LOS ANGELES — Ellen DeGeneres has expressed support for former partner Anne Heche following the actor's fiery car crash last week in Mar Vista.
Heche was hospitalized Friday after crashing her car into a house, which caused it to catch on fire. She is in a coma after sustaining significant burns. A spokesperson for Heche told the L.A. Times that, as of Monday, the actor "is in critical condition" with "a significant pulmonary injury requiring mechanical ventilation and burns that require surgical intervention."
When approached by a Daily Mail photographer Monday in Santa Barbara, DeGeneres, who dated Heche from 1997 to 2000, was asked about her ex's condition. DeGeneres kept her response short and to the point: "We're not in touch with each other, so I wouldn't know."
The former talk show host added, "I don't want anyone to be hurt."
In 2001, a year after the two split, DeGeneres spoke to the L.A. Times about the end of their relationship.
"[I]t was the first time I ever had my heart broken. I'd always been the one to leave relationships, and I had been in long-term relationships, and it was the one time I really believed this is forever," DeGeneres said back then.
"I felt safe and I felt we shared so much together, and it was the first time I've had my heart broken, and it was in a big way," she continued. "Because there is no closure ... I know what it's like to lose someone, and that's a horrible feeling, [but] it's almost worse to lose someone and know they're still alive out there, and I don't understand. So it was a big heartbreak."
DeGeneres is the latest celebrity to weigh in on Heche's accident.
Alec Baldwin, one of Heche's frequent co-stars, shared a video on Instagram on Saturday.
"There's not a lot of women I've worked with that are brave in the way that Anne is brave," Baldwin said. "She would do anything. She was very original and very brave."
Fellow actor Rosanna Arquette tweeted the day of the accident, writing, "Anne Heche is in the hospital severely burned from a car accident this is really tragic. Pray for her."
Heche's ex-boyfriend James Tupper, with whom she shares a son, Atlas, sent his "thoughts and prayers" with an Instagram photo of the actor on Saturday.
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