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Ellen Pompeo Is Dead Serious About Inclusive Hiring: ‘As Caucasian People, It’s Our Job’

Ellen Pompeo.
Highbrow brilliant! Photo: Net-A-Porter

A little known fact is that Migos’s “Walk It Like I Talk It” was actually an ode to Grey’s Anatomy star Ellen Pompeo. Okay, not really — but after candidly discussing achieving pay equity on Grey’s, Pompeo has continued to use her “I was told by AppleCare” voice for the forces of good. During a Net-A-Porter actress roundtable with Gabrielle Union, Gina Rodriguez, and Emma Roberts, Pompeo chided both Hollywood at large and the producers of that very Net-A-Porter interview for not hiring a racially inclusive production team.

“This day has been incredible, and there’s a ton of women in the room. But I don’t see enough color. And I didn’t see enough color when I walked in the room today,” Pompeo began. She told a story about meeting with a director and advocating for racially inclusive hiring before she even signed on. “I think it’s up to all productions to make sure that your crew looks like the world that you see. As Caucasian people, it’s our job. It’s our task, it’s our responsibility to make sure that we speak up in every single room that we walk into, that this is not okay, and that we can all do better. It’s our job because we’ve created the problem.”

After Pompeo finished, Union — whose eyebrows were working overtime in support of Pompeo’s comments — raised her coffee cup for a cheers. Later on, all three of the other women talked about racism in Hollywood and that the key to inclusive hiring is just … inclusive hiring.

Well, hello! Let’s celebrate allyship!

Ellen Pompeo Gets Tough on Inclusive Hiring: ‘It’s Our Job’