In an especially candid interview, the leading ladies from Shonda Rhimes’ Thursday night lineup recently sat down with Entertainment Weekly and discussed their various roles on Scandal , Grey’s Anatomy , and How to Get Away With Murder , and what it’s like working for such a celebrated TV creator like Rhimes.
In regards to the previous season of the hit medical drama Grey’s Anatomy , which featured the tragic death of Derek Shepherd, Ellen Pompeo reacted with the best sexist remark she could muster.
“All of a sudden, Patrick [Dempsey] leaves, and it’s like, Oh my God, Meredith’s gonna get killed with Alzheimer’s!” Pompeo stated. “The show couldn’t possibly go on without the man!”
At the same time, Viola Davis was asked what it was like being a black woman in the entertainment world and dealing with discrimination. “You have to come from Detroit or Atlanta to be black,” she explained. “If you have John Denver on your iPod and you come from Central Falls, Rhode Island, then: Eh, you trickle-down black woman.”
In one of the more hilarious talks in the interview, Kerry Washington described the moment when she first told Rhimes that was pregnant. “I was talking to an actress who’s pregnant and really worried about telling her bosses, and I said, ‘Yeah, when I told my boss I was pregnant, she literally jumped up and down in my trailer,’” Washington said. “I don’t know if there’s a male showrunner who would do that.”
Meanwhile, Rhimes joined in on the conversation and talked about how big of an influence her mother had in her life. In particular, the one thing she noted was how her mother tended to deal with racism by meeting it head on.
“When I encountered something that felt like racism—like my high school guidance counselor saying to me, ‘Honey, I don’t think you were made for Ivy League schools’—I called my mom at work and said, ‘Mom, this lady says I’m not made for Ivy League schools.’ And my mother said, ‘Hold on, I’ll be there in five minutes,’” Rhimes explained. “My mom drove up to the school, walked into the guidance counselor’s office, came out, and said, ‘Everything’s fine now.’”
The interview with the leading ladies comes at pivotal times for each of the Thursday night shows. With each show entering a new phase in its run, it will be interesting to see what unfolds when they premiere this fall.
Grey’s Anatomy , Scandal and HTGAWM will premiere on September 24, on ABC.
[Image Courtesy: ABC]
