Ellen DeGeneres will end her daytime
talk show after 19 seasons, DeGeneres announced on Wednesday.
Speaking with The Hollywood
Reporter, DeGeneres said that she was ending the show because it
was “not a challenge anymore.”
“When you’re a creative person, you
constantly need to be challenged – and as great as this show is,
and as fun as it is, it’s just not a challenge anymore,”
DeGeneres said. “I was going to stop after season 16. That was
going to be my last season, and they wanted to sign for four more
years and I said I’d sign maybe for one. They were saying there was
no way to sign for one. 'We can’t do that with the affiliates and
the stations need more of a commitment.' So, we [settled] on three
more years, and I knew that would be my last. That’s been the plan
all along. And everybody kept saying, even when I signed, 'You know,
that’s going to be 19, don’t you want to just go to 20? It’s a
good number.' So is 19. (Laughs.)”
DeGeneres, 63, returned to television
in 2003 with her syndicated talk show, The Ellen DeGeneres Show,
after ABC canceled her sitcom, Ellen, following her coming out
gay on the cover of Time magazine and the coming out of her
character on the show in 1997. She married actress Portia de Rossi in
2008.
Wednesday's announcement comes almost a
year after allegations surfaced of a toxic workplace at her talk
show. According to Nielsen ratings, the show has lost more than a
million viewers this season.
The Ellen DeGeneres Show has
earned 64 Daytime Emmys.