Ellen Pompeo Shares Financial Reason She Won’t Leave ‘Grey’s Anatomy’
- Ellen Pompeo continues to be a part of Grey’s Anatomy due to financial reasons and emotional attachment to the show.
Ellen Pompeohas been a mainstay on the hit medical drama Grey's Anatomy since its first season, and though most of the original and early cast members have moved on to other projects, Pompeo has stayed on.
Now, the Good American Family star is opening up about why she continues to take part in the ABC show, which is currently in its 21st season.
Though Pompeo took a step back from the show in 2022, she hasn't left the program completely, now acting as narrator and executive producer, and she recently told El País why.
"That would make no sense, emotionally or financially. The show was streamed more than a billion times in 2024. More than a billion times," she told the outlet.
Pompeo continued, noting that "The companies that own the show and stream the show make a lot of money from our images and our voices and our faces. If I were to walk away completely, everybody gets to make money from my hard work for 20 years and I wouldn't make any money. To me, it doesn't make any sense that everybody [else] gets to profit off of my hard work. And emotionally, the show means a lot to people. I want to have an attitude of gratitude toward the show."
Pompeo also explained why she chose to star in Hulu's limited series about a midwestern woman who, along with her husband, adopted a Ukrainian child with a rare form of dwarfism.
The real-life couple the show is based on began to believe that their daughter was not a child but instead an adult pretending to be a young girl and grew concerned that their lives were in danger. They ultimately faced charges of neglect after they moved to Canada without their adopted daughter.
"People have been watching me in the same role for 20 years. I've been playing the same role for 20 years. I had no reason to believe that I could do anything else. I hadn't tested myself in 20 years and I can't expect my audience to believe me as anything else. If I'm going to ask them to watch me as a new character, then I'd better deliver on all fronts," she told the outlet, calling the experience both "thrilling and terrifying.
