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IMDbPro

Ellen DeGeneres

  • Producer
  • Writer
  • Actress
IMDbProStarmeter
Top 5,0007664
Ellen DeGeneres in American Idol (2002)
Ellen's Next Great Designer
Play trailer1:50
Ellen's Next Great Designer (2021)
93 Videos
99+ Photos
Emmy-winning talk show host Ellen Lee DeGeneres was born in Metairie, Louisiana, a New Orleans suburb. She is the daughter of Betty DeGeneres (née Elizabeth Jane Pfeffer), a speech therapist, and Elliott Everett DeGeneres, Jr., an insurance agent. Her brother is musician and producer Vance DeGeneres. Her parents divorced when she was 16 years old. Her mother remarried, and her new husband, salesman Roy Gruessendorf, moved the family to Atlanta, Texas.

After graduating from Atlanta High School in 1976, Ellen attended the University of New Orleans as a communications major, but she dropped out after one semester. She held a wide variety of jobs until she turned to stand-up comedy, making her bones at small clubs and coffeehouses before working her way up to emcee Clyde's Comedy Club by 1981. Her comedy was described as a distaff version of Bob Newhart. Beginning in the early 1980s, she toured nationally and was named the funniest person in America after winning a competition sponsored by the cable network Showtime. This led to better gigs, including her first appearance on The Tonight Show Starring Johnny Carson (1962) in 1986.

Though DeGeneres's early forays into series television were not successful (she appeared as a supporting player in two short-lived TV situation comedies in the period 1989-92, Open House (1989) and Laurie Hill (1992)), she scored a hit headlining her own 1994 sitcom on ABC "These Friends of Mine" (renamed Ellen (1994) after its first season). She made TV history in April 1997, when her character, and DeGeneres personally, revealed that she was a lesbian. However, the show was canceled the following season due to declining ratings, after which DeGeneres returned to the stand-up circuit. In 2001, DeGeneres launched a new series, The Ellen Show (2001), on CBS, but it suffered from poor ratings and was canceled.

Redemption as a television artist came in 2003, when DeGeneres's daytime talk show, The Ellen DeGeneres Show (2003), proved to be both a critical hit and a commercial success. Along with good ratings, the show has won unprecedented kudos from the industry, winning 15 Emmy Awards in its first three seasons on the air and becoming the first talk show in TV history to win the Emmy Award for Outstanding Talk Show in its first three seasons.

DeGeneres has also made a name for herself as a host of awards shows. She hosted the Grammy Awards in 1996 and 1997, as well as the Primetime Emmy Awards in 2001 and 2005. In February 2007, she had the ultimate TV awards show gig, hosting the Oscars, which she hosted again in 2014.
BornJanuary 26, 1958
  • More at IMDbPro
    • Contact info
    • Agent info
    • Resume
BornJanuary 26, 1958
IMDbProStarmeter
Top 5,0007664
  • View contact info at IMDbPro
  • Won 1 Primetime Emmy

Seeing Double: Celebrity Doppelgangers

Seeing Double: Celebrity Doppelgangers

Ever noticed the resemblance between Elizabeth Debicki and Caitlin FitzGerald? Take a look at some celebrity duos who could be mistaken for one another.
See the gallery
[object Object]
Photos

Photos492

Ellen DeGeneres, Richard Simmons, and David Garcia in The Ellen DeGeneres Show (2003)
Ellen DeGeneres and Nick Tate in Open House (1989)
Ellen DeGeneres, Alison La Placa, and Ted Shackelford in Open House (1989)
Ellen DeGeneres, Mary Page Keller, Danny Gans, Alison La Placa, and Philip Charles MacKenzie in Open House (1989)
Ellen DeGeneres, Mary Page Keller, Alison La Placa, Debra Stipe, and Nick Tate in Open House (1989)
Ellen DeGeneres, Mary Page Keller, Danny Gans, Alison La Placa, Chris Lemmon, Philip Charles MacKenzie, and Nick Tate in Open House (1989)
Ellen DeGeneres in Open House (1989)
Ellen DeGeneres in Open House (1989)
Ellen DeGeneres in Open House (1989)
Ellen DeGeneres, Mary Page Keller, Danny Gans, and Dore Keller in Open House (1989)
Ellen DeGeneres, Mary Page Keller, Ray Buktenica, Alison La Placa, and Philip Charles MacKenzie in Open House (1989)
Ellen DeGeneres and Lisa Darr in Ellen (1994)

