Laura Dern says helping Ellen DeGeneres come out on sitcom was ‘one of the most incredible experiences’ of her life

Laura Dern has reflected on the “crazy” and “incredible” experience of helping Ellen DeGeneres make queer history with her coming out scene on her ‘90s sitcom Ellen.

In April 1997, Marriage Story actress and LGBTQ+ icon Laura Dern joined forces with DeGeneres and other industry heavyweights, including Oprah Winfrey and Demi Moore, for a revelatory, two-part episode of DeGeneres’ comedy show Ellen.

During the episode, entitled “The Puppy Episode”, DeGeneres character Ellen Morgan, who was based on the former talk show host, realised that she is a lesbain after connecting with the colleague of a friend. The colleague, named Susan, was played by Dern.

After initially brushing off Susan’s advances, Ellen later tracked her down to the airport and came out as gay. In doing so, DeGeneres’ character became the first leading lesbian character on TV. DeGeneres herself became the first lesbian actress to play a leading lesbian character, too.

Ellen Morgan’s coming out aligned with Ellen DeGeneres’ own coming out; she came out as a lesbian during an interview with TIME magazine two weeks prior to “The Puppy Episode” airing.

During a recent chat with Bowen Yang and Matt Rogers on their Las Culturistas podcast, Dern spoke about the “honour” and “privilege” of taking part in the episode.

“Back to cultural shifts, you know, obviously we’re only going to effect change if we’re the first ones,” she said, as the trio discussed the advancement of LGBTQ+ representation.

“Culture catching up to storytelling for the LGBTQ community had to be a thing when someone would go first,” she continued.

Palm Royale star Laura Dern, 59, went on to recount being part of “The Puppy Episode” as a “massive moment” for her and general popular culture. 

However, she said that her and the cast’s “assumption” was that people would see the episode, and have their hearts and minds opened to the LGBTQ+ community. Sadly, that wasn’t the case.

The team assumed that they were “going to do this thing and thank God people will wake up, love their relatives and their neighbours, see them, everything will expand, culture will catch up, and it will be a beautiful celebration,” she shared.

After the scenes aired the whole cast, including Dern, were subject to a “crazy” week and following “couple of years”.

“It was like major security for a couple of years for any of us involved,” she recalled, explaining that they were subjected to “bomb threats, losing sponsors, and advertisers”.

“The world went, ‘No, no, no.’ She lost her show,” Dern said. One year and one season after the coming out scene, Ellen was cancelled. The cancellation was ostensibly down to falling ratings, but the heavily criticised coming out scene also had a major impact.

Dern went on to state that watching Ellen come out in character was “one of the most incredible experiences” of her life to date.

During the airport scene, DeGeneres and Dern held hands as DeGeneres character confessed her feelings for Susan.

“She was looking in my eyes, saying for the first time, out loud, with people watching,” Dern remembered.

“The privilege, the luxury of feeling it for someone in a moment was so beautiful. It was one of the most incredible experiences of my life.”

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