Writer and producer, Shonda Rhimes, guesses lines from some of her hit television shows and movies including, 'Grey's Anatomy,' 'Scandal,' 'Queen Charlotte,' 'The Princess Diaries 2,' and 'Private Practice.'
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00:00Don't ever ask a man to pick you, choose you, love you.
00:02It's not a good idea.
00:04It's a great line, cause I wrote that for sure.
00:06Am I right?
00:07Yeah.
00:08Holy crap.
00:08There we go.
00:13All right, everybody.
00:14It's a beautiful night to save lives.
00:16Let's have some fun.
00:17That is the pilot of Grey's Anatomy said by Derek Shepard.
00:21All right, everybody.
00:22It's a beautiful night to save lives.
00:25Let's have some fun.
00:27You know, I've always loved medical shows.
00:29And so creating Grey's Anatomy was really a chance
00:32to get to play in that world.
00:33And I love to watch medical documentaries.
00:35I was kind of a medical junkie.
00:37So it was really exciting to sort of come up with a world
00:39where I could play with that and learn along with everybody
00:42cause there were interns
00:43who didn't know what they were doing.
00:44For Grey's we treat every season like it's the last season
00:47so that we can really leave it all on the floor
00:49for the audience.
00:50So we're not trying to hold anything back.
00:52We really shape every season as if it's the first time
00:55we've ever done the show if we can,
00:57to keep it fresh and new.
01:00You have to be twice as good as them
01:01to get half of what they have.
01:02That is the season three premiere of Scandal.
01:05And that is Papa Pope yelling at Olivia Pope.
01:08You have to be what?
01:11Twice as good.
01:13Twice as good as them to get half of what they have.
01:18You know, I didn't have any actress in mind
01:20when I wrote the part.
01:21And what was fantastic was to get to meet someone
01:24like you, and to get to meet you.
01:26And I think that's what I'm most proud of.
01:28To get to meet someone like Carrie,
01:30who I actually had thought of was kind of the opposite
01:32of the part in my original thinking.
01:34And then to discover how right she was.
01:37And the more you watch her play that role,
01:39the more powerful it is.
01:40I mean, I think we spent maybe 20 minutes together
01:42before I knew like, yeah, she's Olivia Pope.
01:45I try really hard not to write series
01:47with any particular person in mind.
01:49It was great to be able to write Queen Charlotte
01:51because I already knew who the queen was
01:54and I already knew who Agatha was,
01:55so that was really helpful.
01:57But in general, no, I try not to do that
01:59because the actors surprise you.
02:01The people who come in surprise you.
02:02And you end up putting people in roles
02:04that you never imagined.
02:05And it's so much better that way.
02:12I don't know this one.
02:13Nepotism belongs in the arts, not in plumbing.
02:17I don't know what that means.
02:19It is a film?
02:21Oh, maybe this is Princess Diaries 2?
02:24This might be Princess Diaries 2.
02:25It sounds like a Princess Diaries 2 line.
02:28Nepotism belongs in the arts, not in plumbing.
02:32I watched the first film and Debra Martin-Chase,
02:35who's the producer,
02:36approached me about writing the second one.
02:38And I thought that would be a really fun thing to do.
02:40And it turned out to be great.
02:41I mean, I always think it's funny now
02:43because I'm working with Julie Andrews now in Bridgerton,
02:46but I also spent time writing her as a queen in that movie.
02:50And so it was kind of great to get to work
02:52with her both times,
02:52but it's also sort of come full circle in a weird way.
02:55There's a scene that got cut out of the movie
02:57that was pretty much one of my favorite scenes
02:59because it was this moment where Julie Andrews says
03:04she's just had her heart broken.
03:06And some staff comes in
03:07and they're starting to ask her a question.
03:09And she screams, like,
03:10do I never get a moment to myself?
03:12And it's such an amazing moment, the way she played it,
03:15the elegance in which she did it.
03:16And it was really about the pain of being a queen,
03:18that she did so well.
03:19But in general, honestly,
03:20she's the nicest person you will ever meet.
03:23And she was so nice to me.
