Ellen DeGeneres is hanging up her dancing shoes. On Wednesday, the comedian and daytime-television host announced that her talk show, The Ellen DeGeneres Show, will come to an end in 2022, after its 19th season.
“When you’re a creative person, you constantly need to be challenged—and as great as this show is, and as fun as it is, it’s just not a challenge anymore,” DeGeneres said in an interview with The Hollywood Reporter announcing the news. She revealed that she’ll have a sit-down interview with her friend and former daytime-television queen Oprah Winfrey on May 13, where she’ll discuss her decision to step away from the television program that’s won her a whopping 64 Daytime Emmys.
DeGeneres indicated that her plan has long been to end the show in 2022—but her announcement comes in the wake of a number of scandals and controversies surrounding her once-beloved daytime-television program. Last July, two explosive reports by BuzzFeed News revealed that dozens of employees considered The Ellen DeGeneres Show a toxic workplace environment, claiming that top Ellen executive producers engaged in sexual misconduct and harassment at the workplace. After these allegations went public, Ellen ousted executive producers Ed Glavin and Kevin Leman as well as coexecutive producer Jonathan Norman, and gave a heartfelt apology to open season 18 of her show. While the season premiere received the highest premiere ratings Ellen had received in years, the ratings soon fell to the lowest point ever, pulling in a million less viewers than average.
DeGeneres said that while the drama “destroyed” her, it had no influence on her decision to end Ellen. “It almost impacted the show,” she tells THR. “It was very hurtful to me. I mean, very. But if I was quitting the show because of that, I wouldn’t have come back this season.” DeGeneres also responded to allegations that she was a difficult boss who reportedly made people chew gum before talking to her, calling those claims “so stupid.”
As for DeGeneres’s future: She doesn’t see herself going back to television, but rather has her sights set on the silver screen. “A sitcom seems like a walk in the park compared to this, 180 shows a year. I don’t know if that’s really what I want to do next, but movies for sure. If there were a great role, I’d be able to do that,” she told THR. Does that mean we should prepare for The Ellen Movie, coming to a theater near you in 2024?
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