Ellen Pompeo recalled a heated exchange with Denzel Washington on the set of Grey's Anatomy.
’s, had recruited Washington as a surprise guest director to appease a restless Pompeo. “Debbie Allen was like, What can I do to keep Ellen interested? What can I do to keep Ellen here? Because after you [Dempsey] left, I was like, ‘Oh, why do I have to stay here?’” Pompeo explained. “And Debbie was like, ‘No, no, no. You’ve got to stick around. I’m gonna bring in a surprise for you,’ and she would never tell me who it was. But she knew I was a huge fan [of Washington].
That surprise evidently soured during a scene in which Pompeo’s character, Dr. Meredith Grey, had to listen to an apology from the man who forced her jaw to be wired shut. “He made this choice to speak very softly. And [Meredith] was pissed that [she] had to sit there and listen to this apology, and he wasn’t looking at [her] in the eye,” she said of her scene partner. “Again, we love actors who make choices, right? And I yelled at him, and I was like, ‘Look at me when you apologize. Look at me.
Pompeo recalled Washington telling her, “‘I’m the director. Don’t you tell him what to do.’” Apparently, she didn’t take kindly to her director’s...direction. “And I was like, ‘Listen, motherfucker, this is my show. This is my set. Who are you telling?’ Like, ‘You barely know where the bathroom is,’” Pompeo declared. “And I have the utmost respect for him as an actor, as a director, as everything, but, like, yo, we went at it one day.”when she visited the set.