Kathy Griffin Once Called Ellen DeGeneres a ‘F*cking Untalented Hack’ in an Argument
Fellow comedians don’t always get along, as a certain 2014 Kathy Griffin Ellen DeGeneres phone call would attest. Griffin, the outspoken actress and comedian who became infamous for a photo of her holding up the bloodied, decapitated head of U.S. President Donald Trump in May 2017, thereafter embarked on a “Laugh Your Head Off” stand-up comedy tour, on which she clued in audiences to the time she let Ellen have it over the phone.
Griffin used that tour to discuss how her life changed after the iconic photo hubbub, and also spilled piping hot tea about other celebs, including one that left our jaws on the floor: a Kathy Griffin Ellen DeGeneres phone call in which Griffin called the lesbian (soon-to-be-former) daytime talk show host a “fucking untalented hack” for refusing to honor comedian Joan Rivers after she died in September 2014.
So what was the Kathy Griffin Ellen DeGeneres beef about anyway?
During a 2018 show at the Dolby Theatre in Los Angeles, Griffin said, “One of the things that really hurt Joan [Rivers], and we talked about it at our last meal together, was that Ellen [DeGeneres] always shunned her and Ellen thought she was vulgar and not funny.”
“I called her,” Griffin continued, “and I just said, ‘Look, woman to woman, comic to comic, I think you need to let go of your hatred for Joan Rivers. She’s passed away, just do a fucking tribute, be cool.’”
Griffin said that DeGeneres refused and said, “There’s a difference between mean and funny,” stating that Rivers was mean.
Griffin said, “That fucking set me off. So we had a fight in which I used inflammatory words like, ‘Look, you fucking untalented hack.’ … You know when you’re fighting with someone and you can kind of laugh at a point? Yeah, not that day.”
Still bothered by the discussion the next day, Griffin says she decided to text DeGeneres, stating, “It was so Dynasty that I demand to be Alexis as long as you’re Krystle.” She continued, “I think we should do a scene in the pool, I think there should be big hats [and] that bitch didn’t even respond! But that was a good idea!”
For the record, Joan Rivers was the first woman ever to host a late-night talk show program, which aired during the late ’80s and early ’90s. Afterwards she became well-known for her comedic red carpet celebrity interviews and eventually hosted the E! Network series Fashion Police in the early 2010s, during which she and her co-panelists would crack jokes and critique celebrity fashions, giving Rivers a “mean” reputation among some viewers.
Kathy Griffin is finding herself in headlines once again due to a recent announcement that she has lung cancer and would be undergoing surgery to remove part of her lung. Griffin also revealed that she had attempted suicide while battling a prescription pill addiction. Hornet wishes her a quick recovery and continued success with her sobriety.
