In 2005, Sandra Oh was cast in the career-changing role of Cristina Yang in the ABC medical series Grey’s Anatomy, which, as you may know, became a pretty huge hit.
And the star has opened up about just how dedicated she was to her onscreen character of Cristina while speaking to Dartmouth College’s graduating class of 2025 on Sunday.
She went on to say that being cast in Grey’s in her early 30s brought her “financial stability, fame, and privilege,” but despite this, her time on the show was “one of the most challenging decades” of her life. Sandra admitted to being demanding of both herself and the show’s writers, which “caused grief” for everybody and led to calls with the “big boss,” Shonda Rhimes, who tried to encourage the star to let the staff do their job.
“I demanded a lot from myself and from the writers,” she confessed. “If something bothered me in a script, I would fight for what I believed what was right for the character of Cristina because I felt responsible for her. And while this contributed to the creation of a memorable character, my desire to make the dialogue fit and my belief that I knew what was best for the character also caused grief for the writers and for me.”
Sandra said that she ended up becoming so notorious for her demands that production had a “dedicated Sandra whisperer on staff,” whose sole task was to come to the Grey’s set and “deal with” her.
“That doesn’t happen anymore. I am my own whisperer,” she said. “One time… the writers and I were at an impasse about something in this script, and I had to have a call with the big boss. And Shonda, I’ll never forget, she said to me: ‘Sandra, we have been here before. You got to trust me. Something will come through if you just say the damn words.’ … It has stayed with me. I heard her.”
Would you like to see Cristina back on Grey’s? Let me know in the comments below! You can also watch Sandra’s full commencement speech here.