Anyone here watched it? I did and I think it was interesting. She starts off by saying she looks older because she stopped injecting filler and botox and she does look older and she also looks more human ( and less like a stuffed animal) and normal and I love that for her.
She jokes about how she did those things because she was seeking approval and how much comedians need approval. She is making tons of jokes about female socialisation there that I thought were interesting. She also addresses her "be kind" persona and says- while she wants to be beloved, maybe it would have been better for her if she ended her shows with "go fuck yourselves". She makes many jokes about how people expected her to be extraordinarily kind and how expectations for women when they are bosses can be quite sexist.
I never really thought all of those allegations about her being mean had much substance to them anyway so I enjoyed the special.
She says its her last goodbye to show business. That kind of makes me sad because I'm curious what being cancelled might have done to her world view and I do think she would have had more interesting more feminist things to say.
It is crazy to me all the barriers she broke through in show business and she still got cancelled because of whiny people on twitter. One would think pulling gays and lesbians out of the closet culturally would afford her some redemption or respite from cancellation but I suppose not.
Wondering if people here who watched it had thoughts as well? Do you think that she might come back in a couple of years and reinvent herself to be more radical and outspoken? or do you think shell ride off into the sunset with portia?
This is insane. I just watched this last night and was going to make almost the exact post! I think she is riding off with Portia--and frankly, who can blame her! The part where she defined herself as a strong women really got to me. I know exactly what she is talking about. How a woman with more than one or two gears gets shit on. I cannot believe what they did to her and then losing Twitch. I can relate to what she went through.
I agree that her work now would be great bc she has nothing to lose. What also struck me is her sheer talent. She is the master of observational humor. I hate all the attention men get for this when she has always been the best at it w/o the navel-gazing narcissism (Jerry Seinfeld, Louis CK). I loved her joke about the 'spectrum'--that was sheer genius. I think that 'go fuck yourself' is the first time she ever let herself swear in stand up, too, just to make the point. I am only a few years younger than her and I could relate to every single age joke. It is sad we are losing intelligent, strong women like this to a generation of strident unfunny people and women who can only talk about sex (re: Jacqueline Novak--just awful). I have to say, Ellen makes me proud of my generation of women. I watched her since her sitcom, which was brilliant. I remember crying when she came out on TV. I collected the TV Guide she was on and held on to it for many years.
There are few stand-up specials I'd recommend more. [I liked Mike Birbiglia's too].
If I could run off with a Portia Del Rossi type I would too.
I resonated with some of the stuff she said- women are expected to be nicer and more empathetic and nurturing and her great crime seems to be that she was not conforming to that and just wanted to be a performer and a comic- like every other man who is a comic and a performer. Mulaney can spiral into addiction, cheat on his wife and he gets to come back and make jokes about that. Jimmy Fallon had alcohol problems and he gets to keep his show. Will Ferrell gets celebrated for going on a road trip with his creepy friend. But Ellen has to go away because some people who worked for her were mean to other people and she was diva ish?
I noticed that she swore too! I think its the first time I have heard her say a bad word in all the years I've watched her! And possibly the first time I have seen her angry.
Also- I think her and Wanda Sykes are the only women I have heard talk about aging in the last- decade- in entertainment. And the only ones to not pretend that older women are just the same as younger women. Like women are not allowed to age in entertainment for some reason.
I like her face without filler. I feel bad she ever felt she had to do that. All the old male comics who completely let themselves go but Ellen has to get filler. I'm glad she stopped doing things for peoples approval.
I really hope she keeps going, shes spent so much of her career being this symbol and role model, maybe she will now -post-cancellation- find the freedom to be an individual. I think she would have a very interesting perspective.
I remember watching Jerrod Carmichael going on one of Ellen's last shows and he kept reiterating how what she did for gay people was no small thing. How she changed people's minds about gay and lesbian people and how she made it possible for him to have a relationship with his grandmother. Honestly, that kind of impact for a TV show host is unheard of in any age. David Letterman didnt have that. And all of that is supposed to go away because "mean"?
I hope she comes back and she doesnt censor herself again.
Agreed, esp this: Mulaney can spiral into addiction, cheat on his wife and he gets to come back and make jokes about that. Jimmy Fallon had alcohol problems and he gets to keep his show. Will Ferrell gets celebrated for going on a road trip with his creepy friend. But Ellen has to go away because some people who worked for her were mean to other people and she was diva ish?
I am so angry about the boy's network that propped Mulaney up after using his wife as material then dumping her after obviously cheating on her. And Olivia Munn gets all this sympathy despite being a 'home wrecker'. ugh. Also, the David Letterman comment is no joke. He got no punishment for sexually harassing his staff. Sometimes I really hate this world.
