Ellen Pompeo Sun Herald interview
Anatomy of success
3rd July 2006, 18:09 WST
Walking on to the set of Grey’s Anatomy it’s easy to mistake the actors for the doctors they play. With just a few hours sleep since their last 16-hour day, star Ellen Pompeo and her fellow cast members look every bit as tired as surgeons coming off an all-night shift.
Clutching cups of coffee and queuing for a pastry, they share a joke, hold each other up as the last traces of sleep disappear and admit that, as with doctors, what makes the long hours bearable is the fact that they’re all in it together.
“There’s a solidarity because everybody is exhausted,” Pompeo said.
“To make an hour-long drama is such a tremendous amount of work we’re lucky we do get along so well and that the show is successful . . . it sort of makes all the exhaustion worthwhile.”
One of the biggest hits of last year, Grey’s Anatomy has almost singlehandedly revived the hospital drama genre with its mix of real gore, romance and occasional comedy around the central theme of a woman trying to cope with a situation she’s not quite sure she can handle.
It’s a theme, Pompeo said, that drew her to the series despite never having been a fan of medical programs.
“I’ve never even watched a single episode of ER,” she said, “but there are a lot of parallels in my life to this show.
“When I did the pilot I had no idea what I was doing, I had no idea what I was getting myself into, so with every scene I’d hope I was doing the right thing.
“And I guess that sort of translates into what you see as Meredith (Grey, her character) hoping she is doing the right thing.”
Hard work and self-doubt aside, there are advantages to being the star of your own drama.
Pompeo smiles as she tells how she got to choose the handsome Patrick Dempsey to play her on-again, offagain, love interest, Derek Shepherd.
“I tested with a lot of guys and I said, ‘I want it to be him’,” she says, “and luckily the network felt the same way.
“I had the best chemistry with him and I don’t know how you define that, he just sort of stood out . . . and he had great hair!”
Then there’s the rest of the cast, who Pompeo jokes with almost constantly.
“I don’t like her,” Pompeo says, joking and pointing to co-star Katherine Heigl with a smile.
“And he is OK, like on Tuesday through Thursday,” she says of Justin Chambers (Alex Karev), before admitting that without the close cast the shooting schedule would be unbearable.
“I think for the most part we are all very lucky we really get along because it is a lot like on the show. I mean, we are together all the time.”
Heigl is quick to agree, adding that it helps to be around friends when you’re dealing with the very lifelike products of the special effects department.
As Grey’s beautiful intern Isobel “Izzie” Stevens, she plays a former model out to prove she’s more than just a pretty face. That means her character is usually written into every messy, bloody operation there is. And yes, she says, it’s very bloody indeed.
“Once I had to lift a cow’s heart out on to a scale and it was supposed to be an engorged human heart, so it was really big,” Heigl said.
“The artery was trailing down, slapping my arm, and I’m thinking, ‘Hold it together, hold it together’ until they called ‘cut’. It was so gross.”
Scott Ellis, SUN HERALD
Source: The West Australian
3rd July 2006, 18:09 WST
Walking on to the set of Grey’s Anatomy it’s easy to mistake the actors for the doctors they play. With just a few hours sleep since their last 16-hour day, star Ellen Pompeo and her fellow cast members look every bit as tired as surgeons coming off an all-night shift.
Clutching cups of coffee and queuing for a pastry, they share a joke, hold each other up as the last traces of sleep disappear and admit that, as with doctors, what makes the long hours bearable is the fact that they’re all in it together.
“There’s a solidarity because everybody is exhausted,” Pompeo said.
“To make an hour-long drama is such a tremendous amount of work we’re lucky we do get along so well and that the show is successful . . . it sort of makes all the exhaustion worthwhile.”
One of the biggest hits of last year, Grey’s Anatomy has almost singlehandedly revived the hospital drama genre with its mix of real gore, romance and occasional comedy around the central theme of a woman trying to cope with a situation she’s not quite sure she can handle.
It’s a theme, Pompeo said, that drew her to the series despite never having been a fan of medical programs.
“I’ve never even watched a single episode of ER,” she said, “but there are a lot of parallels in my life to this show.
“When I did the pilot I had no idea what I was doing, I had no idea what I was getting myself into, so with every scene I’d hope I was doing the right thing.
“And I guess that sort of translates into what you see as Meredith (Grey, her character) hoping she is doing the right thing.”
Hard work and self-doubt aside, there are advantages to being the star of your own drama.
Pompeo smiles as she tells how she got to choose the handsome Patrick Dempsey to play her on-again, offagain, love interest, Derek Shepherd.
“I tested with a lot of guys and I said, ‘I want it to be him’,” she says, “and luckily the network felt the same way.
“I had the best chemistry with him and I don’t know how you define that, he just sort of stood out . . . and he had great hair!”
Then there’s the rest of the cast, who Pompeo jokes with almost constantly.
“I don’t like her,” Pompeo says, joking and pointing to co-star Katherine Heigl with a smile.
“And he is OK, like on Tuesday through Thursday,” she says of Justin Chambers (Alex Karev), before admitting that without the close cast the shooting schedule would be unbearable.
“I think for the most part we are all very lucky we really get along because it is a lot like on the show. I mean, we are together all the time.”
Heigl is quick to agree, adding that it helps to be around friends when you’re dealing with the very lifelike products of the special effects department.
As Grey’s beautiful intern Isobel “Izzie” Stevens, she plays a former model out to prove she’s more than just a pretty face. That means her character is usually written into every messy, bloody operation there is. And yes, she says, it’s very bloody indeed.
“Once I had to lift a cow’s heart out on to a scale and it was supposed to be an engorged human heart, so it was really big,” Heigl said.
“The artery was trailing down, slapping my arm, and I’m thinking, ‘Hold it together, hold it together’ until they called ‘cut’. It was so gross.”
Scott Ellis, SUN HERALD
Source: The West Australian
