{"id":29020,"date":"2019-08-16T04:00:00","date_gmt":"2019-08-16T10:00:00","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/kift\/music-news\/ellen-degeneres-and-portia-de-rossis-life-altering-love-story\/"},"modified":"2019-08-16T04:00:00","modified_gmt":"2019-08-16T10:00:00","slug":"ellen-degeneres-and-portia-de-rossis-life-altering-love-story","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/kift\/music-news\/ellen-degeneres-and-portia-de-rossis-life-altering-love-story\/","title":{"rendered":"Ellen DeGeneres and Portia de Rossi’s Life-Altering Love Story"},"content":{"rendered":"
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Do you remember what was Big in ’04<\/a>? Paris Hilton<\/a><\/strong> saying “That’s hot.” Nick Lachey<\/a><\/strong> and Jessica Simpson<\/a><\/strong>. Flavor Flav<\/strong> and Brigitte Nielsen<\/strong>.<\/p>\n

None of those things are big anymore, but behind the scenes at VH1’s Big in ’04 Awards something much more momentous was brewing.<\/p>\n

Dec. 1, 2004, happens to have been the night when Ellen DeGeneres<\/a><\/strong> ran into Portia De Rossi<\/a><\/strong> at L.A.’s Shrine Auditorium, after which de Rossi’s life would never be the same.<\/p>\n

Well, neither of their lives would ever be the same, because they’ve been together ever since, but de Rossi emerged like a butterfly from her chrysalis, slowly but surely and finally<\/em> embracing who she was.<\/p>\n<\/section>\n<\/div>\n

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\"Portia<\/p>\n

J. Vespa\/WireImage<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

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The Ally McBeal <\/em>and Arrested Development <\/em>star hadn’t been avoiding relationships with women, not since her 1999 divorce from Mel Metcalfe<\/strong>, anyway. (The Australian actress says she married him for the green card, but in the end she couldn’t bring herself to take advantage of their “great, caring relationship.”) In fact, she was in a relationship with writer and filmmaker Francesca<\/strong> Gregorini <\/strong>when she met DeGeneres.<\/p>\n

But as she would soon admit, as she tottered into the real-deal spotlight as the partner of one of the most famous openly gay women in the world, she hadn’t really been living her life all the way out<\/em>.<\/p>\n

De Rossi let photographs taken of her with Gregorini over the course of their two-year relationship, during which they lived for a time together in Vancouver, do the talking for her. But she herself would change the subject when interviewers asked if she was gay. She didn’t talk about that part of her private life at all, at least not publicly, until she was with Ellen.<\/p>\n<\/section>\n<\/div>\n

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“I was thinking, Well, the people who need to know I’m gay know, and I’m somehow living by example by continuing on with my career and having a full, rich life, and I am incidentally gay, but it’s not a big political platform. I justified it in so many ways,” de Rossi told The Advocate<\/em><\/a> in the summer of 2005. “Believe me, I had a very, very long and difficult struggle with my sexuality.”<\/p>\n

She revealed that just days beforehand she had come out to the last person on her list, her 98 1\/2-year-old grandmother in her native Australia, who initially thought she said “Alan,” not “Ellen.”<\/p>\n<\/section>\n<\/div>\n

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\"Ellen<\/p>\n

Time Magazine<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

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DeGeneres’ public coming out, meanwhile, occurred on the April 14, 1997, cover of TIME<\/em> magazine, so she was fully aware of how much of a conversation simply living one’s truth could start.<\/p>\n

“She was so courageous and so loud in ’97, and now she is doing something that is more subliminal,” de Rossi said admiringly. “She’s changing the world, she really is, and it’s exciting to be a part of that.” She admitted to The Advocate<\/em>, “It’s hard having a relationship that’s public. It’s hard living a life that’s somewhat public, and hard when you put that life together with someone who is so famous and so loved and admired. It’s also real exciting.”<\/p>\n

After dating Anne Heche<\/a><\/strong>for a few headline-making years, DeGeneres first met de Rossi in 2000. De Rossi recalled to The Advocate<\/em>, “I really never stopped thinking about her, because I just haven’t felt that kind of energy with anyone in my life. So there’s that.” Then they saw each other again at a photo shoot and “she took my breath away,” the actress said. So when they reunited at the Big in ’04 Awards, that was that.<\/p>\n<\/section>\n<\/div>\n

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By the end of 2005, they were sharing a two-bedroom home in L.A. and parenting three rescue cats. (London’s Evening Standard<\/a><\/em>, reporting in 2004 that Gregorini was devastated by the sudden breakup, said that de Rossi had moved right in with DeGeneres two weeks after the award show.) They also bought a 120-acre ranch, de Rossi being an avid horseback rider.<\/p>\n<\/section>\n<\/div>\n

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\"Alexandra<\/p>\n

Kevin Winter\/Getty Images<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

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“It’s the first time that I’ve known in every cell of my being that I’m with somebody for the rest of my life,” DeGeneres told People<\/em><\/a> in November 2005. She had been in a relationship with photographer Alexandra Hedison <\/strong>for four years before she and de Rossi got together.<\/p>\n

