I’ve always been a mega and loyal
Ellen DeGeneres fan, very much enjoying both her stand-up comedy and her sitcoms.
I’ve loved the fun she makes of people, situations and herself and my best has always been her perspective on the concept of The Fear i.e. the fear of saying or doing something with the best of intentions and having it misinterpreted as you being a total Pig - and then trying to over-explain to show that you’re not and making it all worse.
In everything I’ve ever seen her in she’s been open and honest and her voice has always been authentic and uniquely hers – un-influenced by other people and their opinions or what she thinks she should be in order to please them or be acceptable etc.
This is why I’ve felt iffily disappointed by
The Ellen DeGeneres Show ‘cos she’s different in it, not nearly as funny and doesn't seem true to who she really is at all.
Before the show started a couple of months ago I was very keen on it, imagining her being a ground-breaking talk show host but now I’m finding I’m not enjoying it and end up feeling annoyed at her for allowing herself to be manipulated into losing her sense of humour as a result of censoring herself.
I’m convinced she feels she has to tip-toe around the millions of sensitivities of the celebs she interviews as well as the ludicrous stories that so often surround them and then ends up being a glorified ad campaign to make them look good.
Last Friday I watched the episode that featured the first interview with Martha Stewart after her being released from prison and while Ellen managed to get a couple of jokes in they weren’t nearly as whammy or hysterical as what I just know she’d have come up with previously.
Martha Stewart is a convicted defrauder and yet the audience was encouraged to see her as a brave, wonderful victim of circumstance, clapping and whooping as her and Ellen showed them how to make the most impossibly complicated uggers napkin rings.
I don’t mind so much that Mary Stewart herself is the con that she is and not really the domesticated housewife (and now yoga guru) she pretends to be but I just can't accept Ellen fitting into some kind or manufactured image.
She did make a couple of jokes about making the rings but the real Ellen wouldn’t be interested enough to even give it a bash or she'd pass sarcy comments through everything.
The other thing that sucks is that in an interview with Larry King on Saturday, comedienne
Kathy Griffin mentioned that she’s never been invited onto Ellen and won’t ever be a regarded by them as a “friend of the show” as she called it ‘cos of being outspoken about celebs.
This was how Ellen used to be though – not necessarily with a focus on celebs only but about everything and now Kathy's too radical for her show when all she is very funny.
I understand that celebrities might not want to be on the show if Ellen went crazy ripping them off when they arrive but so what if their ego’s can’t cope? She could do the show about something else if they refused, which I actually reckon the majority wouldn’t anyway.
From Ellen’s questions and jokes on the show, to the brownly bland studio design of the set to the dancing even - none of it rings true to her.
I didn’t want to feel this about her dancing but the slowness of it and in the context of everything else I do. I don’t understand why she's done it – it’s hardly as if she needs the moolah - I saw an E! special about her being one of the richest there are in Hollywood.
I wish she’d come back and just suddenly flip out and say exactly what she’s thinking to a celeb who just can’t cope.
Do you agree that she's different?