Meredith Grey

Meredith Grey
Grey's Anatomy character
Ellen Pomepo as Dr. Meredith Grey
Portrayed by	Ellen Pompeo
First appearance	"A Hard Day's Night" 1.01, March 27, 2005
Created by	Shonda Rhimes
In-universe information Occupation Surgical Resident Parents Ellis Grey (mother) Thatcher Grey (father) Susan Grey (stepmother; deceased) Siblings Lexie Grey (half-sister) Molly Grey-Thompson (half-sister) Spouse Derek Shepherd Children Zola Grey-Shepherd (adoptive daughter) Nieces and nephews Laura Thompson (half-niece)

Meredith Grey is a fictional character on the ABC television series Grey's Anatomy and is portrayed by actress Ellen Pompeo. Meredith is the series' protagonist and narrator of many of the episodes in the series. She appeared in the series' first episode as an intern, but is now a surgical resident.

As the daughter of world-renowned surgeon Ellis Grey (Kate Burton), Meredith is met with high expectations of her capacity as a surgeon when she begins working at the hospital. Her instincts and flair for medicine garner praise from residents and attendings at the hospital, especially Richard Webber (James Pickens, Jr.). Meredith's relationship with Derek Shepherd (Patrick Dempsey) has been a focal point of the series and she previously practiced with him on his neurosurgery service, though must choose another specialty due to the difficulties they encounter when working together.

Series creator Shonda Rhimes has commented on Meredith's tendency to make reckless decisions, saying that, "she does not believe in good or bad, she does what she thinks is right." On the other hand, speaking of Meredith's tampering with the Alzheimer's trial in season seven, Pompeo says that Meredith "clearly crossed a line." In response to speculation that after Pompeo’s contract is over Lexie Grey (Chyler Leigh) might assume the role of series protagonist, Rhimes has said she feels as if Meredith is "the Grey of Grey’s Anatomy and that's how it goes."

Storylines

Backstory

Meredith is the daughter of Ellis and Thatcher Grey. She spent her early childhood in Seattle, where her mother was completing her surgical residency at Seattle Grace Hospital. Due to her mother's long-term affair with her colleague, Richard Webber (James Pickens, Jr.), her father left when Meredith was five years old. Soon after, she and her mother relocated to Boston, Massachusetts and Thatcher lost all contact with his daughter. Meredith went on to attend Dartmouth College. After graduating, she travelled in Europe with her best friend Sadie Harris (Melissa George), but returned home when her mother was diagnosed with early-onset Alzheimer's disease. This prompted Meredith to attend medical school, after which she secured a position in the surgical residency program at Seattle Grace Hospital.

Seasons 1-8

The night before Meredith's internship begins, she has a one-night-stand with Derek Shepherd (Patrick Dempsey), a stranger she meets in a bar. She discovers the next day that he is an attending neurosurgeon at Seattle Grace. Meredith is assigned to work under resident Miranda Bailey (Chandra Wilson), and befriends her fellow interns, George O'Malley (T. R. Knight), Izzie Stevens (Katherine Heigl), Cristina Yang (Sandra Oh) and Alex Karev (Justin Chambers). She hides the fact that her mother suffers from Alzheimer's disease from the other doctors, including Richard, who is now the hospital's Chief of Surgery. Meredith initially resists Derek's advances, but they eventually begin a relationship. She is surprised by the arrival of Addison Montgomery (Kate Walsh), Derek's wife, having been unaware that he was married.

Derek struggles to choose between Addison – from whom he is estranged – and Meredith, but ultimately returns to Addison. Meredith is devastated and turns to searching for her father, though their brief reunion fails to give her any closure regarding her childhood. She learns that her father re-married and had two more daughters, which is why he never fought for her. Meredith has a series of one-night-stands, including with George, who is in love with her. When she cries in the middle of their encounter, their friendship temporarily ends. Meredith begins a relationship with veterinarian Finn Dandridge (Chris O'Donnell). Derek experiences jealousy which manifests as anger: he criticizes Meredith's promiscuity and calls her a whore. They later end up having sex after a heated argument, and Derek resolves to leave Addison.

Meredith briefly dates both Derek and Finn, before choosing Derek, who divorces his wife. Her mother experiences a completely lucid day, and expresses her great disappointment at how ordinary Meredith has turn out to be. Following a ferryboat accident, Meredith is knocked into the water and has to be rescued by Derek. She flatlines at the hospital, and awakens in an "afterlife", where she interacts with deceased former acquaintances. Ellis dies in the interim, and Meredith meets with her mother, who tells her that she is anything but ordinary and urges her to wake up. Meredith is subsequently resuscitated. Thatcher and his wife Susan reach out to Meredith after Ellis' death. However, shortly thereafter, Susan also dies following a rare complication of a surgical procedure performed at Seattle Grace. In his grief, Thatcher blames Meredith and forbids her to attend the funeral. Lexie (Chyler Leigh), Meredith's half-sister, begins working at Seattle Grace as an intern. Meredith initially rejects Lexie's attempts to get to know her, but slowly softens towards her.

Derek pushes Meredith to make a greater commitment to their relationship than she feels able to, and the pair break up once more, though they continue having break-up sex for several weeks. When Meredith finally decides that she wants to commit to Derek, she finds out that Derek kissed Rose, his scrub nurse and ends their relationship once more. Derek begins dating Rose and Meredith sees a therapist, Dr Wyatt (Amy Madigan). She admits that as a child, Ellis attempted suicide in front of her. Meredith is finally able to realize that Ellis did not truly want to die, but committed the act as a cry for attention. Meredith initiates a neurosurgical clinical trial, enlisting Derek as a consulting neurosurgeon. The trial fails repeatedly, but the final patient they treat survives, which leads Meredith and Derek to reunite and move in together.

