- 2 days ago
The Hollywood Reporter gets a behind-the-scenes look at the set of 'Grey's Anatomy' led by James Pickens Jr. who plays Dr. Richard Webber on the show. Plus, we chat with cast members Chandra Wilson, Alexis Floyd, Niko Terho, Midori Francis, Harry Shum Jr., Adelaide Kane, Anthony Hill and Jake Borelli.
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00:01Hey, Hollywood Reporter.
00:03Hey, Hollywood Reporter.
00:05Hollywood Reporter, welcome to the set.
00:07We're the cast of Grey's Anatomy, and we're here on set.
00:10Come on in.
00:27This is the breezeway.
00:29This is also known as our ambulance bay, and this is where our ambulances will come up with
00:35emergent patients, and then we will park them on into the trauma center.
00:40Here we go.
00:45I got a cop, Michael Fazioli, 28, GSW, to the right upper arm and left leg.
00:49Hey, this one's mine.
00:50We shoot here in the breezeway at least once an episode.
00:54We are usually a nine-day episode, sometimes a ten.
00:58It's pretty busy around here.
01:00The work and the care and the commitment is so vivid and remarkable.
01:06You step on set and it's reflected in the people and in the atmosphere.
01:10After 20 seasons, you better be friendly with everyone.
01:13I've been with Grey's Anatomy since the very, very beginning.
01:18I have five rules, memorize them.
01:20Rule number one, don't bother sucking up.
01:22I already hate you, that's not gonna change.
01:24I am still, to this day, in shock and awe, and I still get the same butterflies, clearly.
01:34You know, when it's time to do the work.
01:37We're gonna walk and we're gonna head into the trauma unit.
01:40Into the emergency room here, or the trauma unit as we like to call it.
01:45And, oh, got a little special person that I think you all know.
01:50What's up, Hollywood Reporter? I play Dr. Winston Ndugu here on Grey's Anatomy.
01:54Okay, nice and slow.
01:57Let's go.
01:58This is where we'll transport people from, our patients from our ambulance bay,
02:03and we'll bring them into here.
02:05These are the emergent patients, folks who, you know, you're looking at traumatic injuries usually.
02:10When I got here, I realized how much people just will chit-chat in between takes.
02:15To the one where I wasn't really that used to it, so I was like, oh, we're talking about the weekend.
02:21And then we get right back into, like, getting into a body or something.
02:24Dr. Webber, you caught the bleed, why don't you do the honors?
02:27No, go ahead, you're already there.
02:29We're trying to get out of character as soon as possible.
02:32Yeah, immediately.
02:33You were the first person I met besides Kelly McCreary, and you immediately came over to me asking me where I'm from.
02:40Yeah.
02:41We talked about music and jazz from Kansas City.
02:43I felt welcomed immediately, and that's the whole cast all the way across the board.
02:46Chandra Wilson, who plays Bailey, who we're the two longest-running cast members now,
02:51she's really good at that, you know, of welcoming and kind of laying out the landscape so the new performers or actors feel comfortable.
03:01When I got cast, it was crazy, because I had seen this as a child.
03:06And then meeting Chandra Wilson.
03:08I don't always get starstruck, but it was, it still sometimes is, because Bailey is so real to me from those formative memories of watching this show,
03:17that it was like, it was hard to think of you as not Bailey.
03:21And then I start talking.
03:23Yeah.
03:24It was a pinch me moment.
03:26It was like, holy crap, this is Dr. Bailey, and I'm now in a show with her.
03:30That's very cool.
03:31Yeah.
03:32I wasn't allowed to watch the show growing up.
03:34Aww.
03:35Meaning?
03:36So, were you done?
03:37Yeah.
03:38My mom.
03:39She was growing up.
03:40Mm-hmm.
03:41No, my mom said the same thing.
03:42I was allowed to watch this in middle school.
03:44At some point, either the day of the table read or maybe the day before we get a chance to take a look at the script.
03:51It's exciting.
03:52Yeah.
03:53Like every time you walk in there, it's just like this energy.
03:55It just feels like a little bit like, you know, a table read, like theater.
03:57A little bit like you're just getting to perform and figuring out what the characters are saying and what it means.
04:03Sometimes you don't quite know yet and then you're figuring out through the reading.
