Ever since Sarah Drew was fired unceremoniously on Grey’s Anatomy, I thought that Ellen Pompeo was somehow responsible for it. Then, when excerpts from Lynette Rice’s book started being published in Entertainment Weekly about the medical drama started to come out, I thought I can’t wait to see what people have to say about Pompeo. It turns out the person who told the worst story about the actress was herself.
Pompeo shared a story about the time 2-time Oscar winner Denzel Washington directed an episode in the 12th season. Meredith Grey was attacked by a patient who left her with a broken jaw. At the end of the episode, the patient apologizes to her, and that is when the trouble began behind the scenes.
“He [the patient] made this choice to speak very softly. And [Meredith] was pissed that [she] had to sit there and listen to this apology, and he wasn’t looking at [her] in the eye,” Pompeo recalled, wavering between talking about herself and the guest star as actors and characters. “Again, we love actors who make choices, right? And I yelled at him, and I was like, ‘Look at me when you apologize. Look at me.’ And that wasn’t in the dialogue, and Denzel went ham on my ass.”
She continued: “He was like, ‘I’m the director. Don’t you tell him what to do.’ And I was like, ‘Listen, motherf‑‑‑er, this is my show. This is my set. Who are you telling?’ Like, ‘You barely know where the bathroom is.’ And I have the utmost respect for him as an actor, as a director, as everything, but like, yo, we went at it one day.”
It is not her show. She is part of an ensemble. The same way ER was not George Clooney’s show, Seinfeld is not Jerry Seinfeld’s show, Everybody Loves Raymond was not Ray Romano’s show, and Two and a Half Men was not Charlie Sheen’s show. The show belongs to the networks and the studios. You are just a face who can be fired or replaced. I bet you ABC could’ve killed her off last season, and it still would’ve gone on.
She thinks she is all that, but what has she done since Grey’s? Nothing. Do you know what she is going to do after Grey’s? Pray that the show remains in syndication so she can get residuals.
She is also going to pray that her co-stars don’t start talking about her like they did Patrick Dempsey. I have a feeling that what they will say will make Katherine Heigl look sweet compared to Pompeo.
After this story started trending on Twitter, I started to think that Rice’s group might put the final nail in Grey’s coffin, as in this might be the final season. I could be wrong. But I feel another show is going to get cancelled because of the Ellen effect. Case in point Ellen, the sitcom, was not Ellen DeGeneres’ show, but Ellen, the talk show, is.
