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Movies & TV

02nd Jun 2019

Ellen DeGeneres speaks out about her sexual abuse in new Netflix series

Rudi Kinsella

Ellen DeGeneres

Ellen DeGeneres spoke very candidly in a new episode of My Guest Needs No Introduction.

Ellen DeGeneres was one of the guests on the new season of My Guest Needs No Introduction with David Letterman, and her interview was far more emotional than many fans expected it to be.

The TV chat show host is used to being the one asking the questions, but in this instance, she was being asked about her life and career as a whole.

The topic of conversation shifted to her stepfather sexually abusing her when she was a teenager, after her mother was diagnosed with breast cancer.

“He told me… he’d felt a lump in her breast and needed to feel my breasts,” she told interviewer David Letterman.

DeGeneres first spoke about the abuse back in 2005, but said she was now going into more detail “because I want other girls to not ever let someone do that”.

Her mother has since broke her silence about the subject, telling NBC News “I know now that one of the hardest things to do is speak up after being sexually abused. I love my daughter, and I wish I had the capacity to listen to her when she told me what happened.”

Speaking at the end of the interview, DeGeneres said: “We covered a lot more than I intended on covering.”

Other guests on the new season of the series include Lewis Hamilton and Melinda Gates, and all episodes are now on Netflix.

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