Entertainment Today and Beyond

GREY’S ANATOMY axes actress BROOKE SMITH amidst controversy

According to Entertainment Weekly, actress Brooke Smith, who plays Dr. Erica Hahn on ABC’s GREYS ANATOMY, will exit the series abruptly on this Thursday’s episode after Network brass reportedly “had issues with both the explicit direction Hahn’s relationship with Callie Torres (Sara Ramirez) was taking and “the Hahn character in general”. As a fan of Grey’s Anatomy from the beginning, I feel that the writers of the show crossed the line. Not in the lesbian storyline but in the dialogue between the two which was way over the top for a network program. Taking straight characters and turning them gay is also a stretch but there were a handful of scenes in the last two weeks that certainly lit up the switchboard over at the network.

Dialogue scenes between Ramirez and Eric Dane, who plays Dr. Mark Sloan, were also pretty risqué of late and I thought the show was going in a dangerous direction as I watched this play out for the last month or so. I also think the fact that the Hahn character has been written as a mostly unlikable human being didn’t help things from a creative standpoint. Smith’s chemistry with Ramirez was non-existent. At the end of the day this was not about sexual orientation but DIALOUGE, which was more appropriate on a cable show like Nip Tuck or Rescue Me than on Grey’s. Many people will try and spin this story as homophobic but I don’t see it that way. Unlike the same sex male storyline on the same networks BROTHERS AND SISTERS which works really well, the writers on Grey just botched this one up by taking their material to an extreme. Unfortunately Actress Brooke Smith paid a price. Expect the protests to begin but for all the wrong reasons!

November 6, 2008 Posted by Entertainment Today & Beyond | Reviews | Brooke Smith, controversial lesbian episodes, Dr. Hahn, Grey's Anantomy | Leave a Comment