“We were just supposed to be together,” the 31-time Daytime Emmy winner said. “It was a tough decision. I was physically getting sick because I was trying not to say anything. So I told Alex and she told Francesca. It was really hard to uproot everything.”<\/p>\n

Gregorini admitted to The Advocate<\/em><\/a> in 2014 that her breakup with de Rossi was “pretty harrowing. I’ve never really talked about it, and, I want to be respectful to all the players, and, to be honest, I’ve definitely made my peace\u2014Portia and I are friends, I’m friends with Ellen.”<\/p>\n

“Everything turned out as it was meant to,” Gregorini added, “but it definitely, at the time, it was a very harrowing experience, because heartbreak is harrowing. Any breakup is just awful, but then to be dragged through the press, while it’s happening, in real time, it’s definitely not a picnic. It did make me stronger. I definitely went down for the count, for a couple months there, but, it definitely gave me a resolve to pick myself up, and make something of myself, and my life…<\/p>\n

“We were meant to be together for that point in time, and, and then not, and I think she’s found a great partner for her. I think they’re really well matched.”<\/p>\n<\/section>\n<\/div>\n

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Back in the earliest days of their relationship, DeGeneres, who’s 15 years older than de Rossi, took a “never say never” approach to the two of them having kids.<\/p>\n

Since, however, they’ve been moms to their various rescue pets (both are dedicated animal lovers and active with related charities), and shooting her talk show obviously takes up a hefty amount of Ellen’s time.<\/p>\n

And she has at least three more seasons<\/a> of The Ellen DeGeneres Show <\/em>ahead.<\/p>\n<\/section>\n<\/div>\n

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“It’s the hardest job I’ve ever had, but it’s the most satisfaction I’ve ever had, so I’m sure it’s like being a mother,” DeGeneres told People<\/em> in 2005, when Ellen was only in its third season. “It challenges you every day.”<\/p>\n<\/section>\n<\/div>\n

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\"Ellen<\/p>\n

Lara Porzak Photography via WireImage<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

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But though they didn’t have kids, another milestone that DeGeneres had hoped for in 2005 did come to pass: On May 15, 2008, after the California Supreme Court struck down a law blocking gay marriage as unconstitutional, DeGeneres announced on the air that they were planning to tie the knot.<\/p>\n

She and Portia got married<\/a> on Aug. 16, 2008, at their Beverly Hills estate, both wearing Zac Posen for their big day.<\/p>\n

Now Ellen is, to many, right up there with Oprah Winfrey<\/a><\/strong>in terms of no-last-name-needed pop culture titans. And she’s become a bit of a real estate tycoon: She and de Rossi have flipped more than a dozen Southern California properties, including a $40 million mansion in Los Angeles that they sold for $55 million<\/a> to Napster co-founder Sean Parker<\/strong> in 2014\u2014six months after buying it for $40 million. Earlier this year they bought a Bali-inspired home<\/a> in Montecito for $27 million; and listed a beach house they owned in Carpinteria for two years for $24 million (it sold in July<\/a> for $23 million), a Beverly Hills home<\/a> they owned for six months for close to $18 million, and, per Architectural Digest<\/em>, put another Santa Barbara house on the market for $8.95 million (since reduced to $7.95 million<\/a>).<\/p>\n

The LA Times<\/em> reported<\/a> in June that they bought Adam Levine<\/a><\/strong> and Behati Prinsloo<\/a><\/strong>‘s renovated 10,000-square-foot Beverly Hills mansion for $42.5 million. (As for the Beverly Hills house where they tied the knot: Ellen sold it<\/a> to pal Ryan Seacrest<\/a><\/strong> for around $40 million in 2012.)<\/p>\n<\/section>\n<\/div>\n

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\"Ellen<\/p>\n

Broadimage\/Shutterstock<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

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Home ownership has proved harrowing at times, however, through no fault of their own. The couple were among the thousands of residents who had to evacuate their house in Montecito  when the 2017 Thomas fire blazed through the area on its way to becoming the largest wild fire in California history.<\/p>\n

The fires were followed by killer mudslides that left 20 people dead in the Montecito area. DeGeneres and de Rossi had been back in their home for 10 days when they evacuated again. <\/p>\n

They expressed their thanks to the heroic firefighters<\/a> and other first responders who risked their lives<\/a> during both disasters.<\/p>\n

Talking to Extra<\/em><\/a> in December 2017 about their last-minute change of plans for the holidays, which they’d planned to spend in Montecito, Ellen put it all into perspective.<\/p>\n

“We’ll just lay low and just, you know, be grateful for having our pets with us and Portia’s horses are evacuated and we’re hoping to get them someplace soon and it’s, you know, it takes something like this to just remember, you know, just how fragile life is, and how you should never take anything for granted,” she said. “I’ll be counting my blessings for Christmas.”<\/p>\n<\/section>\n<\/div>\n

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\"Ellen<\/p>\n

Michael Rozman\/Warner Bros<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n

