If you were on the internet in 2010, you probably faintly remember a video of a floppy-haired kid named Greyson Chance performing a wildly impressive cover of Lady Gaga’s “Paparazzi.” You may even remember Ellen DeGeneres featuring Chance on her talk show, which launched his video into true viral territory. Chance was signed mere months after that appearance to DeGeneres’ since-shuttered record company, eleveneleven, as the label’s first artist.
Although this sounds like a wholesome, extremely 2010s internet story, Greyson Chance is now setting the record straight. In a new interview with Rolling Stone, the 25-year-old singer said that he has “never met someone more manipulative, more self-centered, and more blatantly opportunistic” than the former talk show host.
Chance told the publication that this interview was “the first time I’ve been honest about her, and this is the last time I want to talk about it.” He gave a detailed timeline of his experiences with DeGeneres, starting with a phone call that his mother received a week after the video was posted to YouTube. Upon taking his first plane ride to Los Angeles to meet DeGeneres, Chance said that she told his mother, “You’re never going to have to work again a day in your life.”
Meanwhile, she made similar lofty promises to Chance, saying, “I’m going to protect you. I’m going to be here for you. We’re going to do this together.”
DeGeneres showered Chance in gifts, including $10,000 and a new piano, and secured a team of longtime music industry professionals to help grow his burgeoning career. But as he started touring, Chance claimed DeGeneres became “really invested,” “domineering and way too controlling,” even exerting control over his wardrobe.
“My whole week, my whole month, my whole year could change [with] one text message from her,” Chance told Rolling Stone. “That was horrible.”
That includes an incident in which DeGeneres allegedly berated Chance and his mother for not watching an advance copy of Justin Bieber’s Never Say Never documentary that she had acquired for them, even though Chance was exhausted from back-to-back tour dates.
According to Chance, DeGeneres said to his mother, “What type of mother are you? Do you realize that I went out of my way to get this for you, and he can’t sit down and watch it?” To him, DeGeneres said, “Disappointed isn’t even remotely what I’m feeling right now.”