Sadie, Meredith's friend from medical school, arrives at Seattle Grace as an intern. Cristina feels threatened by their closeness, and she and Meredith briefly fall out. Derek is visited by his mother, Carolyn, who gives him her engagement ring to propose to Meredith with. He becomes depressed and rejects Meredith, however, when he makes mistakes during an operation, leading to a patient's death. When Izzie is diagnosed with Stage 4 metastatic melanoma, Meredith convinces Derek to operate on her. He agrees to perform the surgery, and later proposes to Meredith in the hospital elevator. Izzie begins to plan the perfect wedding for a reluctant Meredith, but when, on their wedding day, Derek discovers that Izzie has a second brain tumour, the couple let Alex and Izzie marry instead. Meredith and Derek marry by writing their wedding vows on a post-it note.

Having become a heavy drinker following Susan's death, Thatcher experiences liver failure. For Lexie's sake, Meredith agrees to donate part of her liver to him. She later becomes pregnant with Derek's baby, but he is shot by the husband of one of his deceased patients before she can tell him. Cristina operates on Derek, but mid-surgery, the gunman reappears. Meredith pleads with him to shoot her instead. Her colleague Jackson Avery (Jesse Williams) tricks the gunman into believing that Derek is dead. In the aftermath, Meredith has a miscarriage. She learns that she has a "hostile uterus", which leads her to consider her other possible genetic flaws. Derek, worried about the possibility that Meredith will develop Alzheimer's, initiates a clinical trial hoping to cure the disease. She and Cristina briefly fall out: Cristina admits that she blames Meredith for causing her post-traumatic stress by having her operate on Derek. They reconcile, however, after treating victims of a college campus shooting.

The Chief gives Meredith the opportunity to continue her mother's research into diabetes, but Meredith opts to work on Derek's Alzheimer's trial instead. When the Chief's wife, Adele, is diagnosed with Alzheimer's, she receives a spot on Derek's trial. Meredith tampers with the drugs so that Adele does not receive the placebo. She and Derek decide to adopt Zola, an orphaned baby from Africa, and make their marriage official. When the truth about Meredith's tampering comes out, however, a furious Derek tells her he cannot raise a child with her. Meredith is fired, and tries to conceal both this and her separation from Derek from the adoption counselor. Although Richard steps down as Chief of Surgery and takes the blame for the trial tampering to protect Meredith, Zola is taken away. She and Derek reconcile and fight to get Zola back, but fear the worst when the judge cancels their hearing. Meredith tells Derek that she does not want another child, just Zola. They are both delighted when the adoption counselor unexpectedly returns Zola to them.

Development

When casting actors for Grey's Anatomy, series creator Shonda Rhimes envisioned Meredith being played by someone akin to "that girl from Moonlight Mile." She was informed that the actress in question was Ellen Pompeo, who had a deal in place with ABC, having previously tested for a pilot show for the network. Pompeo was cast as the programme's titular character, described by Mary McNamara of the Los Angeles Times as "a prickly, independent sort whose ambition, and ambivalence, is fueled by the fact that her mother was a gifted surgeon and now suffers from Alzheimer's." Meredith also serves as the show's narrator, and as such was likened in early reviews to Carrie Bradshaw (Sarah Jessica Parker), the narrator and protagonist of Sex and the City.

Reception

Pompeo has been nominated for multiple awards for her portrayal of Meredith. She and the Grey's Anatomy cast won Best Ensemble in a Television Series at the 2006 Satellite Awards. During the following year's ceremony, she was named Best Actress in a Television Drama Series. She was among the Grey's Anatomy cast members awarded the Outstanding Performance by an Ensemble in a Drama Series accolade at the 13th Screen Actors Guild Awards, and received nominations in the same category in 2006 and 2008. Pompeo received a Best Performance by an Actress In A Television Drama Series nomination at the 64th Golden Globe Awards – the programme won Best Drama Series at the same ceremony. Also in 2007, Pompeo and the female cast and crew of Grey's Anatomy received the Women in Film Lucy Award, which honors those "whose work in television has positively influenced attitudes toward women." Her performance has garnered two People's Choice Award nominations. At the 37th People's Choice Awards, she was nominated against Dempsey and Oh in the Favorite TV Doctor category, though all three lost to Hugh Laurie's Gregory House. The following year, she was a contender in the Favorite TV Drama Actress category. In 2007, show-business awards reporter Tom O'Neil commented that Pompeo was overdue an Emmy Award nomination for her role in Grey's Anatomy. Readers of O'Neil's awards website, The Envelope, included Pompeo in their 2009 nominations for Best Drama Actress in the site's Gold Derby TV Awards. Entertainment Weekly launched the EWwy Awards in 2008, to honor actors who have not received Emmy nominations. Pompeo was nominated in the Best Actress in a Drama category, and placed fourth, with 19 percent of readers' votes. In 2009, McNamara suggested that Pompeo, "who has worked very hard and against all narrative odds to make Meredith Grey an interesting character at last" should have received an Emmy nomination.

External links

• Meredith Grey at ABC.com
• Template:IMDb character