‘Grey’s Anatomy’ Star Camilla Luddington on Ex-Writer Elisabeth Finch’s Betrayal: “It Sucks to Be a Part of the Story”
After Peacock’s documentary on Elisabeth Finch was released earlier this month, Camilla Luddington says she received requests to comment (including from the doc’s directors and The Hollywood Reporter) on the former Grey’s Anatomy writer who was revealed to have fabricated stories about her life. Luddington, who has played Dr. Jo Wilson on the hit ABC medical drama for 12 seasons, didn’t comment for the doc, nor has she commented since Anatomy of Lies released on Oct. 15. Now, she’s opening up about the experience on her podcast with her former co-star Jessica Capshaw.
“I remember when I heard this documentary was being made, but that actually came after finding out that someone in my daily life at Grey’s had lied about her entire identity — who she was, things that had happened to her. A whole ‘nother person. Whole ‘nother, whole ‘nother,” said Call It What It Is podcast co-host Capshaw, who played Dr. Arizona Robbins for 10 seasons on Grey’s, departing the show after season 14 but making a return appearance last season on the beloved Ellen Pompeo series now in its 21st season.
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“It is scary when someone can lie so easily, so confidently, that you really cannot tell,” replied Luddington. “This was somebody who lied to us about cancer. That’s something that you don’t ever imagine someone could lie about.”
Finch was a top writer turned co-executive producer on Grey’s for eight seasons before she was exposed — via an email from her estranged wife, Jennifer Beyer, to Grey’s creator and boss Shonda Rhimes — as having fabricated many elements of her personal life, stories that had inspired countless plotlines.
Anatomy of Lies focuses on several of those plotlines, including the powerful 2019 episode about rape survivors, “Silent All These Years,” which was in response to Christine Blasey Ford’s testimony at the Supreme Court confirmation for Brett Kavanaugh, and storylines that emanated from that involving Jo. Finch — who claimed she suffered from rare bone cancer chondrosarcoma, lost a kidney and underwent an abortion, and suffered from PTSD over close ties to the 2018 Pittsburgh synagogue shooting, among other fabricated stories of trauma — wrote that episode and, as the documentary’s directors showed and spoke to THR about, “had this strange affinity for Jo.”
Now speaking to Capshaw, Luddington likened the experience to living in an episode of Dateline that she didn’t realize she was in. “You watch these documentaries, and I’m like, ‘I would have known. I would know that person’s lying.’ And then you have an experience where it feels like you’re in a Dateline documentary,” she said on their “Call It Liars” podcast episode. “I did not know. I truly did not know. And I think that kind of throws you for a loop because then you feel like your own instinct on stuff is way off. And — this is what I don’t like about it — it makes you start questioning yourself. ‘Why didn’t I see that? How did I believe that?’ And I don’t like this self-doubt.”
After Beyer reached out to Rhimes, Finch was put under investigation by Shondaland and Disney, and subsequently took an indefinite leave of absence from Grey’s in March 2022. Shortly after, Anatomy of Lies co-director Evgenia Peretz published her two-part feature in Vanity Fair, where Beyer helped expose Finch’s years of false claims. Since then, Finch has offered two public apologies; one in a late 2022 interview with The Ankler, and another on her social media (which is now private), where she apologized to her family and friends on the day Anatomy of Lies was released. Beyer, in a post to her Facebook page, rejected the latter, saying her now ex-wife Finch has “demonstrated no meaningful remorse for her actions toward either me or my children.”
Capshaw said of Finch, “It never occurred to me to not believe her. The things that she lied about, you could never in a million years imagine questioning.” After finding out the truth, Capshaw said, “I sort of felt like, ‘Oh, she was really good at that, because I believed her.’ But I was not sitting in the seat of the woman that she married and represented a whole different life to.”
Capshaw and Luddington both likened the experience for Beyer, as Finch’s then-wife, to playing out like a movie.
“I will say this,” added Luddington, “because I have been asked to comment on this documentary — very strange experience seeing yourself in that kind of way — and I personally don’t want to talk about my experience on set with this person. It’s hard for me to even … you know … with this person. What I hate about this is it makes you go back and question all the little things.”
Luddington then shared a never-told personal story of her first trip to Hawaii — she says she was excited to be able to afford the vacation, which she took with her now-husband Matthew Alan — and that Finch showed up, three days into her trip, at the hotel bar of her Kauai hotel, also on vacation with someone.
“I remember thinking it was the most random coincidence,” said Luddington. “Then you start to think back about, ‘Who did I tell?’ I had told so many people where I was going, I’m sure I would have told her. And, is there a world in which she just happened to be on vacation at that hotel with me in Kauai? Sure. That happens, people run into each other. But I don’t like the now questioning and going back and reevaluating all those things.”
Capshaw then asked, “Did she check in as Jo Wilson?” The question was a reference to Finch checking in to her treatment center, and introducing herself to Beyer, under the name “Jo,” as is explored in Anatomy of Lies. “I completely believed everything she said. There was never a moment of suspicion,” Capshaw continued. “And I remember when I left [Grey’s], she came and found me. And we ended up having a really long conversation outside my trailer because she was so sad that I was leaving and wanted to talk about it. … What is true, and what’s not true?”
Luddington said she didn’t like how the Grey’s family was “caught up” in Finch’s story. “I don’t like having felt like someone like that was in our orbit and not feeling like I sensed any of that truth myself. It just is uncomfortable and none of it feels good,” she said. “It sucks to be part of the story. It’s uncomfortable to be a part of the story.”
The Grey’s fan-favorite stars said they ultimately decided to talk about this on their podcast so they could reach others who have found themselves in similar situations, which were words echoed by the Anatomy of Lies directors when they spoke about why they wanted to adapt Beyer’s story for the screen.
“It’s been very gratifying to see her healing throughout this entire process,” Peretz told THR recently about Beyer after the documentary was released. “And, it’s not just for her. We were hoping to touch a wide audience who had similar experiences where they’ve been deeply betrayed to, lied to or suddenly woke up and thought the person they loved was not that person. This sudden sense of gaslighting is a very common phenomenon, and so we’re hoping people who have had similar experiences can see this and feel like they’re not alone. And not feel they are gullible but feel that it’s a very common thing and that it’s very human.”
Her co-director and husband, David Schisgall, added: “The people who are taken advantage of in this way are people who are very empathetic. In a certain way, the bigger your heart, the more liable you are to something like this.”
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