Long before MeToo and cancel culture, Katherine Heigl, star of 'Grey's Anatomy', paid with her promising career for her penchant for speaking honestly about show business. Now, her partner Ellen Pompeo claims her as a misunderstood heroine.
Ungrateful, diva, controlling... In just over two years, Katherine Heigl went from being the actress of the moment, called to become a great Hollywood star after triumphing in Grey's Anatomy, to joining the black list of show business and forever drag a string of qualifying adjectives that for years served to label her as the most difficult actress in the industry. It was, of course, the pre-MeToo era, one in which freedom of expression for actresses was not even remotely what it is now. More than 14 years have passed since that episode and, nevertheless, she continues to make people talk and from time to time feed the lies of pop culture.
A few days ago, her co-star and star of her series Ellen Pompeo claimed Heigl on her podcast 'Tell Me With Ellen Pompeo'. "I remember Heigl said something on a talk show about the crazy hours we were working. And she was one hundred percent right. If she had said it now, she would be an absolute heroine. But she was ahead of her time. She made some statements about our schedules, and of course, the reaction was to criticize a woman and call her ungrateful. When the truth is that she was 100% honest and what she said was absolutely correct: she had the balls to say it because it was the truth, she wasn't lying," Pompeo explained in his podcast.
That talk show was that of the almighty David Letterman. In it Heigl complained about working "17 hours a day" and about a "cruel" and "evil" filming dynamic. "I'm going to keep saying it because I hope they're ashamed of it," she concluded, directing the barb at the producers of the series, with Shonda Rhimes at the helm.
In September and on the occasion of a union strike in the audiovisual sector, Heigl recalled the episode on his Instagram account: "Some of you will remember that more than ten years ago I spoke out vehemently about the absurdity of the working hours at which crews and actors were forced to work. I was even interviewed by Diane Sawyer and not-so-kindly informed that 'no one felt sorry' for me. In a very public way and for many years, I got my ass kicked for speaking out. ".
Indeed, Heigl has never been silent. Of the Jude Apatow comedy 'Embarrassing Me', which served to launch her to fame, she said that she was terribly "s---st." "He shows women as humorless and always tense shrews, while men are adorable, goofy, fun-loving guys," he explained in a statement that upset his co-star Seth Rogen. But his unfiltered honesty has also played tricks on him.
In 2008 the actress made a terrible miscalculation when she received an Emmy nomination and she decided to exclude herself and give up the award because she considered that the material provided by the series' writers was not good enough. Her damage to her relationship with the omnipotent Shonda Rhimes was irreparable, but also to her perception and reputation within the industry. Heigl, who left the series permanently in 2010, had some success in romantic comedies such as '27 Dresses', 'The Truth' and 'Like Life Itself' before the phone stopped ringing.
Her inclusion on the Hollywood blacklist led, as she herself has explained, to stress, anxiety and even suicidal thoughts. And although his sincerity (at times justified, at times miscalibrated) cost him what could have been a great career in Hollywood, Heigl has been able to return to television with series like 'Firefly Lane', from Netflix, or 'Suits' while She has become a prominent animal rights activist, spearheading a campaign to abolish the use of gas chambers to euthanize homeless dogs.