Known for

Ellen DeGeneres in The Ellen DeGeneres Show (2003)
The Ellen DeGeneres Show
6.7
TV Series
  • Producer
Ellen DeGeneres in The Oscars (2014)
The Oscars
7.7
TV Special
  • Writer
  • 2014
Ellen DeGeneres, Joely Fisher, and Clea Lewis in Ellen (1994)
Ellen
6.1
TV Series
  • Producer
Albert Brooks in Finding Nemo (2003)
Finding Nemo
8.2
  • Dory(voice)
  • 2003

Credits

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IMDbPro

Producer

  • Couple Time
    • Completed
  • Jekyll
    • Pre-production
  • Little Funny
    • Completed
  • Family Game Fight (2021)
    Family Game Fight
  • Ellen DeGeneres in The Ellen DeGeneres Show (2003)
    The Ellen DeGeneres Show
  • Michael Douglas and Adam Devine in Green Eggs and Ham (2019)
    Green Eggs and Ham
  • Little Ellen (2021)
    Little Ellen
  • Tig Notaro: Drawn (2021)
    Tig Notaro: Drawn
  • Ellen DeGeneres and Scott Foley in Ellen's Next Great Designer (2021)
    Ellen's Next Great Designer
  • Endangered (2021)
    Endangered
  • Tabitha Brown in All Love with Tabitha Brown (2020)
    All Love with Tabitha Brown
  • Sarah Hyland in Lady Parts (2020)
    Lady Parts
  • Wildlife Warriors
  • The Masked Dancer (2020)
    The Masked Dancer
  • Kristen Bell in Momsplaining with Kristen Bell (2018)
    Momsplaining with Kristen Bell
  • Melissa McCarthy in Little Big Shots (2016)
    Little Big Shots
  • Ayesha Curry in Fempire (2019)
    Fempire
  • Jon Dorenbos in Let Me in So You Can Win! (2019)
    Let Me in So You Can Win!

Writer

  • Little Funny
    • (creator)
    • Completed
  • Ellen DeGeneres in The Ellen DeGeneres Show (2003)
    The Ellen DeGeneres Show
  • Family Game Fight (2021)
    Family Game Fight
    • (creator)
  • Ellen DeGeneres in Ellen's Game of Games (2017)
    Ellen's Game of Games
    • (creator)
  • Ellen's Greatest Night of Giveaways (2019)
    Ellen's Greatest Night of Giveaways
    • (creator)
  • Juego de juegos (2019)
    Juego de juegos
    • (uncredited)
  • Ellen DeGeneres in Ellen DeGeneres: Relatable (2018)
    Ellen DeGeneres: Relatable
  • Kristen Bell in Momsplaining with Kristen Bell (2018)
    Momsplaining with Kristen Bell
    • (creator)
  • Ellen DeGeneres in The Oscars (2014)
    The Oscars
  • Ellen's Bigger, Longer & Wider Show
  • The 79th Annual Academy Awards (2007)
    The 79th Annual Academy Awards
  • The 57th Annual Primetime Emmy Awards (2005)
    The 57th Annual Primetime Emmy Awards
  • My Short Film (2005)
    My Short Film
  • Ellen DeGeneres: Here and Now (2003)
    Ellen DeGeneres: Here and Now
  • Ellen DeGeneres in The 53rd Annual Primetime Emmy Awards (2001)
    The 53rd Annual Primetime Emmy Awards
  • Ellen DeGeneres: The Beginning (2000)
    Ellen DeGeneres: The Beginning

