Ellen DeGeneres Netflix Special is Painfully Self-Indulgent: Review

“For Your Approval,” the new comedy special starring Ellen DeGeneres, begins with a sort of run-through of DeGeneres’ long career. We open with a shot of DeGeneres in her dressing room, smiling wistfully as she looks in the mirror and sees, over herself, a projected memory of her first appearance on Johnny Carson’s “Tonight Show”; She smiles slightly at the memory, then stands and walks down the hall to the stage. As she walks by, she sees clips from her 1990s sitcom on monitors, including her character’s (and her own) coming out as a lesbian. She walks up a flight of stairs where each individual rung has a headline about the cancellation of that 1998 sitcom and hears voices like Barbara Walters and Diane Sawyer describing the controversy; She lets out a deep sigh at the top of the stairs. 2024 DeGeneres breaks into a brave smile as Dory, her “Finding Nemo” character projected behind her, instructs her to “Just keep swimming.”

It’s a spectacle of ego that seems at odds with the humble, righteous attitude DeGeneres displays on stage — but that gap has been part of the whole Ellen experience lately. While the package goes on to describe first the seismic success of her talk show, which launched in 2003 (just five years after her sitcom was canceled) and then the painful swirl of reporting around the workplace culture during the talk show ‘Ellen’ Before it went off the air in 2022, there’s an uneasy feeling of being stuck in a ride with someone living in her own mythology.

The special is being marketed as DeGeneres’ last; An hour and a half into the bombastic Eras Tour-style opening tour of DeGeneres’ iconography and impact, she thanks the crowd for allowing her to “say goodbye on my terms.” And suffice to say, DeGeneres has a lot on her mind. That’s true even if she doesn’t explicitly address the conclusion of her talk show: an early bit, about the challenges of parallel parking, seems designed to draw the audience’s attention to safer ground, away from the dramas with which she left her daytime program. But her reference to “the deep shame you feel when you give up and drive away” seems to resonate beyond the parking lot.

She then straightens herself up and continues with tame observations about how annoying windshield wipers are. This – and, elsewhere in the special, the musing on the respective personalities of doves and butterflies – is the kind of thing DeGeneres has been known for since the start of her career. That understated, low-key approach has made it ironic that she has become a cultural lightning rod twice over, first for her openness about her sexuality, and then for her reputation as a tough and demanding boss. After the initial outburst, DeGeneres was able to enjoy the cold, just-talking aspect of her comedy. Contrary to what she claimed on stage about being “kicked out of show business,” in the five years after “Ellen” was canceled a new sitcom for CBS, hosted the Emmys, starred in a Pixar movie and got a talk show deal. At each step, her fun, sunny, easy-going personality shined through, and the advancements in her career helped legitimately make progress for queer people.

It seems harder for her to dig herself out now, partly because she seems less interested; A key aspect of the special is the discussion of aging, and DeGeneres, who is closing out her career, doesn’t seem interested in defending herself on specific terms at this point. (That’s not to say she’s at peace with it. She’s angry about the criticism she’s received, noting that it was unfair and unreasonable to expect her, a career comedian, to also be a boss in the workplace .) She talks about the culture in the workplace. set as fun and happy, and makes a joke about how her love of scaring people looks different in retrospect – a joke that’s a bit too convoluted, and clouded by what actually happened, to land.

Comparing DeGeneres’ two career explosions is also challenging, because in the first case she was clearly a victim of prejudice (albeit, as noted, during the short period she was between appearances); in the second case the matter seems murkier. She notes that the confusion surrounding her reported behavior conflicted with her ordering her audience to “be kind” at the end of each episode. “If I had ended my show by saying, ‘Go fuck yourself,’” she muses as the audience roars, “people would have been surprised to find out I’m nice.” Well, sure. But a third and surprisingly attractive option might have been to end her show by saying “goodbye” or “see you tomorrow.” There’s no reason at all why DeGeneres had to say “Be nice”; if her persona was a prison, it was at least partly one of her own making.

DeGeneres is in the most stable position in this special when it comes to discussing the universally recognizable. Windshield wiper humor just feels time-consuming, but DeGeneres tackling her mother’s dementia, for which she is in a care facility, is conveyed with clear emotion and biting humor. DeGeneres at times seems frustrated in “For Your Approval” that her personality — the talk show games, the talkative bonhomie, the big checks handed out to audience members, “Be Kind” — blossomed beyond her control, though I say that at his least would argue the way she chose to end each episode was firmly within her reach. But to the extent the claim is true, it’s because the Ellen DeGeneres who conquered celebrity culture and set the relentlessly, banally optimistic tone for the Obama era tended to obscure the Ellen DeGeneres who sees things so clearly. keep.

But of course the hardest thing to see is yourself. “For Your Approval” is executive produced by DeGeneres and by Ben Winston, the current leader of celebrity worship television. From James Corden’s ‘Late Late Show’ to Hulu’s ‘The Kardashians’ to the 2021 ‘Friends’ reunion, Winston products tend to be so polished that no negative impression can linger for long. In DeGeneres, Winston has found a subject for whom—whatever she might say about the way she was thrown out of the company—there is still enough existing affection to give her power over her audience. Late in the special, DeGeneres lists her complications, culminating in the declaration: “I am tough, impatient and demanding. I am direct. I am a strong woman.” The standing ovation that follows may continue, and continue – and continue.

DeGeneres is clearly strong and someone who has been through a lot; That said, articles about the work culture at an office she led are available for anyone who wants to dig into it. To come back and just talk about what was on her mind, without addressing the content, was a choice available to her, and that probably would have been fine; digging all the way in would certainly be intriguing. But to allude to the fact that she was abused and “kicked out of show business” while dancing around what exactly happened on her set takes both dexterity and a bit of nerve. “For Your Approval” is ultimately a frustrating watch and a wanderer to go out on.

“Ellen DeGeneres: For Your Approval” premieres on Netflix on September 24.