Shonda Rhimes, the creator of ABC’s “Grey’s Anatomy,” “Scandal” and the recently ended “Private Practice,” is one of the most prolific and powerful creative forces working in network television. (Only Chuck Lorre, who has three sitcoms on CBS, has as many series on the air.) In its ninth season, “Grey’s” remains one of the most highly rated dramas on television. In its second, “Scandal” has hit its bonkers creative stride. This season the series, about political fixer Olivia Pope (Kerry Washington) having an affair with the president, has staged an assassination attempt and exposed the vote-rigging plot that got the president elected in the first place. It is simultaneously ultra-cynical and overly romantic, and week in and week out, the ballsiest show on television (and by far the most fun to talk about). Rhimes spoke with me about why everyone keeps insisting Olivia Pope is a good guy, how much she hates it when people call “Scandal” a guilty pleasure, and her bafflement by the lack of racial diversity on TV in 2013.
How a feminist franchise becomes a trilogy of terror
No one died in last week’s episode of “Grey’s Anatomy.” Though the institution of marriage was certainly on the chopping block: Sandra Oh’s union was dealt a fatal blow, lapsed virgin Sarah Drew gleefully fled a shotgun wedding, and any remaining sexual chemistry between Ellen Pompeo and Patrick Dempsey was killed by baby-making issues. Chandra Wilson spent the hour dreading her impending nuptials until Oh persuaded her to accept the rite as a necessary evil: just strap on the dress and think of England.Watching the show’s alternately unconvincing, saccharine, tart and touching plot threads wend toward their conclusion, I steeled myself for the inevitable jolt of violence I’d learned to expect from “Grey’s” and its OB-GYN spinoff, “Private Practice.”To my surprise, the episode ended benignly. Letting down my guard, I settled in to enjoy the twisty political adult soap “Scandal,” grateful writer-producer Shonda Rhimes (the force behind “Grey’s” and “Practice”) didn’t feel the need to deploy visceral bloody shocks to heighten suspense on her youngest series.Continue Reading… … Read More