Actress

  • Wesley Snipes and Kevin Hart in True Story (2021)
    True Story
  • Pixar Popcorn (2021)
    Pixar Popcorn
    • (voice)
  • Taylor Swift: You Need to Calm Down (2019)
    Taylor Swift: You Need to Calm Down
  • Mayim Bialik, Kaley Cuoco, Johnny Galecki, Simon Helberg, Jim Parsons, Melissa Rauch, and Kunal Nayyar in The Big Bang Theory (2007)
    The Big Bang Theory
  • Finding Dory: Marine Life Interviews (2016)
    Finding Dory: Marine Life Interviews
    • (voice, uncredited)
  • Finding Dory: Fish Schticks (2016)
    Finding Dory: Fish Schticks
    • (voice)
  • Albert Brooks, Ellen DeGeneres, Ty Burrell, Ed O'Neill, Kaitlin Olson, and Hayden Rolence in Finding Dory (2016)
    Finding Dory
    • (voice)
  • Kinect Rush: A Disney-Pixar Adventure (2012)
    Kinect Rush: A Disney-Pixar Adventure
    • (voice)
  • Julie Kavner, Nancy Cartwright, Dan Castellaneta, and Yeardley Smith in The Simpsons (1989)
    The Simpsons
    • (voice)
  • Protect Me from What I Want (2009)
    Boys on Film 4: Protect Me from What I Want
  • Papa Louie: When Pizzas Attack! (2006)
    Papa Louie: When Pizzas Attack!
  • Matt LeBlanc in Joey (2004)
    Joey
  • My Short Film (2005)
    My Short Film
  • Lauren Ambrose, Freddy Rodríguez, Frances Conroy, Rachel Griffiths, Michael C. Hall, Peter Krause, and Mathew St. Patrick in Six Feet Under (2001)
    Six Feet Under
  • Bernie Mac in The Bernie Mac Show (2001)
    The Bernie Mac Show
  • In-development projects at IMDbPro

Videos93

Finding Nemo: 3D BD
Clip 1:00
Finding Nemo: 3D BD
Finding Nemo: 3D BD
Clip 1:21
Finding Nemo: 3D BD
Finding Nemo: 3D BD
Clip 0:32
Finding Nemo: 3D BD
Finding Nemo: 3D BD
Clip 1:06
Finding Nemo: 3D BD
Finding Nemo: 3D BD
Clip 0:39
Finding Nemo: 3D BD
Finding Nemo: 3D BD
Clip 0:58
Finding Nemo: 3D BD
Finding Nemo: 3D BD
Clip 0:35
Finding Nemo: 3D BD
Finding Nemo: 3D BD
Clip 1:04
Finding Nemo: 3D BD
What Will Fans Remember About 'Finding Dory' (That Dory May Not)?
Interview 1:30
What Will Fans Remember About 'Finding Dory' (That Dory May Not)?
Academy Awards: 86th Annual
Interview 2:17
Academy Awards: 86th Annual
Trailer
Trailer 0:51
Trailer
Official Trailer
Trailer 1:50
Official Trailer

Personal details

Edit
  • Official sites
    • Ellentube
    • Facebook
    • January 26, 1958
    • Metairie, Louisiana, USA
    • Portia de RossiAugust 16, 2008 - present
    • Vance DeGeneres(Sibling)
  • Other works
    Music video for Sheryl Crow: "A Change (Would Do You Good)"
  • Publicity listings
    • 4 Biographical Movies
    • 2 Print Biographies
    • 6 Portrayals
    • 9 Interviews
    • 42 Articles
    • 5 Pictorials
    • 22 Magazine Cover Photos

Did you know

Edit
  • Trivia
    Is only the second woman to host the Oscars on her own. The first was Whoopi Goldberg.
  • Quotes
    I'm a lesbian, an Aquarian, and a vegetarian.
    • Blue sneakers
    • The Ellen DeGeneres Show
      (2003)
      $15,000,000

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