Ellen, the generousIt’s not often someone celebrates their show being cancelled – but Ellen DeGeneres had good reason to pour the bubbly when CBS canned “The Ellen Show” a few years back.
“It was the first time I ever got a bottle of wine and a note saying, ‘Congratulations, you were cancelled,’ ” says DeGeneres. That cancellation meant DeGeneres could begin planning her Telepictures talk show, “The Ellen DeGeneres Show” (10 a.m./ Ch. 4) – which, in its first season, has been a ratings success, a critical/fan favorite and has garnered a record 12 Daytime Emmy nominations.
With her first season winding down – May sweeps begin today – DeGeneres reflected on the hard work that goes into hosting a daily talk show.
“I want every single day to be better than the last,” she says. “I want to come up with something fresh and new, no matter who the guest is. It’s definitely a lot harder as far as the energy level, but it’s also easy, because it’s what I do, what I’ve been training to do over the last 20 years.
“It’s hard and easy – and it’s certainly not what I expected.
“I feel like I don’t want this to end – I’ve had situations where things have ended for me and I don’t want to ever take anything for granted,” she says. “Just because we’re doing well now doesn’t mean it will be forever, so I try to enjoy every minute it’s working and people are responding.
“I came into this not wanting to follow a formula – I didn’t want to go, ‘Well, this worked for Johnny [Carson]’,” she says. I think that’s the problem with a lot of shows – they try to follow some type of magic formula.
“The reason most shows do well it’s that they’re fresh and new,” she says. “That being said, we really can’t re-create the wheel.”
DeGeneres says she’ll be using her summer hiatus to re-charge her batteries for next season.
“Unless it’s something that I really can’t say no to, I’m basically saying no to everything . . . I just want to rest, lay down for a couple of months and get ready for next season.”
Elsewhere, Scott Matthews has been named vice president of news at co- owned Ch. 5 and Ch. 9. And King World has cancelled “Living it Up! with Ali & Jack” after one season.