‘Grey’s Anatomy’ Alum Katherine Heigl Reveals If She’d Ever Return to ABC Drama

Katherine Heigl resents the reputation for being “difficult” she developed while starring on Grey’s Anatomy from 2005 to 2010, but she “could never say never” to making a return to the ABC medical drama. In a new interview with The Washington Post, the actress, now 42, shared that looking back at how she was treated in her 20s “pisses me off.”

“I may have said a couple of things you didn’t like, but then that escalated to ‘she’s ungrateful,’ then that escalated to ‘she’s difficult,’ and that escalated to ‘she’s unprofessional,’” said the actress, who is set to executive produce and star in the new Netflix series Firefly Lane. “What is your definition of difficult? Somebody with an opinion that you don’t like? Now, I’m 42, and that s— pisses me off.”

Heigl was branded as difficult to work within the industry during her time portraying Dr. Izzy Stevens on the show, and the controversy made headlines when she withdrew her name from Emmy consideration the year after winning one such award, citing she didn’t feel she was “given the material this season to warrant an Emmy nomination.” In 2016, Heigl told Howard Stern that she had apologized to Grey’s creator Shonda Rhimes after the move was widely condemned, and she told the Post in this week’s interview, “At the time, I was just quickly told to shut the f— up. The more I said I was sorry, the more they wanted it.”

“The more terrified and scared I was of doing something wrong, the more I came across, like I had really done something horribly wrong,” she said, describing the years that followed her exit from Grey’s as something similar to a “shunning,” especially once her romantic comedies began to make less money. “I asked my mom and my husband to find me somewhere to go that could help me because I felt like I would rather be dead,” said Heigl. “I didn’t realize how much anxiety I was living with until I got so bad that I had to really seek help. You can do a lot of inner soul work, but I’m a big fan of Zoloft.”

Despite everything surrounding her time on Grey’s Anatomy, Heigl said she “could never say never” to making a return to the show. “I think it would just be completely dependent upon the team over there, how they feel about it, and the story,” she said.