So what if Letterman sexually harassed his staff? Ellen gave the stink eye to a janitor one time! That's obviously WAY worse!! 🙄
It's odd that Mulaney swore up and down for years that he didn't want children, he accidentally (I assume) got Munn pregnant, and now they just had a second child. Maybe he realized that fatherhood is better than he assumed, but I can't shake the feeling he was jerking his first wife around.
but I can't shake the feeling he was jerking his first wife around.
He probably was. Hopefully she can have a family (if she wants one) with a better dude and leave that scrote behind
I'd forgotten about the Letterman scandal! Yikes.
I will say, I dont actually have a problem with Mulaney or Fallon coming back and I will watch Mulaney specials because he is funny. There should be more forgiveness and grace for humans being humans. But damn, surely if anyone has earned some grace its Ellen!
Jimmy Fallon also did blackface. But apparently that’s not as bad as a woman being unkind.
If I could run off with a Portia Del Rossi type I would too.
I'm straight, but if I was a lesbian, I would run off with either Ellen or Portia.
I enjoyed some of Ellen's jokes, but in between the good stuff felt like a lot of filler. Replying to you to state that Mike Birbiglia is brilliant!
Yes, I agree the Birbiglia is a better craftsperson of the story. The Old Man and the Pool was sheer genius in writing and storytelling. Of course, he has the benefit of Ira Glass, et al, helping him. It is a boy's club. As well-placed as Ellen is, I don't get there is a room of writers helping her craft her stand-up, but if you saw MB's special, this is exactly what he has. I just cannot take the invisible male network for granted anymore; it is that ubiquitous. In other words, I would argue MB has a leg up, per patriarchy. And it is not like he is bearing his pain up there, like she was. At several points in her special I felt that pain directly. MB does not have/show that sort of vulnerability. I wept for her, not for him. I thought of myself up there, as I went through something similar, and how I would have been sobbing uncontrollably doing what she was doing. So I think the filler was also a breather. I think there was a lot of self-censorship, as she is rightfully furious. The opening with the TV screens said a lot of what she could not say. She was canceled for nothing. For being a women and a lesbian which Aziz Ansari and Louis CK get to make a come back and have all the dudes rally around them.
I think she was taking a page from Hannah G. but I don't think Ellen can go as far as Nanette did. She also gets extra points for not claiming she's a they now to win sympathy. Or that she is autistic. (both plays for Hannah's playbook).
I think Ellen is too old and has faced too much REAL homophobia and discrimination to go for that "WAH I'm non-binary" or "WAH I'm autistic" nonsense. Plus, nobody would give her grace even if she tried it because she's an older woman. And older women don't get grace in the entertainment industry
I totally agree about age, but Hannah G. grew up in Tasmania!
Tasmania's criminal penalties for homosexual activity were the harshest in the Western world when they were repealed in 1997. It was the last Australian jurisdiction to decriminalise homosexuality after a United Nations Human Rights Committee ruling, the passage of federal sexual privacy legislation and a High Court challenge to the state's anti-homosexuality laws
I am going to go out on a limb and say that being a lesbian born in Tasmania where it was illegal for the first 20 years of her lifetime to be a lesbian was a bit more discriminatory then what Ellen dealt with here in the US. In fact, an old friend of mine dated Ellen way back in New Orleans--both were regulars at the lesbian bars there. Remember, Hannah was hospitalized from a gay bashing, not to mention how her parents worked to reject her homosexuality, or silence it. Ellen did something incredible by choosing that battle here and we are all so indebted to her, and I think she could bc she had such acceptance--and would not be put in jail.
The weird thing to me about Hannah is that as recently as 2021 she said this: > Gadsby's pronouns are she/her, but she joked in her special, Douglas, that she wanted to adopt the pronoun "y'all."
So maybe she caught the 'they' bug in Hollywood. Or maybe she was with her last gf --the turncoat, 'joey' Soloway--but is back to being a 'she' with her wife now? I don't know. She is def TRA though and her comments about Dave Chappelle were awful. I reject her alphabet soup persona (but see where it comes from in her case), but still admire what she did with the Picasso exhibit.
Older women get no grace in the academy either. I, like Ellen, have been blacklisted there are an older woman/feminist, so I def identify with her, except with NO money.
So disappointed by Hanna G. I thought that she was smarter than that.
Interesting point about MB's network - if you love comedy, his podcast episode with Hanna G. about writing comedy is one of my favourites.
