Comedian and actor Eric Andre has addressed the controversy surrounding Ellen DeGeneres’s off-screen behaviour.
The Ellen Show host was the subject of criticism earlier this year when it was alleged that there was a “toxic” work environment behind the scenes of the US daytime talk show.
Speaking to Vanity Fair, Andre said: “Boohoo, Ellen was mean. Who gives a s***? I never thought she was nice! She seems like she’d be like, ‘F***ing get me a coffee! Now!’”
Though the Eric Andre Show star did concede that it was unacceptable for bosses to mistreat their employees, he said that the specific criticism that DeGeneres was “not nice” paled in comparison to some of society’s greater evils.
“We have a psychopath in the White House and we’re in the longest war of all time. It seems like small potatoes compared to the world crumbling into these right-wing authoritarian dictatorships and these industrialised nations.”
“Is that what cancel culture’s devolved to?” he asked. “‘That guy’s not nice!’ James Corden is f***ed if that’s the only criteria to get called out.”
“James Corden and Lorne Michaels are screwed! They’re trembling in their f***ing boots,” he added.
Talk show host and Gavin and Stacy actor Corden has spoken before about treating people rudely when he became famous, telling The New Yorker earlier this year: “I started to behave like a brat that I just don’t think I am.”
“It’s so intoxicating, that first flush of fame. And I think it’s even more intoxicating if you’re not bred for it,” he said.
Michaels is the TV producer and screenwriter best known for creating and producing Saturday Night Live.
Earlier this year, a petition was created proposing that DeGeneres be replaced on The Ellen DeGeneres Show by Andre, which gained 100,000 signatures and was mischievously shared on social media by Andre himself.
