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In her posthumous memoir, Call Me Anne, actress Anne Heche wrote that Ellen was the ‘first and only woman that I ever fell in love with’ and added that she was ‘mesmerized’ by how open the comedian was about her sexuality.
Famously, Heche dated the talk show host between 1997-2000, in the process becoming one of Hollywood’s first openly lesbian couples.
During her life, Heche had been open about the fact that her father, a Baptist choir minister, was a closeted homosexual. He passed away due to AIDS complications at 45 in 1983.
‘I think my father was a sexual addict. I think he saw everybody as a sexual being. But I think at that time he was living a very flamboyant homosexual lifestyle,’ she told Larry King in a 2001 interview. ‘You know, at that time there were bath houses where the whole trick was how many can you do a night. You know, there is no question of what he was doing at that time.’
Heche was killed in a fiery car crash in August. The actress had traces of cocaine and fentanyl in her system at the time. She was 53 years old.
In the book, Heche accuses Six Days, Seven Nights director Ivan Reitman of telling her to be more like Jodie Foster and not talk publicly about her sexuality. She wrote: ‘Why, Ivan asked me, can’t I just be like Jodie Foster? (I didn’t know what that meant. “Everybody knows it,” he explained, “it” being her sexuality. “She just doesn’t talk about it
The way they were: Ellen DeGeneres posted a heartfelt message to her ex-girlfriend Anne Heche just before it was revealed that the actress has died aged 53 in August
Heche’s son, Homer, revealed earlier this month that his mother had finished her memoir’s manuscript prior to her passing in August
Heche’s autobiography, the follow-up to her 2001 book Call Me Crazy, will be released on January 24.
In an excerpt from the book, published by People, Heche writes about compromising her burgeoning movie career over her relationship with Ellen. The actress laments not being asked at the time by media outlets about why she was in a relationship with the comedian.
Heche wrote: ‘Since nobody asked, I will tell you why. Because I had lived in a family that was built upon lies. My father hid his sexuality his entire life.’
She continued: ‘When I met Ellen and she was open and honest about her sexuality, it was the most attractive and alluring quality in a person that I had ever seen. I was mesmerized by her honesty, and that is why she was the first and only woman that I ever fell in love with.’
‘I was in love with a person who had chosen to leverage her very public persona in support of the cause she was standing up for, which was LGBTQ+ rights for everybody on the planet who wanted them. Love became my destiny,’ the late star added.
In 1983, her father, Donald, became one of the first people in the United States to be diagnosed with AIDS, which was how his family came to learn that the Baptist minister and choir director had been living a secret homosexual life.
According to Heche, her father never admitted to being gay. He died from the disease at the age of 45.
Heche pictured attempting to escape a gurney as firefighters bring her to safety following her fiery crash on August 5
‘This is a sad day’: DeGeneres, who who dated Heche from 1997 to 2000. ‘I’m sending Anne’s children, family and friends all of my love’
Following her tragic death, Ellen released a brief statement on Twitter saying: ‘This is a sad day. I’m sending Anne’s children, family and friend all of my love.’
The Donnie Brasco star is survived by two sons – Atlas, whom she had with Tupper, and Homer, 20, whom she had with her ex-husband Coleman Laffoon.
Heche also wrote about being confronted during the filming of the smash hit comedy Six Days, Seven Night in 1997 over her relationship with Ellen.
Heche said that her co-star, Harrison Ford, and director, Ivan Reitman, grilled her about rumors that she and Ellen were having a child.
She wrote: ‘Our ‘pregnancy’ was everywhere. They showed me this as proof of why this openness about my relationship was becoming a pain in the ass for them.’
Anne Heche and Harrison Ford in the 1998 hit movie Six Days Seven Nights
Six Days, Seven Nights director Ivan Reitman asked Heche to be more like Jodie Foster and not speak publicly about her sexuality
Heche pictured during the filming of Six Days, Seven Nights, in the blurb for her new book, her co-star Harrison Ford is referred to as her ‘mentor’
DeGeneres and Heche were serious enough that in 1999, they declared that if Vermont legalized same-sex marriage in a highly publicized case then before the state’s supreme court, they would tie the knot.
Heche continued: ‘Why, Ivan asked me, can’t I just be like Jodie Foster? (I didn’t know what that meant. “Everybody knows it,” he explained, “it” being her sexuality. “She just doesn’t talk about it.'”)
Foster first publicly acknowledge her sexuality in 2007 during a speech at the The Hollywood Reporter’s Women in Entertainment breakfast.
It doesn’t appear that Heche holds any ill-will towards Ford. The blurb for Call Me Anne makes reference to ‘How Harrison Ford became her on-set mentor.’
In a 2020 interview with People, she said it was Ford who stepped in and saved her part in the comedy.
‘I would not have gotten that movie. He called me the day after they said I wasn’t gonna get it, because I took Ellen to the [Volcano] premiere, and Harrison Ford, he was a hero.
‘He said, “Frankly my dear, I don’t give a damn who you’re sleeping with. We’re gonna make the best romantic comedy there is, and I’ll see ya on the set.”‘
The Heche family, left to right, Nancy, Abigail, Nathan, Donald and Anne Heche
Throwback to 1997: DeGeneres and Heche were serious enough that in 1999, they declared that if Vermont legalized same-sex marriage, they would tie the knot
Just prior to her death, Heche said in an interview with the Behind the Velvet Rope podcast that she and Ellen split because the comedian’s goal was to ‘make a lot of money.’
Although Heche did credit Ellen with ‘moving the needle’ by coming out.
She said in the interview: ‘Ellen deserves the position she deserves. She did not have warriors on her side other than me. We were each other’s army and that has been erased from history but it was true. She didn’t have a lot of people standing up for her or with her.’
Earlier this month, Heche’s 20-year-old son Homer took over his mother’s Instagram account to announce the publication of the book.
Homer explained that his mother had finished the manuscript for her book prior to her passing. He said: ‘I know she was excited to share with the world. So, mom, here I am sharing it with the community you created, may it flourish and take on a life of it’s own, as you would have wanted.’
Heche’s son also said that a special event launching the book will be held at the Barnes & Noble location at the Grove at Farmer’s Market on January 24.
The event will feature Heche’s podcast partner, Heather Duffy. She told People following the publication of the first excerpt: ”[Heche’s] life was bookended with a lot of pain.’
Duffy went on: ‘Anne was homeless in her youth and abused by her father, and then to make it to Hollywood and be such a success and then to be treated that way by the press and the public… being blacklisted.’
‘It never jaded her. It never made her less optimistic. It never made her untrusting of others. She was filled with kindness for others,’ she added.
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