Ellen DeGeneres squirms at awkward comment during Oprah Winfrey interview

Ellen DeGeneres couldn’t hide her discomfort at one comment from Oprah Winfrey during today’s tell-all interview.

Anyone expecting Harry-and-Meghan-style bombshells from Oprah Winfrey’s appearance on The Ellen DeGeneres show today would’ve been sorely disappointed.

The talk show legend was very much in safe mode, lobbing questions like “How are you actually feeling? How are you really feeling?” at her friend of over 25 years, who announced yesterday she’ll quit her talk show next year after a scandal-plagued 18 months.

All the while, Winfrey politely ignored the many allegations of bullying, misconduct and a toxic workplace culture that have dogged The Ellen Show in recent times.

Ellen and Oprah catch up.

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Those topics were left to US Today host Savannah Guthrie, who spoke to Ellen in a more in-depth interview today – but one that was still very much centred on how the allegations had affected Ellen herself (sample question: “Did you feel like you were being cancelled?”)

However, one awkward moment in Ellen’s Oprah chat did highlight the very real differences between the two talk show queens.

Ellen appeared visibly uncomfortable when Oprah spoke about the guilt she felt finishing The Oprah Winfrey Show in 2011 after 25 seasons, knowing that the show’s huge team of employees had “built their financial life” on the program continuing.

“When you have a large staff as you do, and as I did, that staff becomes your family. These are your tribe; these are your people. You would not be who you are without those people doing the work that a lot of people don’t recognise is going on behind the scenes,” Oprah began.

“You often don’t think, as I often didn’t think, when you’re looking at people: Car insurance, mortgages, college educations being paid … for everybody on that staff, they have built their financial life, their family life, based on this show. For me, that was hard too,” she continued.

Ellen squirms as Oprah lists the many staff who will be out of work.

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By this point, Ellen couldn’t hide her discomfort, looking off camera nervously as she fidgeted with her hands. With Ellen silent, Oprah moved the conversation along and the show soon cut to a commercial break.

Elsewhere in the interview, Oprah told her friend she expected she would “miss the camaraderie of the audience” once The Ellen Show finishes next year. She asked Ellen what it had been like telling the crew of her plans to end the show.

“It was hard,” said Ellen. “There were tears … It was really hard. I DO love everyone here, we DO have a relationship … I wanted to give them a year to celebrate with me and stay with me.”

But just hours after her announcement yesterday, another of DeGeneres’ former employees went on the attack. Two-time Emmy-winning former Ellen Show producer Hedda Muskat gave an explosive interview to Sunrise slamming her former boss.

Muskat, who was one of the first producers hired to work on the show during its debut season, claimed its demise had come because viewers had finally “woken up” to Ellen’s true nature.

“The viewers have spoken. Her ratings have been in the toilet for a long time now. Her show has not been fun, it has not been interesting, and she’s not really ‘stepping down’ – the viewers fired her,” she said.

Muskat alleged that DeGeneres “despised” her non-celebrity guests, and claimed the talk show titan was not in a position to interview real people because she really couldn’t carry a conversation with them.

Asked what she thought DeGeneres should do once her obligations on the show come to an end, Muskat said her former employer should “work on a farm with all of the animals and the pets and the dogs and the cows and the pigs because she can relate to animals far more than she does with people”.

Originally published as Ellen DeGeneres squirms at awkward comment during Oprah Winfrey interview