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Despite the (sometimes literal) storms they’ve handily weathered, like any famous couple Ellen and Portia’s soul-mates-finding-each-other story hasn’t excused them from the annoyances of being in the public eye. They’ve been the subject of as many split rumors as anybody, triggered by anything as innocuous-seeming as a missed award show or a bare ring finger, enough so that DeGeneres joked about them on her show in 2013.<\/p>\n

She said she had been flipping through a tabloid that put on its cover that her marriage was crumbling, only to find that article ripped out. “I will never know what’s tearing my marriage apart,” she quipped.<\/p>\n

But when stories that they were going through a messy split wouldn’t go away, Ellen was compelled to speak out more forcefully in March 2014.<\/p>\n

“The truth is, and this is corny, I fall more in love with Portia all the time. I really do,” she insisted to People<\/em><\/a>. “She surprises me all the time. It’s what anyone experiences when you find that person that gets you, wants to take care of you, wants the best for you. We’re really lucky because we know how rare it is.”<\/p>\n<\/section>\n<\/div>\n

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\"Ellen<\/p>\n

APEX \/ MEGA<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

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In 2016 the rumor mill was at it again, prompting DeGeneres to tell People<\/em>, “I can’t imagine not being married. I have my best friend, the person I want to spend time with more than anybody else in the world.”<\/p>\n

She and Portia remained as devoted to each other as ever, she said, and they readily put in the work that any committed relationship requires.<\/p>\n

“Our priorities are each other too,” DeGeneres said. “If we had kids, then I’m sure they would be, but we are. And that’s important.”<\/p>\n

On their ninth wedding anniversary<\/a>, she wrote on Instagram alongside one of their wedding photos, “Being her wife is the greatest thing that I am.”<\/p>\n<\/section>\n<\/div>\n

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Last year, they celebrated the big 10 with fans by sharing never-before-seen pictures and video from their wedding day<\/a>.<\/p>\n

“Ten years ago, Wayne Dyer officiated our wedding ceremony. These words were life-changing to us then, and they mean just as much now,” DeGeneres captioned one post.<\/p>\n

“10 years ago today, Ellen and I were married,” de Rossi wrote in another. “We wanted to share Wayne Dyer’s poignant and special words with you to remind us all how far we’ve come\u2014that we are living in a country that supports #marriageequality #waynedyer.”<\/p>\n<\/section>\n<\/div>\n

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Now with 11 years of marriage in the books, the couple are still still ducking the usual rumors (somehow not everyone has caught on that they sell houses all the time, it’s not personal), and still having the best time together.<\/p>\n

Last summer they went on safari in Tanzania<\/a> and were spotted in London alighting from a helicopter<\/a> just days ago.<\/p>\n<\/section>\n<\/div>\n

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\"Portia<\/p>\n

Instagram<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

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On David Letterman<\/a><\/strong>‘s My Next Guest Needs No Introduction <\/em>this year, DeGeneres called her wife “fantastic.”<\/p>\n

“She’s very, very funny. She makes me laugh, which is really important.” When she started getting ready for her first stand-up special in over 15 years, the comedian said, de Rossi was entirely supportive and even gave her notes after every performance.<\/p>\n

As for the ongoing split rumors, DeGeneres chooses to view them in a positive light.<\/p>\n

“The divorce rumors came and then we really knew the perceptions had changed,” she told Letterman. “I’m not kidding. I know it sounds ridiculous, but when that started happening, I thought, ‘Oh, now we’re finally accepted.’ We get the same s–t as every celebrity couple.’<\/p>\n

“I thought, ‘Wow, this is great that I’m pregnant, not pregnant, divorced, not divorced, whatever. That means there is an acceptance for this.”<\/p>\n<\/section>\n<\/div>\n

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(Originally published Jan. 24, 2018, at 6 a.m. PT<\/em>)<\/p>\n<\/section>\n<\/div>\n

via:: E! Online<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Do you remember what was Big in ’04? Paris Hilton saying “That’s hot.” Nick Lachey and Jessica Simpson. Flavor Flav and Brigitte Nielsen. None of those things are big anymore, but behind the scenes at VH1’s Big in ’04 Awards something much more momentous was brewing. Dec. 1, 2004, happens to have been the night […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[98],"tags":[],"class_list":{"0":"post-29020","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","6":"category-music-news"},"acf":[],"publishpress_future_action":{"enabled":false,"date":"2026-06-13 19:45:37","action":"change-status","newStatus":"draft","terms":[],"taxonomy":"category","extraData":[]},"publishpress_future_workflow_manual_trigger":{"enabledWorkflows":[]},"distributor_meta":false,"distributor_terms":false,"distributor_media":false,"distributor_original_site_name":"KIFT - The LIFT FM","distributor_original_site_url":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/kift","push-errors":false,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/kift\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/29020","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/kift\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/kift\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/kift\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/kift\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=29020"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/kift\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/29020\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/kift\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=29020"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/kift\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=29020"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/kift\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=29020"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}