Tig Nataro (who seems oblivious to the trans bullshit, also thought she was smarter) is part of that man posse with MB and Ira Glass, I wonder who Ellen is friends with. I wish we could hear Ellen uncensored.
On MB- "sleepwalk with me" and "the new one" was quite raw i thought. I remember feeling some type of way the first time I watched those. He can be vulnerable when its called for.
I haven't watched it yet. But your review has me interested. I'm also interested because of all the people online whining about her getting a second chance as if it's a scandalous thing. Like, even if she was a tyrant of a boss and a complete nightmare to work under, she's still not even HALF as evil as most men working in Hollywood. She deserves a chance at a comeback. She fucking EARNED it!
It is crazy to me all the barriers she broke through in show business and she still got cancelled because of whiny people on twitter. One would think pulling gays and lesbians out of the closet culturally would afford her some redemption or respite from cancellation but I suppose not.
A lot of younger people prefer to pretend that anything that happened before 2010 doesn't matter. Most of the people who screech about how evil Ellen is think that her career began with Dory the Fish and disregard all the barriers she broke for LGB people back in the 90s.
Do you think that she might come back in a couple of years and reinvent herself to be more radical and outspoken? or do you think shell ride off into the sunset with portia?
I think she's probably done. She's been through two major cancellations at this point (the first in the 90s when her career was torpedoed when she came out as a lesbian, and the second when she was outed as a "mean boss"). And a lot of people will be wary to work with her because of her new reputation of being an asshole. Plus, she's currently in her 60s. She probably just wants to retire and live quietly and not deal with the stress of working in entertainment
She might do a few more Netflix stand-up specials here and there. And maybe some voice over work. But she's probably better off being retired or semi-retired. And, if she does retire, I'd love her to pull a JKR and go Full TERF
Do watch it! The stand-up itself was understated- theres one or two moments where she directly says what she means and it made my jaw drop. But her typical style is to make a seemingly simple joke and one has to peel back layers to understand why shes saying what shes saying. Part of why I made this post was to ask if other women watching it saw the same energy that I saw.
It's crazy how much amnesia this wokey worldview and cancel culture have brought.
Do you think she could be might be terfy? Shes been happy to go along on with LGBTQ stuff generally- perhaps because of who she was to the movement- I thought but maybe being cancelled because of a trans identified male might have woken her up some.
I’m not the person you’re replying to, but I could see her being terfy! She’s an old school lesbian after all, so I’d hope she was a terf - maybe I’m too optimistic tho LOL
I just cannot imagine Ellen not being somewhat TERFy. She has to see how this trans ideology has decimated the lesbian community. Especially since nearly every young lesbian in the public eye is switching to being "queer" and/or a non-woman
She's chummy with George W. Bush (which undoubtedly contributed to her cancellation before he was "redeemed" by being anti-Trump), and that hints at her being politically moderate at best. I'd be very surprised if she doesn't fundamentally believe that trans is hogwash.
I recall Ellen also getting grief for interviewing John McCain and Bruce Jenner on her show and being polite to them. Despite the fact that her show was all about fluffy entertainment and not confrontational political shit.
Speaking of these interviews, the fact that young "queer allies" gave her grief for them is such utter bullshit. I think its admirable that Ellen chose to win over the same conservatives that contributed to her losing her jobs in the 90s. Ellen has done more to normalize and gain acceptance for LGB people in America than anyone else. And she never would have succeeded if she had just screeched at George W Bush and called him "Hitler" like these SJWs wanted her to
disregard all the barriers she broke for LGB people back in the 90s
I'm going to go out on a limb and suggest that the people determined to cancel Ellen absolutely loathe gay men and especially lesbians, but in a "progressive" way.
The body of work that made Ellen famous doesn't really do anything for me. Just not my cuppa. Yet I feel like I could honestly say I am a big fan of her, in the sense that I admire the hell out of how she has lived her life and what she has contributed to the world.
Kind of like JK Rowling, now that I think about it. The work that made her famous doesn't do much for me, but the woman herself is pretty admirable from what I can tell.
Completely fair. I only mildly liked her show but it was the first english language tv show that my mom genuinely fell in love with and I love Ellen for that. At a time in my life when I was growing apart from her it brought us back together and provided a space for us to stay still and laugh.
It's weird, even though I never was into her show, I also can remember defending the hell out of it back when she came out. Because the people hating on it were hating for all the wrong fucking reasons. I didn't even watch it, but I'd be damned if I was going to listen to homophobes bitch about how gross and unfunny Ellen was when Everybody Loves Raymond was on the air at the same time.
