Ellen DeGeneres is contemplating a return to the entertainment industry, nearly two years after her daytime talk show ended amid allegations of a toxic work environment. Speaking in a public conversation on July 20 at Cheltenham's Everyman Theatre with broadcaster Richard Bacon, the 67-year-old former host said she misses aspects of her television career but remains unsure how her format would perform in today's fragmented media landscape.
"I would love to do that again," DeGeneres said. "But I just feel like people are watching on their phones, or people aren't really paying attention as much to televisions, because we're so inundated with information and entertainment."
Since stepping away from television in 2022 after 19 seasons, DeGeneres has been living in the English countryside with her wife, actress Portia de Rossi. The couple relocated from California to the Cotswolds in November 2024, shortly before the re-election of President Donald Trump. "We got here the day before the election and woke up to lots of texts from our friends with crying emojis, and I was like, 'He got in.' And we're like, 'We're staying here,'" she said.
Now splitting her days between caring for horses, sheep, and chickens and reflecting on her next chapter, DeGeneres said she is "a little bit bored" and considering new opportunities carefully. "I want to have fun, I want to do something. I do like my chickens but I'm a little bit bored," she told the audience.
In her new Netflix stand-up special released this month, DeGeneres revisits the 2020 scandal that engulfed her show. "No matter what, any article that came up, it was like, 'She's mean,'" she said. "How do I deal with this without sounding like a victim or 'poor me' or complaining? But I wanted to address it."
The former host said she continues to wrestle with the public perception that emerged during the workplace controversy. "It's as simple as, I'm a direct person, and I'm very blunt, and I guess sometimes that means that... I'm mean?" she said. "I hate it. I hate that people think that I'm that because I know who I am and I know that I'm an empathetic, compassionate person."
DeGeneres also reflected on the gendered scrutiny women face in public life. "How dare us have any kind of mood, or you can't be anything other than nice and sweet and kind and submissive and complacent," she remarked. "I don't think I can say anything that's ever going to get rid of that [reputation] or dispel it."
In a separate moment during the conversation, DeGeneres disclosed that she and de Rossi are considering renewing their vows in the U.K. due to concerns over potential legal reversals in the United States. "The Baptist Church in America is trying to reverse gay marriage," she said. "Portia and I are already looking into it, and if they do that, we're going to get married here."
The couple initially wed in Los Angeles in 2008. The renewed interest in a U.K. ceremony comes in response to a June resolution passed by the Southern Baptist Convention supporting a reversal of Obergefell v. Hodges, the landmark 2015 U.S. Supreme Court ruling that legalized same-sex marriage nationwide.
"I wish we were at a place where it was not scary for people to be who they are," DeGeneres said. "Until we're there, I think there's a hard place to say we have huge progress."
