Back in November, we reported that the comedian Ellen DeGeneres had fled America. She then moved across the world to the United Kingdom. DeGeneres has since been laying low in England with her actress wife Portia de Rossi of Arrested Development fame.
Now, new reports are indicating that DeGeneres’ move to England is backfiring on her big time. According to insiders, de Rossi, who has been married to DeGeneres for seventeen years, is far from happy with their new life in the U.K.
de Rossi ‘Feels Totally Suffocated’ In England
Sources are telling Yahoo News that de Rossi feels “like every aspect of her life is micromanaged” in England.
“If she wants to go for a horse ride, a jog, even a trip to the shops, it’ll be met with a dozen questions,” one insider alleged. “Ellen hates going anywhere by herself so Portia’s always on the hook to be by her side.”
DeGeneres, 67, and de Rossi, 52, have settled in a rural celebrity hotspot that is known as the Cotswolds. Months later, however, it seems that de Rossi is having some serious regrets about ditching her glamorous life in sunny California for the gloomy weather of England. Indeed, it seems that DeGeneres isn’t helping de Rossi’s mood with the way that she’s allegedly been behaving.
“Portia feels totally suffocated much of the time,” the source concluded. “She loves Ellen dearly but she’s insisting on some breathing room. She can’t go on like this.”
DeGeneres’ Alleged Possessiveness Of de Rossi
This comes weeks after other insiders claimed that DeGeneres was so possessive of de Rossi that the comedian despised her own male staffers during the 19 seasons that The Ellen DeGeneres Show was on the air. The program ran from 2003 until 2022. It ended after DeGeneres was accused of presiding over a toxic workplace that was rampant with racism and bullying.
According to the new claims, sexism was at play on the set as well, with DeGeneres having an alleged strong dislike for men.
“We went though a lot of male employees just in general,” one male insider told Daily Mail. This source went on to claim that DeGeneres burned through nine stage managers in just one season. He described this as being an “insane number.”
“We had a feeling she really didn’t like guys,” the source added.
This was particularly an issue when her wife de Rossi would visit the talk show’s set. According to the insider, de Rossi had a special seat reserved for her during tapings at stage left. It was reportedly marked for her by a “gold plaque.”
“And listen – you knew, if you see that golden plaque, stay the hell away,” the source continued. “Portia was nice, she would say ‘hi’. But Ellen – she would be in her chair, it would be a commercial break, and if she didn’t know you, she would ask about you.”
“You just hoped and prayed you weren’t seated by her wife, so you didn’t get her attention,” the insider recalled. “You wanted to avoid looking into what we called the Ellen gaze. If she stayed looking at you, that was bad. Her eyes would get more narrow, her cheekbones would stick out. If she looked away from you, you were probably liked – you were probably ok.”
DeGeneres Whines About The ‘Hate’ She’s Received
In the years since her talk show came to an end, DeGeneres has complained that she was “kicked out of show business” for being “mean.”
“The hate went on for a long time. And I would try to avoid looking at the news,” DeGeneres claimed last year. “The ‘be kind’ girl wasn’t kind. That was the headline.”
This played a major role in DeGeneres and de Rossi making their move to England at the end of 2024.
“Ellen really felt she had made her mark on the industry. But that was diminished when she was canceled over her alleged treatment of her staff,” a source told Daily Mail back in November. “Then to have celebrities call her out one by one was so hurtful.”
The insider went on to say that “all the ill will towards” DeGeneres in America partly led to her decision to leave the country.
“She has the one person that still loves her, Portia, and she is ready to leave everyone who in her mind left her hanging out to dry. If she considers it her retirement, so be it,” the source continued. “An enormous part of the U.S. doesn’t like her because of her sexual preferences. And others were turned off by her persona, which some perceived to be fake in the wake of the work place allegations.”
“For Ellen, it’s easier to move away from her problems than to confront them,” this insider concluded. “It seems like a sad end to what she once was in people’s minds.”
Only time will tell if DeGeneres and de Rossi’s marriage ends up surviving their move overseas. It will certainly be interesting to see if one or both of them ends up coming crawling back to America!