Ellen Pompeo Teases She'll 'Hopefully' Make 'Some Appearances' on Grey's Next Year: 'Not a Complete Goodbye'
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The actress departed the long-running series earlier this year after 19 seasons
Meredith Grey might've clocked out of Grey Sloane Memorial, but she hopes to visit Seattle again soon.
Pompeo, 53, currently serves as an executive producer on the series after her character Meredith said goodbye in season 19 earlier this year. However, in the latest installment of Variety's Actors on Actors series, the actress told her former Grey's Anatomy costar Katherine Heigl that she'd be open to returning as Meredith down the line.
"I will be making some appearances hopefully next year, if I can find some time," Pompeo said. "No, it's not a complete goodbye. And I think we've got an interesting story to tell."
Related: 'Grey's Anatomy' Cast: Where Are They Now?
First, Pompeo will film a Hulu series titled The Orphan. "That's going to be a very interesting role to play," she said to Heigl, 44. "I haven't played another character in 18 years. That's crazy — crazy town, crazy town."
But Pompeo feels ready for her next adventure after being on Grey's for "so long."
"I'm happy to let that go," Pompeo said. "We're past that point. I think it's OK for Meredith to stop making bad decisions."
The mother of three cited her character's relationship with Nick Marsh (Scott Speedman) as one of her "frustrations" with the show. "I felt so happy to be able to step away, and I felt like I accomplished something incredible," Pompeo said. "Everywhere, as I’m sure everywhere you go, people just run up to me and say, 'I love you!' It's weird and strange, but it's just love coming at me."
Heigl, who played Dr. Izzie Stevens for the show's first six seasons, left the series in 2010 but said she still gets recognized as the character — sort of.
"I was in the liquor store — I needed some wine. And this man comes up to me and goes, 'Excuse me. I'm so sorry, but my daughter, she's freaking out over here. Would you mind talking to her for a minute?'" Heigl told Pompeo. "And I was like, 'Sure. Come on over, honey.'"
The girl asked Heigl if she knew of Grey's Anatomy, and after Heigl assured she did, "She goes, 'Do you know Izzie Stevens?' And I go, 'Yes, I do,'" Heigl continued. "She goes, 'Are you her mother?' Thankfully, that hasn't happened again."
Most recently, Heigl played Tully Hart in the Netflix series Firefly Lane, which ended in April after two seasons. When reflecting on whether she would ever make a return to Grey's Anatomy, she shared with Entertainment Tonight in 2019 that the decision would be a "tough one" to make.
“I haven't [thought about Izzie] in years. I don't know. I don't know if I would or if I wouldn't," she said.
"I almost feel like that would almost be distracting again to, sort of, what they’ve done with that show in the seven years since I left … and what that’s become and what it is to the fans now," she continued. "It must feel like it would just be kind of like, 'Yeah, we already let that go … why are you here?'"
Heigl and Pompeo recalled to Variety that audiences almost didn't even see Grey's Anatomy at all. "I just remember that I was nervous that they were not going to air it," Heigl said. "There was a moment when it was unclear. They didn't like it."
Pompeo claimed one executive "almost took a nap" on series creator Shonda Rhimes and "almost didn't air that pilot." Now, more than 400 episodes later, Grey's is TV's longest-running medical drama.
Pompeo admitted she miscalculated, too, when it came to the "Pick me. Choose me. Love me." speech Meredith gave to Derek Shepherd (Patrick Dempsey) in season 2.
"I fought that speech so hard," Pompeo said. "That's another really interesting thing about life — some things that I was so against, and I was like, 'I can't beg a man on TV! This is so embarrassing.' And then, it turns out to be one of the most famous scenes ever."
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Grey's Anatomy can be streamed on Hulu and Netflix.
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