A Queer History of the United States for Young People

national television—rumors of her lesbianism through her TV show.
After a successful, nearly two-decades-long career as a stand-up comic,
film, and TV actor, DeGeneres got her own TV sitcom, Ellen, playing Ellen
Morgan, a fictionalized version of herself. During its third season, tabloid
newspapers had begun hinting that DeGeneres was a lesbian. On the April
30, 1997, episode of the show, her character Ellen Morgan came out. As a
build-up to the episode, and to reinforce her own coming out, DeGeneres
appeared on the April 14 cover of Time magazine with the headline “Yep,
I’m Gay,” and made an appearance on the Oprah show.
The coming out episode of Ellen was a sensation. People sponsored
“Ellen Coming Out House Parties” and watched with their friends. A few
advertisers withdrew their sponsorship of the show, and some conservative
groups attacked DeGeneres, the show, and ABC, the television network it
appeared on. The episode had a huge audience of forty-two million viewers.
It now appeared that “coming out” was routinely national news.
Yet, in spite of all this—Ellen DeGeneres’s public coming out took place
over two decades ago—when celebrities come out, it is still news. George
Hosato Takei—who played Hikaru Sulu, helmsman for the USS Enterprise
in the original Star Trek series as well as in many of the subsequent films—
came out to the press in 2000, at the age of sixty-eight. He spoke about his
relationship with his partner (now husband) of eighteen years. Even through
Takei had never really hidden his sexuality—he was a member of several
LGBTQ groups—this became a national news story.