As you might know, the two have known each other since the 90s when they were budding comics. Rosie told The Hollywood Reporter that they had a “good relationship” and “were friends” at the time.
She recalled how she “went to parties” with Ellen, Melissa Etheridge, and KD Lange, and how she hosted Ellen on an episode of her show, where she pretended to be “Lebanese” with her before Ellen arrived. joked about. Outside.
“We supported each other,” she said. “Which is why when she came on my show, I said, ‘I’m not going to let you stand there alone. ‘Let’s take a joke there.’ And we sat down and came up with, ‘Oh my God, I love KC Kasem. Maybe I’m Lebanese.’ It’s a big deal.”
But eventually, something changed in their relationship.
“It became a weird, ‘There can’t be two gays in this town,’ kind of thing,” Rosie said. “Then we each had success and went our separate ways.”
But recently, she got a message from Ellen. Rosie shared, “She checked in on me a few weeks ago to see how I was doing, and I asked her how she was surviving TV.” “It’s a big transition. But there’s awkwardness in our relationship. I don’t know if it’s the jealousy, the competition, or the fact that he once said a mean thing about me that really hurt my feelings.
Rosie was referencing Ellen’s previous comments to Larry King that she did not know Rosie and was not her friend. Rosie told Andy Cohen last year that Ellen was “hurt [her] Feelings like a kid,” and that she “never really got over it.”
While Ellen did not publicly address Rosie’s comments at the time, Rosie said she apologized for the remarks during their chat. “She wrote, ‘I’m really sorry and I don’t remember that,'” Rosie shared. “I think he saw me talking about it on Andy Cohen’s show. I remember it very well, I had T-shirts printed and I gave them to my employees who said ‘I Don’t know Rosie. We are not friends.’ ,
Rosie also said: “I have a picture of her in my hands [my then-infant son] Parker. I know his mother. Without her in the room, I could recognize her brother. I knew him for so many years. It felt like I didn’t trust this person to be in my world.”
Ellen has yet to respond to Rosie’s latest comments, but in the meantime, you can read the full interview here.