The actress revealed she resisted saying the famous line but admitted creator Shonda Rhimes knew it would resonate with fans. Ellen Pompeo may have delivered one of Grey’s Anatomy’s most memorable lines, but she wasn’t thrilled about it at the time.
During a recent appearance on the Call Her Daddy podcast with Alex Cooper, the Good American Family actress didn’t hold back when reflecting on Meredith Grey’s emotional plea to Derek Shepherd (Patrick Dempsey) in a pivotal 2005 episode of the long-running ABC medical drama.
“Girl, bye,” Pompeo, 55, quipped about her character’s now-iconic line: Pick me, choose me, love me.
“There was a lot of stuff I didn't want to do at the time,” she admitted. “I didn't want to say, ‘Pick me, choose me, love me.’”
However, she acknowledged that Grey’s Anatomy creator Shonda Rhimes had a strong instinct about the line’s impact.
“She knew that was gonna pop,” Pompeo recalled. “I was like, ‘Why would I do this? Why would I beg?’ But you have to just suck it up and do it. And it ended up being one of the biggest, most iconic things ever. So, I'm not always the best judge of what’s gonna work.”
Pompeo has previously spoken about her reluctance toward the line. In a 2023 conversation with former co-star Katherine Heigl for Variety’s “Actors on Actors” series, she admitted she “fought that speech so hard.”
“Some things that I was so against—like, ‘Why would I beg a man? I can’t beg a man on TV, this is so embarrassing’—end up being some of the most successful scenes,” Pompeo reflected.
She even admitted that her emotional performance in the scene wasn’t entirely scripted. “In the scene, I’m crying, but I’m really crying because I have to beg a man on television.”
Pompeo also opened up about another emotional moment on Grey’s Anatomy. During her Call Her Daddy interview, she revealed that both she and co-star T.R. Knight (who played George O’Malley) were deeply uncomfortable filming their season 2 sex scene.
“The scene was so uncomfortable and awkward,” she recalled. “He didn't want to do it. I didn't want to do it. And when we filmed it, it was so bad—we both cried.”
Despite these initial hesitations, Pompeo’s performances helped define Grey’s Anatomy as one of television’s most beloved and enduring dramas.
Source: People
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