Rosie O’Donnell said “a weird thing” led her never to appear on Ellen DeGeneres’ former talk show.
The “Now and Then” star helped pave the way for DeGeneres and her now-canceled series but explained on “Watch What Happens Live” Thursday that the “Finding Nemo” voice actress ended up snubbing her.
“We had a little bit of a weird thing,” O’Donnell told Andy Cohen. “After my show went off the air and hers was coming on the air, Larry King was on with Ellen and he said, ‘Whatever happened to Rosie O’Donnell? Her show went down the tubes. She came out as a lesbian and disappeared!’
“And Ellen said, and I’m quoting, ‘I don’t know Rosie. We’re not friends.’”
O’Donnell, 60, admitted that she “never really got over” DeGeneres’ public comments.
“I was in bed with Kelli [Carpenter], and I said, ‘Did I just hear that or was that a hallucination, auditory voice in my [head]?’” O’Donnell said, shocked. “It hurt my feelings, like a baby, and I never really got over it.”
The “Mr. Wrong” star, 64, had appeared on “The Rosie O’Donnell Show” and jokingly came out as “Lebanese,” but DeGeneres’ public comments turned O’Donnell off to appearing on DeGeneres’ show despite receiving an invitation “at the end” of the show’s run.
The “Harriet the Spy” star said she wanted to bring someone with her so it would be “a little less awkward,” but DeGeneres’ staff “didn’t want to do that,” so O’Donnell declined.
Closing the conversation, O’Donnell told Cohen, “I wish her all good things in her life and that she should be well, so there you go.”
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