Ellen DeGeneres: "We're not coming back." (actress admits to impending cancellation of her sitcom 'Ellen')

"It's a really hard time for me, because there's no closure. There's no way of saying good-bye." The final word had yet to come from ABC on Ellen DeGeneres's show, but in an acceptance speech March 7 for an award from the Los Angeles Gay and Lesbian Center, the actress admitted that the end was in sight. "I know it," she said. "I can just tell by the indications that I'm getting nothing, so I'm assuming we're not coming back.

Ellen's demise would have been impossible to predict a year ago. With huge ratings for the title character's coming-out episode as well as the tremendous publicity DeGeneres herself received for acknowledging she is a lesbian, the show's success seemed guaranteed. But the past year has found the program grappling with falling ratings, a skittish network, and complaints from critics who no longer think the sitcom is funny.

Even as the program seemed to be winding down, a fresh controversy was heating up. In remarks published in the San Jose Mercury News and later picked up by Daily Variety, Chastity Bono, entertainment media director for the Gay and Lesbian Alliance Against Defamation, was quoted as saying the program was "too gay-specific" to attract a large audience. "A lot of the stuff on it is somewhat of an inside joke," Bono said. "It's one thing to have a gay lead character, but it's another when every episode deals with pretty specific gay issues."

Bono, who has led a grassroots effort to keep the show on the air, insists that the quotes were taken out of context. "It looked like me calling up Variety and attacking Ellen, which I would never do," she said. "I was merely theorizing as to the different reasons why the ratings are down, and the reporter honed in on that and twisted it. It's not indicative of how I feel at all." Joan Garry, executive director of GLAAD, claimed that the article "clearly misrepresents Chastity's good work."

Bono charged that Glenn Lovell, the reporter who wrote the story, "had an agenda." However, Lovell, who received a tip about GLAAD's "Save Ellen" effort from gay documentary filmmaker Arthur Dong, says Bono herself volunteered the idea that the show was too gay. "As soon as she said that, I said [to Bono], `Whoa, back up a second. It's unusual for an activist to say that,'" Lovell recalled. "I asked her to clarify it, and she went on from there. As for being quoted out of context, what is news is that as a spokesperson for GLAAD she thinks the show should take a more moderate line."

Bono didn't deny that her remarks were newsworthy but said, "This is still not talking about the fact that [Lovell] was taking it out of context in that we were talking about everything GLAAD was doing to save Ellen."

What DeGeneres, scheduled to appear at GLAAD's media awards dinner April 19 in Los Angeles, thinks about the flap is unclear. Simon Halls, her publicist, declined comment. Meanwhile, DeGeneres is reportedly shopping the series around to other networks.