Getty Rumors are circulating that Ellen Degeneres, host of "The Ellen Show," is ready to quit.
As rumors continue to swirl about toxic work culture and sexual misconduct on set at The Ellen Show, reports are speculating that talk show host Ellen DeGeneres is considering walking away from the show.
An unnamed insider who works at Telepictures told the Daily Mail that DeGeneres was ready to shut down The Ellen Show in light of ongoing negative reports against it. The anonymous source said, “She feels she can’t go on and the only way to recover her personal brand from this is to shut down the show.”
While neither the network nor DeGeneres have commented on the show’s potential cancellation, the rumors come at an interesting time. In 2018, E! News reported that DeGeneres had extended her contract to host The Ellen Show through Summer 2020. This means that her contract, if it hasn’t already expired, is set to expire within the next few months and will need to be renewed and renegotiated if The Ellen Show is to continue.
DeGeneres Told The New York Times She Considered Not Renewing Her Contract in 2018
Although the rumors that DeGeneres might leave The Ellen Show are compounded by the allegations coming out against her and the show’s production, this is not the first time the future of The Ellen Show has been called into question.
In the New York Times‘ 2018 profile of DeGeneres, she admitted that she thought about declining to extend her Ellen Show contract, but ultimately decided to extend it through Summer 2020.
The profile revealed that DeGeneres “changes her mind all the time” about her future as a talk show host, and it appears that the opinions of her brother and wife, Portia de Rossi, have some influence. DeGeneres said her brother Vance told her she “can’t stop” hosting because of her “positive, unifying voice.” De Rossi, on the other hand, said “I just think she’s such a brilliant actress and stand-up that it doesn’t have to be this talk show for her creativity. There are other things she could tackle.” “I don’t see the end of her show as her career ending,” de Rossi later added.
Former ‘Ellen Show’ Staffers Accused DeGeneres of Ignoring Sexual Misconduct From Senior Producers
Early reports that DeGeneres is considering quitting The Ellen Show coincide with reports from unnamed former staffers who have accused DeGeneres of not only fostering a toxic work environment, but “turning a blind eye” to sexual misconduct made by senior-level producers of The Ellen Show.
A source told Daily Mail that DeGeneres’s consideration of shutting down her talk show is motivated by the allegations against her. The source said, “The truth is she knew what was going on, it’s her show. The buck stops with her. She can blame every executive under the sun – but Ellen is ultimately the one to blame.”
An anonymous staffer doubled down on that accusation, adding, “Don’t think for a minute anything she has said in that apology means anything. She created and then enabled this toxic culture to go on for so long. If anyone had come to her or those three vile [executive producers] to complain, they would’ve been fired.”
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