"I feel like I’m not doing enough"

February 2, 2018 1:40 PM

To celebrate Ellen Degeneres turning 60, Portia de Rossi surprised her with a gift.

Learn more at ellendegenereswildlifefund.org
See more of Ellen's birthday show

posted by I'm Not Even Supposed To Be Here Today! (26 comments total)

Oh, this is so sweet! And what a line: "It's good to be loved, it's profound to be understood." Thank you for posting.
posted by everybody had matching towels at 1:53 PM on February 2, 2018 [28 favorites]

Ellen turning 60 just doesn't compute in my brain.
posted by DrAstroZoom at 1:54 PM on February 2, 2018 [43 favorites]

I'm crying. That was lovely.

And the love in Ellen's eyes when Portia comes out on stage... oof, I think my heart just swelled three sizes.
posted by Lexica at 1:54 PM on February 2, 2018 [9 favorites]

Oh my goodness, what a video.

A few short years ago, when Portia was a guest on the show she and Ellen would hug, but never kiss. I’m so glad those days are over.

What a gift to be seen for who you are and for your true passions. What a gift, to say “I’m not doing enough” and to be understood, not negated.
posted by third word on a random page at 1:55 PM on February 2, 2018 [19 favorites]

That was very sweet.

As to Ellen's age, she was 32 when she began her breakout (from stand-up) role as the sassy receptionist on UPN? series Open House -- I was an immediate fan -- and didn't get her own sitcom until 1994 ... she was 39 the year of her personal (public) and character coming out. So yeah late bloomer career wise.
posted by dhartung at 2:08 PM on February 2, 2018 [1 favorite]

And the love in Ellen's eyes when Portia comes out on stage.

Yeah, that love is real because, as much as I love her and find her a wonderful television presenter and comedian, I saw her shows and Mr. Wrong and she's definitely not that good of an actor.

And also, not to seem like I'm dismissing the whole amazing thing to focus on what a woman is wearing, but OH MY GOD PORTIA'S PANTS.
posted by MCMikeNamara at 2:08 PM on February 2, 2018 [14 favorites]

Aw, that was lovely. It's a gift to the country of Rwanda as well- the tourism dollars will be welcome.
posted by Secretariat at 2:20 PM on February 2, 2018

Awwwww, the dust must be acting up in here. Thanks for sharing the video!
posted by Hermeowne Grangepurr at 2:35 PM on February 2, 2018

I think I'm allergic to gorillas. Or something. That was lovely!
posted by mumimor at 2:37 PM on February 2, 2018 [1 favorite]

Awww! Ellen's face when Portia comes on stage is adorable, but I love her intense focus as Portia starts talking. Seriously hanging on every word.
posted by rmd1023 at 3:19 PM on February 2, 2018 [8 favorites]

So lovely! Thanks for posting this. Ellen is a gem.
posted by mermayd at 3:27 PM on February 2, 2018

Apparently Portia Di Rossi is 65 years old, which means she was 50 when they started filming Arrested Development -- 11 years younger than Jessica Walters who played Lucille Bluth.

Also this is very lovely and touching, and I'm very happy for them.
posted by mrmurbles at 3:27 PM on February 2, 2018

45. de Rossi is 45.
posted by Iris Gambol at 3:29 PM on February 2, 2018 [9 favorites]

45. de Rossi is 45.

Well that's what I get for trusting the google result of "portia di Rossi age" which says she is 65 and born in 1953. But, yeah, if you click into Wikipedia it says 1973, which makes much more sense. Sorry for the misinformation!
posted by mrmurbles at 3:32 PM on February 2, 2018 [6 favorites]

Hey, mad props to her if it's actually a long con.
posted by Iris Gambol at 3:46 PM on February 2, 2018 [16 favorites]

I know a lot of people who will personally benefit from this. If I can work something out at my next conference, I am a person who will personally benefit from this. This is a lovely tribute, and a great gift not just for Ellen, but to the people of Rwanda and primatologists and everyone who cares about wildlife and research and the conservation of endangered national heritage.
posted by ChuraChura at 5:02 PM on February 2, 2018 [48 favorites]

How amazing. I am verklempt.
posted by billsaysthis at 5:18 PM on February 2, 2018

God, I hated this so much. So, so much.

