This summer Ellen DeGeneres and her Emmy-winning daytime talk show was put under scrutiny for being a toxic workplace. Before the situation became a crisis, DeGeneres and her team were preparing for a regularly scheduled summer break. However, things didn’t go as planned following a BuzzFeed report published on July 16. In the report, there are dozens of shared stories and direct quotes from former and current employees of The Ellen DeGeneres Show. They state that behind the scenes they faced issues involving race and representation, mistreatment, and fear and intimidation. One employee even said, “That ‘be kind’ bullshit only happens when the cameras are on. It’s all for show. I know they give money to people and help them out, but it’s for show” (Yandoli, 2020, para. 2). Following the report, things only began to worsen for DeGeneres and the show’s producers.
The release of the report sparked a negative response on Twitter from a variety of people. Famous comedian, Kevin T. Porter started a thread back in March asking people to “respond to this with the most insane stories you’ve heard about Ellen being mean & I’ll match everyone w/ $2 to @LAFoodBank” (Porter, 2020). The tweet regained popularity following the BuzzFeed report and now has over 2.9K replies, 13.3K retweets, and 72.5K likes. As more and more people replied to the tweet sharing rumors, they had heard about life behind the scenes of The Ellen DeGeneres Show, DeGeneres and her team faced a greater crisis. According to (Cho, 2020), “On July 30, a second report from BuzzFeed was published, this time revealing that former employees of The Ellen DeGeneres Show have anonymously alleged misconduct and harassment involving top producers at the show” (para. 21). Following this report DeGeneres made her first apology by sending a letter to show employees. However, this would not be her last word on the subject.
On August 4, DJ Tony Okungbowa addressed his personal experience as the resident DJ on the show from 2003 to 2013. He stated that he “does not condone the toxicity of the environment and hopes the show would make a change” (Cho, 2020, para. 34). This statement, along with three top producers parting ways with the show brought DeGeneres to make her second apology. Following this apology, celebrities Kevin Hart, Katy Perry and DeGeneres’s wife Portia de Rossi supported her on social media. In an article on MSN, (Finn, 2020) stated, “Staffers are said to be pleased, though with some of the new policies being implemented, including more paid days off and a renewed commitment to foster a more inclusive working environment. Stephen ‘tWitch’ Boss, Ellen’s longtime DJ and fan favorite, has been promoted to co-executive producer” (para. 43).
As of today, DeGeneres has made her third apology, only this time it being during her monologue on the season 18 premiere. The episode aired September 21, in which she stated, “I know that I’m in a position of privilege and power and I realized that with that comes responsibility, and I take responsibility for what happens at my show” (TheEllenShow, 1:08).
Overall, I believe DeGeneres and her team did a great job at handling this crisis publicly. I believe her apologies all came across very genuine and professional. However, some did not perceive her televised apology this way. This created a double crisis for the show. I think as a public figure Elle DeGeneres has become a great spokesperson. She is charming and funny and is widely known for these attributes. I believe where she made her mistake in her crisis communication was including a few humorous bits in her televised apology. Although she didn’t put on a fake front and stayed genuine, she did not think how her stakeholders would perceive the humor. The text says that “stakeholders should be part of the prevention thinking and process” (Coombs, 2019, p. 104), this was not the case in this crisis. DeGeneres and her team should have done a better job at preparing with planning how their stakeholders would retaliate, maybe then they would not have had to apologize so many times.
References
Cho, D. (2020, August 18). Everything to know about Ellen Degeneres’ ongoing talk show controversy. People. https://people.com/tv/ellen-degeneres-talk-show-scandal-timeline/?slide=3551e51f-fb0b-4e38-9f6a-4f370e6f72ad
Coombs, W. T. (2019). Ongoing crisis communication planning, managing, and responding (5th ed.). Thousand Oaks, CA: Sage Publications.
Finn, N. (2020, September 21). The Ellen DeGeneres show returns after a summer of controversy: Timeline of a rocky hiatus. MSN. https://www.msn.com/en-us/tv/celebrity/the-ellen-degeneres-show-returns-after-a-summer-of-controversy-timeline-of-a-rocky-hiatus/ar-BB19fJdx?li=BBnb7Kz
Porter, K. [@KevinTPorter]. (2020, March 20). Right now we all need a little kindness. You know, like Ellen DeGeneres always talks about! She’s notoriously one of the meanest people alive. [Tweet]. Twitter. https://twitter.com/KevinTPorter/status/1241049881688412160
TheEllenShow. (2020, September 21). Ellen’s first monologue of season 18 [Video]. Youtube.
Yandoli, K. (2020, July 16). Former employees say Ellen’s “Be Kind” talk show mantra masks a toxic work culture. BuzzFeed. https://www.buzzfeednews.com/article/krystieyandoli/ellen-employees-allege-toxic-workplace-culture?bftwnews&utm_term=4ldqpgc#4ldqpgc
Claire Lee Hawkins 