04:06I would say it's really cool that you get like live reactions to things that are happening because you don't get that on set because everybody's like quiet.
04:14So it's cool to be in the room and get a laugh when you do something that's funny or when or cry when you see something that's like touching.
04:23Because that's the whole point is for the writers to see what's landing.
04:26Yeah.
04:27Is it her brain?
04:28You know, it's hypochalemia.
04:29We couldn't control the arrhythmias.
04:30The pressure's dropping off a cliff.
04:31Give me an intubation tray.
04:32I know from an actor standpoint feels really cool because everybody is really invested in the integrity of what's said.
04:42And, you know, we can track things and say, all right, but in season so-and-so, episode so-and-so, I said this and I just want to make sure that tracks.
04:51Oh, yeah, you're right.
04:52So that part is really cool.
04:55But again, all these seasons in, every script I open up, I'm learning something else about Miranda Bailey.
05:02And you can see right here we have what we call our makeup station set up on the stage, on stage.
05:10So we come and do our touch-ups right before we get ready to shoot.
05:13Wherever we're shooting the scene is usually going to be on a stage next to us or on a set next to us.
05:18And we'll have these kind of things set up.
05:19The lights will pop on and our makeup artist will come over here and we'll do the touch-ups, which is usually called the last looks.
05:26The last looks right here.
05:27We'll look in the mirror.
05:28Maybe she'll be looking right.
05:29And then we'll walk right out of here onto the set.
05:31All right, let's make our way over to the next part of the hospital.
05:34This is what we call the nurses' station.
05:38And this is where we'll pick up our daily schedule or interns will get their rounds for the day.
05:45This is where they'll pick them up.
05:47So actually, sometimes when they'll hand you stuff here, the things will actually say stuff on them.
05:53Sometimes it'll be to make you laugh and sometimes it will just be random stuff like this, which I don't know if I should read out loud.
05:57Somebody wrote this on here, which is a little morbid, but kind of a testament to Grace Sloan, probably, because it happens a lot here.
06:07We need to move fast.
06:08All right, we're moving the clavicle.
06:09I found the finger.
06:10ORs can take a minute or five.
06:13They get there.
06:14They can be, you know, depending on what you're showcasing.
06:18If it's an OR where it's really just about the conversation, those are fine.
06:23But if it's, oh, the crazy field and blood and transplant and baby and all of this, then those can take a little bit longer.
06:34What's the sewing with the tools and the gloves and the fake blood and the KY to keep everything liquid so it doesn't dry up?
06:41We like to show everything, right?
06:43And so that we have everything there to put together.
06:47But they can be a little time consuming.
06:49You strut around and straighten Richard's tie while the rest of us do the work.
06:54No, I do the work.
06:55One of the things that keeps Miranda Bailey alive for me is that I do not claim ownership of her whatsoever.
07:02So I never use words like she would never do that or she would never say that.
07:07I haven't the slightest idea what she's going to do or say.
07:09And I think my job is to take the thing that's given to me and then figure it out because people do things out of character all the time.
07:17And it's about, okay, so why are they acting that way?
07:23And it's in those moments where I'll get a comment from, you know, somebody watching the show and saying, when you said such a, such a, such a, that really resonated with me.
07:34And I'll go, oh, okay, very good.
07:37Because, you know, that's, that's what the job is, right? Lift the thing off the page and give it to you instead of, you know, trying to whittle it down.
07:46I've been really, really blessed to play this character for as long as I have.
07:51The seven years you spend here as a surgical resident will be the best and worst of your life.
07:55I've watched this character evolve over 21 seasons and, you know, his ups and downs.
08:00I'd like to think of him as being incredibly human through all of this.
08:04We've watched and taken this journey with him when he's, he's been victorious.
08:08And other times when he's been in valleys and had to kind of climb himself back up, you know, he's lost two wives.
08:15You know, he's had a brain aneurysm. He's been electrocuted.
08:19You know, he had a whole knee thing and through it all, he's, he's, he's survived and managed to mentor these young interns.
08:27And, you know, dispense wisdom every once in a while and navigate this, this, this incredible kind of juggernaut called Grace Long Memorial.
08:39Get the hell out of my hospital.
08:41Sleep on it.
08:43We'll talk more tomorrow.
08:46You know what? Sometimes they have old stuff from files.
08:50Last week I was shooting something and I found something that said Derek Shepherd on it.
