‘Grey’s Anatomy’ Season 16 Renewed For Another Season

Greys Anatomy Break, Grey's Anatomy Going on Break

ABC Seattle firefighters Ben Warren and Andy Herrera head to Grey Sloan after rescuing two boys that are injured in a house fire. With one of the boys' lives literally in Andy's hands, her skills are put to the test. Meanwhile, the doctors are hard at work on their projects for the Grey Sloan Surgical Innovation Contest; and Amelia brings Tom Koracick in to consult on her and Alex's patient, on a special, TGIT Crossover Event episode of "Grey's Anatomy".

Grey’s fans are in luck because no one’s saying goodbye to the show just yet. In fact, no one’s going to say goodbye to the doctors at Grey Sloan Memorial for a while. The show has been renewed for seasons 16 and 17.

In May, Grey’s Anatomy was renewed for two more seasons, and Ellen Pompeo, who plays the lead character of Meredith Grey, extended her contract until 2021.

For a while there, fans were wondering if Grey’s Anatomy would continue; earlier this year, Pompeo told TV Line she wasn’t sure if she was going to re-sign her contract. She stated, “I’m contracted through Season 16… And beyond that… I don’t really know. I take it day-by-day.” It seems she’s decided she isn’t ready to part with the doctor-driven reality drama.

“I keep saying, ‘I’m ready to move on and I want to stop the show before the ratings go down,’ but the ratings never go down!” she added. “They go down a little bit, but the fact that we are able to hold our [title as ABC’s No. 1 series] is kind of [incredible]. It’s very cool to have these kind of ratings and be on a hit network show in this [Peak TV] landscape.”

In showrunner Krista Vernoff’s opinion, there could be much more ahead for Grey’s. Vernoff tells TVLine, “I find myself thinking forward… It feels like the show could really go on. In the early years, we would pitch stories, and Shonda [Rhimes] would go, ‘Uh, that’s a Season 8 story. Let’s do that toward the end.’ Now we’ve doubled the expected lifespan of the show and told all the stories we talked about in the early years, so we have almost a blank slate. Where do you go from here? It’s exciting!”

Last January, Pompeo’s contract with Grey’s Anatomy made headlines after it was reported that the actress would be making $20 million a year for playing Meredith Grey.

That’s all the more interesting considering the fact that she almost didn’t audition for the show! CNBC reports Pompeo as telling her agent, upon receiving her initial audition for the series, “I was like, ‘I’m not going to be stuck on a medical show for five years… Are you out of your f—— mind? I’m an actress.’” Pompeo’s agent convinced her to audition, “if only to pay her rent,” CNBC states.

Today, Pompeo is one of the highest paid actresses in Hollywood. Under her 2018 contract, she received $575,000 per episode, along with a seven-year signing bonus. That number doesn’t even take into account producing fees.

Be sure to tune into the finale of Grey’s Anatomy tonight on ABC at 8pm ET/PT.