I get it. A lot of her early work is super corny. Though her early rom-coms where she plays hapless straight women are much funnier in retrospect 🤣
Been a huge Ellen fan since the 80s. Loved the new special.
If you go back and read the Buzzfeed article that tried to ruin her career, Ellen isn't really accused of anything. Disgruntled fired former employees complained about management.
It's a great example of how the media can try to destroy anyone and trick the public into believing someone was accused of things they were never accused of.
I noticed that as well. Apparently, her "crime" was not being aware of what some of the managers on her show were doing. But....isn't that HR's job? No wonder Ellen was pissed if the people around her expected her to be the primary performer on her show AND to intervene when one of her assistant producers started playing grab-ass with the interns. Regardless of whether she was the Queen of Nice or The Biggest Asshole In The Universe, THAT WASN'T HER JOB!
Yeah. I remember noticing that at the time. And I kept waiting for the other shoe to drop and for someone to accuse her directly of wrongdoing and it never happened. I didnt keep up with the story and when her show ended I assumed she had just had enough because she had a whole goodbye year. But damn. They really did make her lose her show because all of the people she employed didnt behave perfectly and she behaved like you would expect a star to.
Funny how no one discusses whether the recipients of her alleged 'mean' behaviour actually deserved it. Does no one anymore consider whether something is warranted or not?
The love she got from the audience made me emotional. After everything, she deeply deserved that.
Haven't watched it yet. But wait has she been cancelled? I mean I thought that she had the last season of her show because she wanted to retire and spend more time with her wife.
Yeah thats what I assumed because I hadn't bothered to follow the story. But she makes it clear in her special that she was cancelled and she lost her show.
That's so terrible! If every man got cancelled for the same things women get, I bet we would no longer have men in entertainment.
I haven't watched it yet. Ive always been a fan, though, so I'll look for it. Thanks.
The "allegations" are also stupid. I mean, Bill Cosby rapes dozens of women, many male comedians make inappropriate sexist jokes about rape and VAW, and Ellen is not very nice to her employees. But who gets excuses made for them?
I recall there weren’t a lot of specific, descriptive examples of her alleged abusive or inappropriate behavior, let alone actual proof. Just vague statements about “creating a hostile working environment” because other employees were behaving badly and ✨microaggressions✨ because a white woman not being friendly and polite enough is basically racism. Then some male comedian with a podcast smelled blood in the water, got Twitter riled up to attack her, and before you know it people claimed she’d fire you on the spot for making direct eye contact. Source: trust me bro
Right after that all blew up, a bunch of “proof Ellen is a sociopath” videos made by commentary channel vultures on youtube started to pop up. They were all mostly just clips of her pranking guests with jumpscares and asking the occasional awkward or slightly insensitive interview question. Ok??
Those videos made me so annoyed. So Ellen Degeneres is an irredeemable monster because she didn't act like Dory The Fish IRL. But none of these YouTube commentary vultures saw fit to call out Howard Stern (who is still active in the media) for publicly tearing Dana Plato apart on air 24 hours before she committed suicide.
'not very nice' during menopause, btw. I kept thinking this. That she probably went through menopause in her tenure there.
Good point. I hadn't even thought about that.
Yeah, her cancellation is absolutely ridiculous. People expect women to be perfect angels and excuse men being subhuman monsters. Exhausting
Yeah! Just that she was "mean" I cannot believe she lost her career over that kind of playground nonsense. There were some serious allegations about workplace misbehaviour by people who worked on the show- but Ellen herself isnt HR- there was no proof at all that she did anything affirmatively to target bully or harass anyone.
Louis CK is back and he flashed some women, he won a grammy. But ellen has to go away?
Not just flashed, masturbated in front of.
Yes, thank you. I was thinking of Louis CK too, but I couldn't remember his name and couldn't be bothered to look him up.
"playground nonsense" indeed.
If I remember correctly, a young TIM was leading the cancellation charge against this prominent, older lesbian, right?
I was curious, so I went down a rabbit hole. Nikkie tutorials was him no? He went on Ellen because he was forced to come out - someone was blackmailing him. And the interview itself is fine, it's a regular ellen interview. But he trashed her on some European show, saying she was so terrible because- checks notes- she didn't say hi to him before the interview. And- rechecks notes- he didn't have a private bathroom, unlike the Jonas brothers. Ya dude some new YouTuber probably wouldnt get treated the same way as proper hollywood stars. Thats hardly reason to cancel someone he claimed to look up to but there you have it.
Yeah, he was basically butthurt that Ellen (a middle aged American lesbian) didn't know who Nikki Tutorials (a Danish dude who does makeup videos on YouTube) was and didn't kiss his ass off stage