One current and 10 former employees of The Ellen DeGeneres have come forward anonymously with claims regarding a “toxic work environment” on set.
The individuals, who spoke on the condition of anonymity out of fear of retribution, told Buzzfeed News in a piece published Thursday, July 16 that Ellen DeGeneres‘ eponymous daytime talk show isn’t the cheery, benevolent program viewers see at home. Instead, employees said they were fired after taking medical leave or bereavement days, faced microaggressions and were subjected to favoritism by executive producers.
No specific claims were made against DeGeneres, however some told Buzzfeed News they were told not to speak to the A-lister if she was in the office.
“People focus on rumors about how Ellen is mean and everything like that, but that’s not the problem,” one former employee claimed. “The issue is these three executive producers running the show who are in charge of all these people [and] who make the culture and are putting out this feeling of bullying and being mean. They feel that everybody who works at The Ellen Show is lucky to work there: ‘So if you have a problem, you should leave because we’ll hire someone else because everybody wants to work here.'”