03:24I was nervous to meet her.
03:25I was shaking.
03:26So lovely.
03:28Oh my God, these are getting scary.
03:32I'm on a road trip with a killer
03:33and you're telling me not to be upset.
03:39Part of me wants to say this is Crossroads.
03:41Part of me wants to say it's How to Get Away with Murder,
03:44but I don't know.
03:45It's Crossroads.
03:46There we go.
03:47I'm proud of myself.
03:48I'm on a road trip with a killer
03:49and you're telling me not to be upset?
03:51You know what was great is
03:53she was a kid.
03:54She was hugely popular at that time.
03:56I've never met anybody so professional.
03:59Like she was on point, rehearsed, practiced,
04:03honed, ready to go every single time.
04:04And she worked so hard.
04:06I think for her,
04:07it was like kind of a little bit of a freer time
04:08because she wasn't in front of an audience all the time.
04:10It was very much a small safe space.
04:13And I thought that she was great.
04:14We had a lot of conversations.
04:16She seemed like a very ambitious,
04:19ready to go person at the time, which was wonderful.
04:21I don't know that I have a Crossroads 2 movie in me.
04:24I don't know.
04:25Maybe they'll do it without me.
04:26I don't know.
04:26I mean, I'd love to see what they're doing next.
04:28Like at this point,
04:29I'd love to see where those characters are.
04:31They were very fun to write,
04:32but yeah, I have no idea.
04:35Men fail upwards all the time.
04:37I kind of want to say this is every show I've ever written.
04:40I'm sure that Meredith has said it
04:41or Christina has said it
04:42or Private Practice Gang has said it
04:44or it feels very scandalous that it's not a specific show.
04:48It's all the shows.
04:49Which one?
04:52It's Inventing Anna.
04:53See, that's even better.
04:55Men fail upwards all the time.
04:57I never met the real Anna.
05:00And I did that on purpose
05:01because I knew that if I met her,
05:03like she's such a charismatic person
05:04and people were so polarized.
05:05People in New York were so polarized about her.
05:07So I knew that I would either love her immediately
05:10and then be super biased while trying to write,
05:12or I would loathe her
05:14and then be super biased while trying to write.
05:15So I just wanted to stay neutral on that topic
05:17and really go through the interpretations
05:20that other people had of their time with her
05:22because that was the best thing.
05:23You're never really going to know Anna.
05:24You're never going to know her.
05:26So it was great to see how other people felt they knew her.
05:29I felt like, A, if she'd been a man, by the way,
05:32it would have been very simple.
05:34Nobody, she wouldn't have gone to jail.
05:35Nobody would have been upset.
05:36They probably would have called her smart and savvy
05:39and brilliant for like, look what you tried to pull off.
05:41It's not that different
05:42than what a lot of men do all the time.
05:45Hers just didn't happen to work out.
05:47But I think because she was a woman
05:49and she kind of had that audacity
05:51and she wasn't a hot chick, which I find gross, but true,
05:54people felt like she should be punished
05:56for not being the thing that she was.
06:00And I thought that was really interesting.
06:06Every day is a damn poll day, starting right now.
06:13Feels like this might be
06:14Hot Chocolate Nutcracker Dance Dreams,
06:16but I don't know.
06:17What is this?
06:19Yes.
06:20Okay, every day is a damn poll day, starting right now
06:21is from Station 19, the pilot episode.
06:24Yeah.
06:25Every day is a damn poll day,
06:29starting right now.
06:31You know, it felt really natural to us
06:32to intertwine the storylines between Station 19 and Grey's.
06:35They were living in the same world
06:36and it felt like such a natural path.
06:38We took some characters from Grey's
06:40and put them on Station 19.
06:41Bailey went back and forth.
06:43Meredith went back and forth.
06:44I think it was a really big deal
06:45because it also allowed us big event episodes
06:48that really got to do something
06:49and showcase a different kind of medicine.
06:51We had a little bit of a hard time
06:52because Station 19, right now, comes after Grey's.
06:57And when it was coming before it,
06:58it made it easier
06:59because you go from an ambulance to a hospital.
