quitters

Work-Loving T.R. Knight Quit Grey’s Anatomy Over Lack of Screen Time

On Monday, charming actress Katherine Heigl complained to Letterman about her exhausting seventeen-hour workdays in Shonda Rhimes’s Grey’s Anatomy sweatshop. Hilariously, in this week’s EW, her co-star T.R. Knight tells Michael Ausiello the reason he left Grey’s (and the security of a $14 million contract) was because Rhimes simply wasn’t working him hard enough.

This fall, Knight was surprised to see his character George O’Malley all but vanish from the show — for the first nine episodes of season 5, he appeared on screen a total of only 48 minutes, compared to 114 for Sandra Oh’s Christina. Still, due to what he calls a gradual “breakdown of communication” between himself and exec producer Shonda Rhimes, the actor chose not to ask his boss what was going on with his character. Instead, he simply asked to leave. “My five-year experience proved to me that I could not trust any answer that was given [about George],” he explains. “And with respect, I’m going to leave it at that.”


He has the gall to complain even after being allowed to while away the hours relaxing comfortably in his trailer, as poor Katherine Heigl spent her seventeen-hour days arduously humping her dead fiancé in front of the camera. It’s just rude, really.

This week’s cover: ‘Grey’s Anatomy’ star T.R. Knight reveals why he left the hit show [Ausiello Files/EW]

Work-Loving T.R. Knight Quit Grey’s Anatomy Over Lack of Screen Time