Katherine Heigl Ellen Pompeo On Izzie’s Gray’s Anatomy Exit
Gray’s Anatomy has turn into one of the beloved and longest-running TV reveals of all time. The present started in 2005 and simply wrapped Season 19, with over 400 episodes and counting.
Over the course of 19 seasons, Gray’s Anatomy has had so many iconic storylines, characters, and extra — it is arduous to summarize the entire legendary TV moments this present has given us.
In fact, alongside the way in which, characters and actors have departed Seattle Grace/Gray Sloan, and people have made for among the most impactful moments. Most just lately, Ellen Pompeo left as a sequence common after enjoying Meredith Gray for the reason that pilot episode.
Whereas Ellen hasn’t left the present fully — she nonetheless supplies the voiceover, and she or he appeared within the Season 19 finale — it was a giant change for the sequence, and marked dropping the final member of the unique intern group as a sequence common.
Out of the unique interns, one of the notable departures got here when Katherine Heigl left the present as Izzie Stevens in the course of Season 6.
On the time, Katherine’s departure got here after a number of behind-the-scenes moments the place she criticized Gray’s Anatomy. Notably, Katherine stepped out of the 2008 Emmys race, which was reportedly seen as a “swipe at producers for diminishing her presence on the series.”
Katherine’s choice to go away that 12 months’s Emmys race led to folks saying she was criticizing the writers — and presumably Shonda Rhimes — and it led to a variety of hate being thrown at Katherine for years. Particularly she was labeled as “difficult” to work with.
Now, 13 years after Katherine’s final Gray’s Anatomy episode, she and Ellen reunited for Selection’s Actors on Actors sequence the place they mentioned their time on Gray’s Anatomy collectively, and in addition the whole lot surrounding Katherine’s departure.
“When Izzie left…there was just so much going on,” Ellen started when speaking in regards to the emotion the early Gray’s actors delivered to their performances and the way it impacted the storylines. “It’s really hard to show up on set when there’s so much…and then there wasn’t even social media. There’s so much attention.”
She continued, saying, “It felt like there was a lot of attention on everything we did. All the time. And everything was amplified, and that added to the emotion, and somehow, that made the scenes better, and that made the show better, and that made the show more popular. And then, Izzie leaves the show, and that was emotional for everybody.”
Wanting again at the moment in her life, Katherine defined the anxiousness she felt on the top of her Gray’s Anatomy fame. “I was just vibrating at way too high of a level of anxiety,” she started. “For me, it’s all a bit of a blur, and it took me years to learn how to deal with that, to master it.”
Katherine mentioned that interval was additionally when she felt she lacked “self-confidence.” She mentioned, “I would not trade anything for my 20s. I absolutely had no idea who I was and what I wanted and who I was supposed to be and who to make happy. Just massive lack of self-confidence. And then, Grey’s hit. The success of Grey’s hit, and I felt, I think it was borrowed confidence.”
She continued, saying, “I started getting real mouthy because I did have a lot to say. And there were certain boundaries and things that I was not okay with being crossed. If you cannot stand up for yourself in this industry, very few people will stand up for you. So you better learn how to, and you better be okay with them not liking you for it.” With Ellen including that it is a “privilege” to even get to that place as effectively.
Talking about her Gray’s departure and a 2007 interview about Knocked Up, which additionally landed her criticism, Katherine started, “I was so naive. I got on my soapbox, and I had some things to say, and I felt really passionate about this stuff. I felt really strongly. I felt so strongly that I also got a megaphone out on my soapbox. There was no part of me that imagined a bad reaction.”
“I felt really justified in how I felt about it and where I was coming from. I’ve spent most of my life — I think most women do — being in that people-pleasing mode. It’s really disconcerting when you feel like you have really displeased everybody. It was not my intention to do so, but I had some things to say, and I didn’t think I was going to get such a strong reaction,” she continued.
Katherine additionally talked about how she’s typically seen as “the bad guy” or the “villain,” and it is one thing she’s realized to cope with. With Ellen including that she did not perceive till her personal large contract negotiation for Gray’s Anatomy and new wage landed within the information, and she or he was informed by her supervisor to be “prepared to be unpopular” due to it.
Katherine mentioned it took years to tune out the whole lot that was being mentioned about her, saying, “I was in my late 20s. It took me until probably my mid-to-late-30s to really get back to tuning out all of the noise and going, ‘But who are you? Who are you without all of the opinions of who you are? Are you this bad person? Are you ungrateful? Are you unprofessional? Are you difficult?'”
She continued, “Because I was confused! I thought maybe I was. I literally believed that version, and felt such shame for such a long time, and then had to go, ‘Wait. Who am I listening to? I’m not even listening to myself. I know who I am.’ I don’t need anybody to tell me who I am.”
Wanting again on Katherine’s departure, Ellen added that, on the time, Katherine was one individual talking out about working circumstances on set, and different issues that have been taking place, and she or he was nearly “ahead of [her] time” as a result of now “the whole world gets to criticize everything and tell everybody to fuck off and it’s okay…but when [she] did it…”
“Listen, nobody likes a confident woman,” Ellen continued. “They’d rather you be a woman looking for your confidence than you actually be a confident woman because that makes them nervous. … Sweet, they can handle. Strong, they can’t.”
As a longtime Gray’s Anatomy fan — sure, I nonetheless watch reside each single Thursday — this dialog between Katherine and Ellen is one I tremendously loved (and did not understand how a lot I wanted it).
