Sandra Oh is looking back on one of the biggest decisions of her career. The Emmy-winning actress has said that she’s still convinced that she made the right decision more than a decade ago when she departed Grey’s Anatomy. Oh explained that she felt her work as Dr. Cristina Yang had reached a natural ending after 10 seasons.
Sandra Oh said she left Grey’s Anatomy after feeling Cristina Yang’s story had run its course
On a new episode of Jesse Tyler Ferguson’s Dinner’s On Me podcast, Oh remembered that Shonda Rhimes, the show’s creator, called her at the end of Season 8 or 9 when the cast was re-negotiating their contracts. “What do you want to do?” asked Rhimes. Oh replied, “Let me think about it,” and spent time making her decision. She later trusted her instincts and decided to leave the hit ABC drama.
She said that she never regretted that decision because she felt she had completed Cristina’s journey. “I felt very much like I did my job. I really did my job,” she said. She added, “I feel like I created a full character. I feel I grew the character in 10 years’ time, where it’s a believable growth.” She also added, “People grow in 10 years, and I believe she really did.”
Cristina exited the series at the end of Season 10 when she took a job at her ex-fiancé Preston Burke’s high-tech research institute in Switzerland. Oh said the writers, gave her character a meaningful goodbye. “And I know that it is extremely rare to have,” she shared. “So, that was a real, real gift.”
According to Page Six, she also revealed that she first auditioned for Miranda Bailey before she discovered Cristina Yang. She immediately thought, “That’s it. That’s the antagonist,” and told herself, “I wanna do that.” During the audition process, her manager told her, “Leave. Leave. We can’t close your deal,” so she walked out before the network audition.
Even so, Oh said the creative team had already seen enough during an earlier work session, and “just cast” her because “that’s all that mattered was that Shonda, Betsy and Peter could see what I was and see what I could do.” Ultimately, Sandra Oh’s decision to leave Grey’s Anatomy marked the end of a defining chapter in her career, but she remains confident that Cristina Yang’s story ended exactly when it was meant to.
TELL US – DO YOU THINK SANDRA OH MADE THE RIGHT DECISION TO LEAVE GREY’S ANATOMY AFTER 10 SEASONS?