I'm 13-months post-divorce, and I've recently decided that I really, really like being single.

Thanks a LOT, Portia and Ellen.
posted by mudpuppie at 6:05 PM on February 2, 2018 [17 favorites]

It amazes me that they know how many of those gorillas are living in the wild. I'd love to learn what methodology they used to figure it out.
posted by 4ster at 7:32 PM on February 2, 2018 [1 favorite]

Ok this is so fucking awesome and the look on Ellen's face when she realized the magnitude of the love her wife has for her made me ugly sob immediately. Thank you for posting.
posted by Hermione Granger at 7:41 PM on February 2, 2018 [8 favorites]

You only find mountain gorillas on the high peaks of the Virunga mountains where Rwanda, Uganda, and Democratic Republic of Congo converge. Their ranges are national parks - Virunga, Kahuzi-Biega, and Bwindi-Impenetrable - and the parks are patrolled by rangers and researchers who follow habituated groups every day from before sunrise until the gorillas go to sleep (even in the face of terrifying geopolitical upheaval). In addition to follows of habituated groups, researchers also do censuses through the parks. You can count the number of gorillas you can see and hear, and you can also get a good estimate of the population by walking along a transect and looking at nest counts, gorilla feces, tracks, and feeding traces. These populations have been the subject of intensive study since the 70s, and the population is small enough that they know exactly who is where. They do amazing health monitoring, too. And the rangers have persisted in incredibly dangerous conditions during the war in Kivu. It's a truly inspiring project, and they've also been able to partner very closely with Rwandan, Ugandan, and Congolese scientists and students.

The other cool thing is that there are so many other organisms benefiting from this intensive conservation. Okapis, all sorts of crazy monkeys, snakes, plants, duikers, etc. One of my many dreams is to work for a bit on the Golden monkeys there - they specialize on bamboo even though their larger taxonomic group (the guenons, who I study) are mostly ripe fruit specialists! There's so much to learn, and it's lovely to know that the station at Karisoke will be maintained and improved. That part of Africa is world heritage.
posted by ChuraChura at 8:10 PM on February 2, 2018 [65 favorites]

Wow! Thanks ChuraChura!
posted by 4ster at 8:56 PM on February 2, 2018 [1 favorite]

(I just realized there are probably no okapis... you have to be further west in the Congo basin to run into them)
posted by ChuraChura at 12:34 AM on February 3, 2018 [1 favorite]

This was lovely and the “to be understood” resonates deeply with me.

My instant thought after the video ended was how this will work in the region, what secondary impact will be made by this being a center named for possibly the most famous lesbian in the world. Rwanda is coming along in terms of LGBT rights, but that’s not saying a lot, Congo isn’t the worst, but Uganda which is also part of the mountains’ region is a nightmare. Will this have positive effects or is there a risk of people not wanting to work at or contribute to the center. Hopefully only positive, but I hope (and would be curious to learn more about) any work or reasoning done around this. I meet similar issues in my own work, how to keep an explicitly pro-LGBT layer in an organization working with a predominantly homophobic/sceptic population.
posted by Iteki at 2:33 AM on February 3, 2018 [10 favorites]

It's a challenging thing, iteki. I know Western researchers who have stayed closeted to work in Uganda and were cautiously out in Rwanda. And that's to say nothing of the experience of LGBT Rwandan/Ugandan/Congolese scientists, which I really don't know much about. Primatologists are becoming more conscientious about the experience of students and researchers who aren't upper middle class straight white Christians, and this is one of the things we're grappling with. It's a hard balance to strike. For example, there was pushback to holding international meetings in Nairobi this summer because of concerns about LGBT rights in Kenya, but we also have a significant number of researchers in sub-Saharan Africa for whom attending international meetings in Europe or North America is prohibitively expensive.
posted by ChuraChura at 9:06 AM on February 3, 2018 [11 favorites]

What a beautiful thing.

I can't say I'm a fan of hers in the traditional sense -- I mean, I never watch her show -- but man she sure seems like a tremendously decent human in a world kinda short of them.

(I am unabashedly a fan of gorillas, though.)
posted by uberchet at 6:25 AM on February 6, 2018 [1 favorite]