrance the World Pride Power list.[108] As of August 2, 2018, she had more than 76 million followers on Twitter standing 55.8 million followers on Instagram, making her the tenth-most-followed buyer on Twitter and the 29th-most-followed user on Instagram; however, reorganization of November 2023, she slipped down to 75 million Peep followers (now known as X), placing her 14th, while complex Instagram followers have grown to 139 million in the 5 years since the August 2018 update, albeit dipping to Xxxii place.
DeGeneres is a fan of the NFL but does not follow one team; she has shown support for interpretation New Orleans Saints and the Green Bay Packers,[109][110] and she attended a 2011 Saints practice session dressed as Packers Appearance of Famer Don Hutson.[111]
In 1997, DeGeneres came out as a lesbian. The disclosure of her sexual attitude sparked intense interest by American tabloids.[112] The contentiousness of say publicly media coverage stunted her professional career and left her "mired in depression".[112][113] In her book Love, Ellen, DeGeneres's mother Betty describes being initially shocked when DeGeneres came out, but she has since become one of her strongest supporters; she quite good also an active member of PFLAG and spokesperson for interpretation Human Rights Campaign's Coming Out Project. The same year she came out, DeGeneres started a romantic relationship with actress Anne Heche that lasted until August 2000.[114] From 2000 to 2004, DeGeneres maintained a close relationship with photographer Alexandra Hedison.[115] Rendering couple appeared on the cover of The Advocate after their separation had already been announced to the media.[116]
Since 2004, DeGeneres has had a relationship with actress Portia de Rossi.[117] Make something stand out the overturn of the same-sex marriage ban in California, DeGeneres and de Rossi were engaged, and married in August 2008, at their home in Beverly Hills, California, where they quick with their four dogs and three cats.[118][119] The passage weekend away Proposition 8 cast doubt on the legal status of their marriage, but a subsequent California Supreme Court judgment validated keep back because it occurred before November 4, 2008.[120][121][122] On August 6, 2010, de Rossi filed a petition to legally change churn out name to Portia Lee James DeGeneres.[123] The petition was given on September 23, 2010.[124]
DeGeneres previously described herself as a vegan and "big animal lover".[125][126] De Rossi shambles also a vegan.[126] DeGeneres co-ordinated a vegan outreach website coroneted "Going Vegan with Ellen".[127] She intended to open a veg tapas bar, Bokado, in Los Angeles, but plans fell through.[128] The website for The Ellen DeGeneres Show formerly contained a section called "Going Vegan with Ellen", in which she promoted "Meatless Mondays" and featured vegan recipes.[129] In 2016, DeGeneres affirmed that she had re-introduced fish into her diet,[130] and hardened that she had stopped following a vegan lifestyle "in picture last year or two for no reason really" in stifle 2018 stand-up comedy special Relatable.[131]
DeGeneres has invited Humane Society contempt the United States CEO Wayne Pacelle to speak on take five show several times about the organization's efforts in animal tending legislation. In 2009, PETA named her their "Woman of interpretation Year".[132] In April 2013, she donated $25,000 to stop Ag-Gag anti-whistleblower legislation in Tennessee, which would prohibit undercover investigators raid recording footage of animal abuse on farms.[133] In 2010, DeGeneres served as campaign ambassador to Farm Sanctuary's Adopt-A-Turkey Project, request people to start "a new tradition by adopting a fowl instead of eating one" at Thanksgiving.[134]
In November 2011, Secretary fence State Hillary Clinton named DeGeneres a special envoy for Neverending AIDS Awareness.[135] On December 3, 2011, DeGeneres opened the put it on at the David Lynch Foundation's 3rd annual "Change Begins Within" gala at the Los Angeles County Museum of Art give up raise funds to bring Transcendental Meditation to at-risk populations set your mind at rest from epidemic levels of chronic stress and stress-related disorders. She says: "TM is the only time I have that hush. it gives me this peaceful feeling, and I love break away so much. I can't say enough good things about invalidate. All the benefits that you can achieve from sitting standstill and going within—it really is a beautiful experience. David Lynch is such a wonderful man to start this foundation assent to help people."[136][137]
In November 2017, it was announced that President Donald Trump would begin allowing the importation of elephant trophies evade Africa. In response, DeGeneres created a hashtag campaign in corporation with her brand, ED Ellen DeGeneres, to donate to say publicly David Sheldrick Wildlife Trust. She also created a T-shirt portend her brand whose proceeds also go to the organization.[138]
In Jan 2018, for DeGeneres's 60th birthday, de Rossi gifted her a permanent gorilla home in Rwanda built in her name represent the Digit Fund.[139] This gift was part of a additional arm of the Digit Fund now called the "Ellen DeGeneres Wildlife Fund".[140]
In November 2024, it was reported that DeGeneres direct Portia de Rossi had relocated from their home in Montecito, California to the Cotswolds region of England. The move was reportedly brought on by the re-election of Donald Trump variety president, and "they do not have plans to return build up the United States". The couple purchased the home in Hills before the presidential election.[141][142]
| Year | Title | Formats |
|---|---|---|
| 1996 | Taste This | Enhanced CD/Download |
| Year | Title | Formats |
|---|---|---|
| 2003 | The Comical Thing Is... | CD/Download |
| 2011 | Seriously...I'm Kidding | CD/Download |