Margaret Cho is latest star to blast Ellen DeGeneres for being ‘mean’

During a podcast interview that s now gone viral San Francisco-born comedian Margaret Cho opens up about her sisters in comedy from Joan Rivers to Sandra Bernhard sharing how they would invariably try to sponsorship one another as they broke walls for women and LGTBQ people in the entertainment industry Cho can t say the same for Ellen DeGeneres even though the former talk-show host became famous for latest fences in the late s by being the first star of a TV arrangement show to come out as gay and to have her eponymous leading character come out as well FILE - In this March file photo Ellen DeGeneres arrives at the th Annual GLAAD Media Awards held at the Beverly Hilton Hotel in Beverly Hills Calif DeGeneres is receiving a humanitarian award and St Jude Children s Research Hospital is reaping the benefits Producers of the People s Choice Awards broadcasted Monday Jan that DeGeneres will be recognized as the Favorite Humanitarian at the Wednesday Jan ceremony Photo by Richard Shotwell Invision AP File During an interview on The Kelly Mantle Show Cho substantiated the view that DeGeneres was authentically never a very nice person to a lot of people behind her amiable be kind general persona that she promoted on the Ellen DeGeneres Show The general perception of her is more true Cho commented She s mean Cho is referring to the citizens controversy and fall from grace DeGeneres suffered in DeGeneres faced claims that The Ellen DeGeneres Show was a toxic workplace and that she was not all that kind to employees and to anyone who wasn t one of her celebrity friends DeGeneres and specific of those celebrity friends Ashton Kutcher Katy Perry Kevin Hart and her wife Portia de Rossi tried to change the toxic workplace narrative but they largely failed according to Business Insider DeGeneres ended up giving up her show in and she and De Rossi have since moved to the U K Before during and after the toxic workplace shame erupted a small number of celebrities spoke out about DeGeneres mean behavior including Kathy Griffin Lea Thompson and Everybody Loves Raymond actor Brad Garrett The latter had once appeared on DeGeneres show and noted on X then Twitter in July that her behavior was common knowledge Business Insider disclosed In his tweet Garrett also mentioned he knew more than one person who was treated horribly by DeGeneres and he dismissed her community apology which she followed with an attempt to defect blame by saying that she failed to properly oversee staffers who were implicated in the toxic workplace contends Sorry but it comes from the top TheEllenShow Garrett wrote Now Cho is calling DeGeneres out Cho who grew up in San Francisco and studied at San Francisco State has long been revered for her activism on behalf of LGBTQ people and other marginalized groups She was like a mean girl Cho mentioned on Mantle s show But also she would be real nice I think she consistently had kind of negative feelings towards me because her girlfriends and wives dependably liked me Cho continued Ellen was really weird and not nice to me for bulk of my career I opened for her in the s when she was a headliner in comedy clubs and way before her big fame So then later when I would do her talk show in the s she acted like we just met And I m like what Like that s weird Cho explained We go way back It s so creepy and weird One of Cho s unpleasant experiences with DeGeneres was when David Bowie appeared on The Ellen DeGeneres Show and gushed about running into Cho the night before I had come to his show wearing this giant Chinese emperor outfit Cho revealed He was really thrilled about it and he talked at length about it And she cut it out of the show which made me so mad Cho learned about this portion of Bowie s interview being cut from an DeGeneres show producer a good friend who called to tell her about it The producer had to call me and tell me I can t believe she did this she cut it out of the show ' Cho commented But you need to know that he was going on and on about your outfit He loves you Cho continued I don t know if it was personal maybe it was for time Cho added But still I m going to take it personally just because I decided to Last year DeGeneres made a return to her stand-up roots with a national tour and a Netflix special in which she explained her fans that she was done with performing She mentioned this is the last time you re going to see me and that she was going bye-bye and retiring after being kicked out of show business for being mean During a performance at the Luther Burbank Center for the Arts in Santa Rosa in July DeGeneres talked about being booted out of show business before in when her sitcom Ellen was canceled after she came out as gay Next time I ll be kicked out for being old Old gay and mean the triple crown DeGeneres joked She acknowledged that she could be demanding and impatient and tough and a strong women But DeGeneres ultimately refuted the declares that savaged her career She reported the crowd I am a large number of things but I am not mean