07:01So we had to get creative
07:02when we started going from a hospital to the ambulance.
07:04But it still worked really well.
07:05We had a great time.
07:10I will stand with you between the heavens and the earth.
07:11I will tell you where you are.
07:13Do you love me?
07:15This almost makes me cry
07:16because it's one of my favorite things I've ever written.
07:18And it was in Queen Charlotte.
07:19And it was the final episode.
07:23I will stand with you between the heavens and the earth.
07:25I will tell you where you are.
07:26Do you love me?
07:27I love you!
07:28You know, there's something about Queen Charlotte
07:30that really felt personal to me.
07:32I don't know, I always act everything out
07:34while I'm writing it.
07:35So something about this just felt, I don't know, intimate.
07:38And to see it on its feet with the actors doing it
07:41just elevated it so much.
07:42I was really proud of that one.
07:43You know what's wonderful is we got to work
07:45with real amazing historians
07:47who were consulting on Bridgerton
07:49and who have been consulting with us
07:50to really get inside that history.
07:51We had like a Queen Charlotte expert talking to us.
07:55So we did a lot of research into what was really there,
07:57but we also knew that we weren't telling the history
07:59of the actual Queen Charlotte.
08:01We were telling the history of Queen Charlotte
08:02as she's portrayed in Bridgerton.
08:04So it allowed us some leeway,
08:05but I really wanted to honor her wherever we could.
08:09I do not want to be just another notch
08:10in your acupuncture table.
08:12That is Addison, I'm pretty sure, Private Practice.
08:17I do not want to be just another notch
08:21in your acupuncture table.
08:23The fans of that show were so amazing and so supportive.
08:26And it's still like, I think, huge in Brazil.
08:29If I do comfort watching, sometimes I like to stick my head
08:31in and see what's going on at private practice.
08:33Okay.
08:34This is a really good line and I don't know who said it.
08:36Guess I wasn't black enough to lead the tribe.
08:39I don't know who said it, but it's really good.
08:42Whoever did.
08:45Is this introducing Dorothy Dandridge?
08:47That's why it's all, well, then it's a great line
08:49because I wrote that for sure.
08:52Guess I wasn't black enough to lead the tribe.
08:55Getting to work with Halle Berry was amazing.
08:57She was a great person.
08:59She was a great person.
09:00She was a great person.
09:01She was a great person.
09:02She was a great person.
09:03Getting to work with Halle Berry was amazing.
09:04She was very dedicated to this role
09:07and threw herself into it.
09:08And we had such fun on the set.
09:10And in a weird way, I became the de facto historian
09:12because I was the one who had done all the research
09:14and read all of the stuff and done all of the interviews.
09:17So really getting to be on set and go, nope,
09:20she said it exactly, no, she said it this way,
09:22or she was lying that direction
09:24if you want it to be perfect, was great.
09:26It was a great experience.
09:29Look, boy, don't go put me on no stand.
09:33I don't answer to nobody.
09:34You know, I love the idea that she was sort of
09:36the first black movie star.
09:38I mean, she wasn't the first black movie star,
09:40but in terms of being nominated for an Oscar.
09:42And I love the story of her and Otto Preminger.
09:44And I got to write in the Nicholas brothers
09:47and all of these people from old Hollywood
09:49that maybe weren't as known to people.
09:51And for me, it was a great experience.
09:56Oh, please.
09:57So pick me, choose me, love me.
10:00Meredith Grey, Grey's Anatomy.
10:02Couldn't tell you which episode exactly,
10:03but I might want to say season two, episode five.
10:08Am I right?
10:08Yeah.
10:09Holy crap.
10:10There we go.
10:11So pick me, choose me, love me.
10:17I'm always amazed that this is the line
10:19that sticks out to everybody.
10:20I mean, I think a lot of it had to do
10:21with Ellen Pompeo's amazing performance,
10:23but I'm always amazed that this is the line that sticks out.
10:25And I want to tell women, don't ever ask a man
10:28to pick you, choose you, love you.
10:29It's not a good idea.
10:30Don't be a pick me girl.