Ellen Nixes New York Shows
Ellen DeGeneres is canceling in the east and honoring West.
The talk-show host has backed out of plans to take her daily chatfest to New York next week following an attack from the Writers Guild of America East and the cancellation of at least one of her scheduled guests in protest.
DeGeneres has repeatedly come under fire in the past two weeks for what's been deemed scablike behavior by the WGAE. The union has scolded DeGeneres, a WGA member, for failing to show solidarity with the guild and support for her show's writers. Instead of making like Jon Stewart, Stephen Colbert, Jay Leno, David Letterman, Conan O'Brien, Jimmy Kimmel and Craig Ferguson, all of whom have gone dark since the strike, DeGeneres has forged ahead with production on the now writerless Ellen DeGeneres Show.
"We're delighted that Ellen DeGeneres has decided not to come to New York to tape her program," the WGA East president Michael Winship said Tuesday. "She knows that the Writers Guild East would have been there to protest her lack of solidarity, not only with her Guild writing staff but all the striking members of the Writers Guild, of which she is a member."
DeGeneres was scheduled to tape shows on Nov. 19 and 20 in Manhattan, but will now shoot the shows from her usual studio in Burbank.
"We will be even more delighted if she does not cross the Guild picket lines at the NBC Studios in Burbank, where her show usually is produced," Winship added.
DeGeneres has not given a reason for backing out of her Big Apple trip. But in addition to wanting to avoid a high-profile protest, she may not have wanted to press her luck with potentially disappearing guests.
Earlier this week, Keri Russell, who was scheduled to appear next week to promote her new film August Rush, canceled her guest spot, reportedly in protest of the show's ongoing production.
DeGeneres did skip her taping Nov. 5, the first day of the work stoppage. However, she returned to work the following day, saying she loves her writers but that audience members had made often pricey arrangements to see the show and she didn't want to let them down.
She also argued it was the all-important sweeps period and her direct competitors, syndicated daytime fare à la The Oprah Winfrey Show, would be forging ahead with new programming.
Her syndicated comrades, however, do not employ members of WGA.
So far, DeGeneres has been defended by the American Federation of Television & Radio Artists, a union of which the host is also a member. AFTRA issued a statement last week, saying DeGeneres was legally obligated to continue in her on-air capacity.
Meanwhile, though DeGeneres may be making enemies by keeping her show on air, she is already attempting to redress the balance with one sympathetic deed.
She will dedicate Wednesday's episode to Kanye West's mother, Donda West, who died Saturday apparently due to complications from cosmetic surgery. Mother and son appeared on DeGeneres' show together two times in the past, the most recent visit having taken place last May. During Wednesday's tribute episode, DeGeneres will run clips from those appearances.
"I just saw her a couple weeks ago," DeGeneres said in a statement this week. "He was as close to her as I am to my mother. He took her everywhere. They were always together. She's been on the show twice...just a wonderful vibrant woman."
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