08:54And it was like an old Derek Shepherd, like, McDreamy note from something.
08:59Oh really?
09:00Yeah, like written stuff in there.
09:01And I was like, that was a cool little, historic little artifact that I found here. It was pretty cool.
09:06I bet you wish you'd taken the stairs right about now.
09:21Well, magic seems to happen in these elevators, you know.
09:24Actually, the doors are manually operated. There's a grip on the other side and it works by a pulley system.
09:34Sometimes it works pretty good and then sometimes it doesn't.
09:38So, you kind of have to go with the flow of it.
09:41You have dialogue within this elevator and, you know, nice thing you know, it comes open.
09:47Sometimes you've got to remember, you know, you've got buttons here.
09:49Okay, you've got to push the button.
09:51Well, the button may be here, but we want you to play it like it pushes up here and stuff.
09:55So, that kind of, it's called elevator acting is what it's called.
09:59I see Seattle skylines and just like paintings all over the place.
10:03And I'm always wondering, kind of, where we got them from?
10:06Who the photographer was? Who the painter was?
10:08And I know, I keep forgetting to ask.
10:10And I want to ask, like, where do we get this stuff?
10:13Alright, let's make our way down the hallway here.
10:16Do a lot of walking talks on this corridor right here.
10:19I like the walking talks. I like walking through the hospital.
10:22Yeah, I love that. Always.
10:23I love that, like, I might mess up and screw everything up right now.
10:26Like the pressure?
10:27Yeah, the pressure and then like if someone, you have to really be in sync with each other.
10:32We're passing the conference room area here where a lot of meetings take place.
10:37And a lot of the crux of a scene sometimes will play out within these, the confines of the conference room.
10:46And then we're back here now at this, this is probably the most iconic of the nursing stations on the show here.
10:54A lot of stuff takes place here.
10:56When I first got to the show, this is the first thing that I actually recognized from the show.
11:00It's such an iconic staircase.
11:01And I was like, oh, I kind of had like a little moment when I first saw it.
11:04And I kind of wanted to walk up it.
11:06Oh, hold on. I recognize this guy over here.
11:09Come on up. Come on down here, man.
11:13This is an iconic staircase.
11:14It is, right?
11:15It is, right?
11:16And it just became more.
11:18I love it.
11:19That's a classic Levi Schmidt moment.
11:23Hey, you two.
11:25Congratulations on making it to work through the traffic.
11:29I'm a huge fan of the show, too.
11:30I've seen every episode twice.
11:32Wait, what?
11:33I'm down to watch more.
11:34I know.
11:35You didn't know this?
11:36I didn't know this.
11:37I'm shocked by most of the script.
11:38I feel like when I show up at the table read, I'm always worried something has changed.
11:42So I flip very quickly through the table read and I'm like, okay, I'm alive.
11:46Still alive in this scene.
11:47Still alive in that scene.
11:48Yeah.
11:49So I'm pretty shocked usually.
11:50I'm shocked, too.
11:51They've touched on a lot of stuff over the years.
11:53Yeah.
11:54But I don't know if it's surprise as much as it is revelation.
12:00I was actually shocked pretty recently.
12:02I don't know if I can talk about it.
12:03But like one of these episodes this season, I was pretty floored when we hit that last page.
12:10I was like, oh.
12:11There's a lot this season.
12:12That's pretty shocking.
12:13Whoa.
12:14I'm so scared of accidentally giving away spoilers.
12:17I'ma leave it up to y'all's imagination.
12:19All I'ma say is my hair's different.
12:23I was at an event last weekend for the Black Cardiologist Association.
12:28And I gave out an honor.
12:30And a young man came up to me who was in his second year of med school.
12:35And he told me that I was the impetus for him to attend medical school.
12:42He has a sister who had just had her second heart transplant and had a kidney transplant.
12:48And he said, your show got my sister through that.
12:53That's happened on more than one occasion where the impact of the show on our fans and stuff has gone beyond what we think it is.
13:03But yeah, I get a lot of I'm a doctor because of this show.
13:07Mostly people want to say thank you.
13:10They want to tell you exactly how long they've been watching and how many times they've started over from the beginning.
13:16It's like a badge of honor for a lot of people like people who watch the show have watched it since the very beginning.
13:22Maybe I've watched it multiple times.
