Patrick Dempsey tries his best to stay separate from his roll as Dr. Derek ‘McDreamy’ Shepherd, but because he portrayed this character and the archetype that went with him for elevan seasons of ABC his series, Grey’s Anatomy, that’s pretty hard to do.
Fans will never forget Derek Shepherd, and you shouldn’t either.
Dempsey left Grey’s Anatomy in 2015, following his character’s death, and began to work behind the camera as a producer on films. Some of those are: Racing in the Rain and Hurley. Now, though, he’s returning to television with a new series, where he won’t be playing a doctor.
Dempsey felt ‘McDreamy’ had run his course as a character, and believed that the character had to die so he could depart the show–and that he probably should have left years prior–so he could move on to other things.
In August, on Good Morning America Dempsey spoke on the archetype that people project on him due to the character he played in Grey’s.
“You’re falling into an archetype that people want to believe is real and then becomes mythology. And you, at the end of the day, you have to separate yourself from that and not believe that’s who you are. It’s a part of you, something that’s inspirational — you want to become a better person and all of what that is, but it’s not who you are at the end of the day.”
Dempsey is heading the new CBS series, Ways & Means, as a discouraged Congressional leader who ends up working secretly with an idealistic young Congresswoman from the opposite party. They’re attempting to save politics, specifically: American politics.
Dempsey also serves as an executive producer on the show, along with Mike Murphy, Ed Redlich, Nina Tassler, Denise Di Nova and Tom Lassally. Murphy and Redlich are co-writing the shows script.
Murphy, a Republican political consultant has advised several high-profile politicians, some of those are: John McCain, Jeb Bush, Mitt Romney, Lamar Alexander, and Arnold Schwarzenegger.
Ways & Means is part of a CBS drama pilote lineup, which includes The Lincoln Lawyer, Silence of the Lambs sequel and The Equalizer.
Derek died. In 2016 he starred alongside Renee Zellweger in Bridget Jones’ Baby, then he sought more roles behind the camera. As an avid race car driver, Dempsey was finally able to complete a project that was personally close to his heart, The Art of Racing in the Rain.
Racing in the Rain was ten years in development. A book was written by the same name in 2008, and Dempsey acquired the rights to create a film as soon as he’d read it. He identified heavily with the material.
Along with that, Dempsey also appeared in The Truth About the Harry Quebert Affair, and Devil’s.
While we don’t have ‘McDreamy’ on Grey’s, there’s a lot of interesting characters still on the medical drama. And it seems that Dempsey is happier not being Derek Shepherd, as hard as that might be to hear. He’s living his life, chasing his dreams, and following his passions.
Hopefully, Dempsey will produce more and be in more for the year 2020. He definitely deserves the spotlight, or the limelight, as the case might be. That salt-and-pepper look is definitely suiting him well too.
