A former writer from The Ellen Show revealed that the 62-year-old treated her writing staff like, well, "s--t."
"We'd watch her in rehearsals, smiling and winning us over with her charm and comic timing," the anonymous writer revealed. "Then the director would yell cut, her face would fall, and she'd level a glare at the writers. 'Why do you keep writing these unfunny jokes?' she'd hiss." Fans were shocked by the allegations, but the rumors never tarnished her reputation.
in 2016 the rumors went mainstream. In her book Kathy Griffin's Celebrity Run-Ins: My A-Z Index, comedian Kathy Griffin mentioned a certain "talk show host" with "short blonde hair" . “I can’t prove it, but this person, who has short blonde hair, has a mean streak that all of Hollywood knows about.”
Later, the rumors of Ellen's "meanness" persisted. In 2017, Corinne Olympios, of The Bachelor fame, begrudgingly admitted that her interview with the talk show host made her "uncomfortable." "She's very aggressive, she was very cold when I saw her before the show, which I don't think I was supposed to, because everybody got very nervous when we bumped into each other and you could tell they were like 'oh, s--t.'"
I started noticing something was "off" about Ellen's persona while watching an interview she did with Katy Perry in 2017. At the time, the reports were focused on Katy's "odd" behavior, but for me, all I could concentrate on was Ellen's weird aggressiveness. She seemed annoyed by the pop star, as if she was quietly seething with contempt, which is weird considering the two have known each other for years. And it's not just me. Others on reddit have noticed it too, particularly when she interviewed the cast of Stranger Things. "Hi all I was just watching a video of the four boys playing the questionnaire game on the Ellen show and I noticed she seemed a little off and frustrated," a commenter wrote. "A lot of people in the comments noticed it too. Some said maybe the boys were a bit too loud and rowdy, but she reacted the same, almost rude."
During her misbegotten season of judging American Idol, Fox promoted it as Nice (Ellen) vs Nasty (Simon). But I heard from a VERY respected entertainment journalist that everyone knew that behind the scenes it was the complete reverse. Simon is known for being a mensch and Ellen a tyrant. It makes me sad given her trail blazing but I can separate that from the reality of what sounds like a miserable off camera personality.