13:23And when when I run into like fans that that talk about like their love for the show, it is like a badge of honor.
13:31Because like I've stuck it from I've stuck to it from the very beginning to the hard times.
13:35The stuff that I didn't think I was going to be able to make it through because it would make me cry and be devastated.
13:40But I'm going to watch it again.
13:41And I caught re caught up and brought like a friend or even like my daughter, my son.
13:47And it's really called passing down generations as well.
13:50We have been inside of people's homes and a lot of times sometimes if someone doesn't quite recognize me at first from the show,
13:59but they know that we've been face to face and it's are you.
14:05Do you go to and they'll name the church or do you do you have it?
14:11It's because they know we've been like this.
14:14And then when they figure it out, it's yeah, yeah, yeah.
14:19And that's it's it's very cool.
14:22It's kind of the biggest compliment right to for people to allow you to come in.
14:28So they don't have to think about anything else but what they're saying on TV.
14:31Just forget about the bills for a minute.
14:33Forget about, you know, everybody.
14:34Everybody be quiet because they're watching their show.
14:36That's how I am with soaps.
14:38So, you know, it so and so it always feels really great.
14:43And it really is 100% just to say thank you.
14:46I started getting recognized pretty quickly.
14:48Once I started the show.
14:50It's amazing to me how many people watch this show.
14:53It opened my eyes to just how big the fan base is.
14:56And then I went overseas not expecting to be recognized and you get recognized everywhere you go.
15:02It's always somebody who loves the show and who watches the show.
15:05Literally everybody I knew back home in Barbados.
15:08I didn't realize how expansive this show was until I went back home for the first time.
15:15And I literally everywhere I went, someone was like, hey, thank you so much for being the first Caribbean person we've seen and can relate to on a big television series.
15:29And I was like, whoa, wow, this really reaches.
15:33And yeah, it was touching.
15:35A really big demographic that I was surprised by is TSA.
15:39Have you?
15:40Oh, yeah.
15:41I swear.
15:42Oh, yeah.
15:43You're right.
15:44Every time I go through TSA I get stopped.
15:46Yeah.
15:47Yeah.
15:48Every single time.
15:49Yeah.
15:50Every time.
15:51So now we're going to head into the famous or infamous conference room here.
15:57Which honestly, from the other side, doubles as trauma room two in the ER.
16:03So this is also where a lot of trauma happens.
16:06So the walls come up, right?
16:08Yeah.
16:09So that's something they're probably interested in.
16:11The walls come up and change in almost every room.
16:14Almost.
16:15Yeah.
16:16It's very confusing.
16:17To accommodate for.
16:18To accommodate camera angles and stuff.
16:20So they'll come up and.
16:21Yeah.
16:22Yeah.
16:23You know, you get the shot that you need.
16:24Here's an alternate Levi Schmidt jacket.
16:26Are you there?
16:27With the appropriate.
16:28Just because I spilled coffee on it.
16:29I did that this morning.
16:30And they had to switch it out.
16:32The interesting fact.
16:33Several years ago we had these.
16:35Well, stethoscopes were custom made.
16:38For the early cast members.
16:41So they would have your name on it and everything.
16:44And they're actually, you know, they work.
16:46So you see.
16:47You understand.
16:48You're the love of my life.
16:49This is so obvious, but I love me some Meredith.
16:50I knew it.
16:51I knew her answer.
16:52I knew you love them.
16:53That pilot episode.
16:54Yeah.
16:55That scene with them.
16:56I mean, it is studied in classes truly.
16:57Yeah.
16:58It is something special.
16:59Chemistry is kind of one of a kind.
17:00I still go back to.
17:01I mean, that is one of my favorites for sure.
17:03The Danny Duquette and Izzy.
17:04I liked that relationship so much.
17:05It was.
17:06I don't know.
17:07It just seemed so.
17:08Yeah.
17:09Yeah.
17:10Yeah.
17:11Yeah.
17:12Yeah.
17:13Yeah.
17:14Yeah.
17:15She literally did everything.
17:16She ruined.
17:17She missed everything for him.
17:18So I thought it was pretty endearing.
17:20You have to do this for me or I'll never be able to forgive you.
17:22For dying?
17:23No.
17:24For making me love you.
17:25You guys, this is a big elevator moment.
