Ellen Pompeo says she was 'horrified' by the iconic 'Grey's Anatomy' scene where Meredith begs Derek to love her

• Ellen Pompeo said on her podcast that an iconic "Grey's Anatomy" scene "horrified" her.
• She said she didn't want Meredith to beg Derek, "Pick me. Choose me. Love me."

The former "Bachelorette" lead Rachel Lindsay was a guest on the "Grey's Anatomy" star Ellen Pompeo's podcast on Monday.

While discussing the aftermath of Lindsay's infamous "Extra" interview with the former "Bachelor" franchise host Chris Harrison, the women drew a comparison between "The Bachelor" and an iconic romance on Pompeo's hit medical drama - and it's not a flattering one.

In the fifth episode of season two of "Grey's Anatomy," Pompeo's character Meredith Grey literally begs her then-boyfriend, Derek Shepherd, who she has recently found out is married, to love her.

"I love you. In a really, really big, pretend to like your taste in music, let you eat the last piece of cheesecake, hold a radio over my head outside your window, unfortunate way that makes me hate you/love you," Meredith says before uttering the words that longtime fans of the show can recite by heart: "So pick me. Choose me. Love me."

Pompeo told Lindsay that she didn't want to shoot the scene, which was written by "Grey's Anatomy" creator Shonda Rhimes.

"When I read that scene, I was horrified," Pompeo said. "I was like, 'I'm going to beg a man?'"

The actress recalled her character "sobbing" while saying the words. "And what's funny about that scene is, I'm bawling my eyes out," she said. But even though she remembered literally crying, she said she wasn't motivated by Meredith's emotions at the moment.

"I'm bawling because I was like, 'I can't believe that I'm on TV begging a man to love me,'" she added.

Pompeo said that while she didn't let her daughter Stella Ivery watch her show, the 12-year-old came across the scene on TikTok and asked her mom why she was pleading so hard for a man's affection.

"And I was like, 'Well, praise Jesus that she's asking me this question and that her head is already in the right space,'" Pompeo said, adding that she initially didn't know what to say but told Stella she "didn't write that" and "didn't want to do it."

Pompeo said she thought the scene was "terrible" but acknowledged that it resonated with fans of "Grey's Anatomy," calling it "one of the most popular scenes in television history."

She then asked Lindsay why she thought women put themselves in a similar situation as Meredith did to be "humiliated" on national television on "The Bachelor."

"I think society has romanticized those moments. They've made it a part of the fairytale," Lindsay replied. "Because it's like, if you come on the other side of it, then it's this beautiful thing, and you have the stories to tell, almost as if things have to be difficult."

Lindsay added, as she's said multiple times in the past, that "Bachelorette" producers edited her story to make it seem like she was begging her ex Peter Kraus to be ready to propose and she compared it to how Meredith begged Derek on "Grey's Anatomy."

The media personality said that even though she'd been married to her husband, Bryan Abasolo, for two years, she still had to "defend" her relationship to the public.

New episodes of "Tell Me With Ellen Pompeo" are available to stream on Wednesdays.