17:27The first gay male kiss on Grey's Anatomy between Levi Schmidt and Nico Kim right in here.
17:34This is where it happened.
17:35Yeah.
17:36Yeah.
17:37Yeah.
17:38Yeah.
17:39Yeah.
17:40Yeah.
17:41Yeah.
17:42Yeah.
17:43Yeah.
17:44Yeah.
17:45Yeah.
17:46Yeah.
17:47Yeah.
17:48Yeah.
17:49Yeah.
17:50Yeah.
17:51Yeah.
17:52Yeah.
17:53Yeah.
17:54Yeah.
17:55You made sure of it.
18:02Actually, you know what's funny, I was talking about this the other day because sometimes peppermint
18:09gum makes me sneeze and Alex Landy were in there and he takes out a Listerine strip and
18:14puts it in his mouth and he's like, you want one?
18:15I'm like, yeah, yeah.
18:16Right as they're calling action, I put it in my mouth and I started sneezing and I have
18:21sneezing of it right before this like iconic god of course you did not necessarily a romantic
18:26relationship but meredith and christina that that best friendship that you know it's good
18:33christina can storm in she's sitting in derrick's lap making up with him and he's like really is
18:37it and yeah yeah just give us like 10 minutes and kicks him out to to to be that uh a best
18:44friend like that i feel like i have a version of that with my really good friends that's kind
18:49of the universal thing that happens with all the characters who's your person right and then that
18:54extends out to the fan base you know for them to say who's are you a this or that or that you know
18:59uh it's about figuring out who's your person
19:03congratulations you all made it you're here
19:09i know this or looks like a high-tech fever dream but it's all real
19:15it's exciting when she's here and we know that she's here because like the plants go up the
19:20little tree and then the bikes are there and parked so we always know when she's when she's here um
19:25filming or doing um voiceover adr stuff uh especially for those of us who don't work with
19:32all that often like like ah our potted plants are out no bikes there ellen's here i mean yeah we
19:40we haven't had i personally like i hasn't been a ton just because when we joined she started phasing
19:46off as a series regular but my interactions with her have been she's been really kind to me and
19:51given me some great advice i feel like she's really taking time to find each of us and have a moment of
19:57like personal empowerment which is huge because she doesn't have to that's yeah like this is in a lot
20:05of ways her show and i think her sort of um igniting our fire especially as new kids on the block
20:13just that that always feels really special to me and precious yeah and she gave us succulents when
20:19we joined she showed it's huge i think i'm the only one who has theirs uh lives also true yeah
20:24good right sorry ellen it was honestly a very nice first impression it was like it was like huge
20:31it was like gorgeous once you're in the gray's family that's just where you are alive dead divorced
20:40you're just there so it's coming home that's what it feels like all the time right you're coming home
20:47and you fall in and you're like oh yes i know this and you know and you you you fall into that rhythm
20:53um right away um because you guys have already had a chance to establish a rhythm um when meredith
21:00gray is around and um you know bailey's face is just as turnt as it's always been
21:06and you know you just fall right back into that rhythm we hate each other yeah
21:11i see her coming i walk you over no but uh oh everybody gets along great you you you better i mean
21:19you're spending you know 12 13 14 hour days with somebody you better be able to get along with
21:25them but you know this is this cast has just been great you know everybody's so giving and
21:31yeah we were engaged and you know all those lines outside of the sound stages but yeah that's pretty
21:40easy there was no imagination for the show having a longevity or me being on the show with all this
21:47longevity i did the first episode so that i could pay my credit card bills that's what it was for um
21:55and first season was a mid-season show so you know we only did like 13 episodes so that's not gonna go
22:02um and then when we finally did get picked up three years tops um in makeup um they told us
22:11this will be a sixer it'll be a six year and i set my mind on six years so every season first day of the
22:19season i say six years six years and i did do that when i on first day back i said six years
22:25i hope it keeps going another 20 years i'm gonna carry that six season with that six just six seasons
22:33don't have the slightest idea which is cool look we show up we put all of our stuff we leave i think
22:46everybody's leaving everything right there you know on the floor and until they tell us to reel
22:52it in and there we go hey we want to thank you all for hanging out with us for a little while
22:58thank you so much yeah and don't forget to tune in thursdays all right 21st season yeah
23:04there we go see you later all right guys see you thanks thanks for coming by
23:16you
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