Wild Card with Rachel Martin - Shonda Rhimes

Episode Date: October 23, 2025

Shonda Rhimes has created some of the most successful TV shows of the 21st century, but she says the secret to her success is not caring whether or not people will like her shows. The “Scandal” and “Grey’s Anatomy” creator is out with a new version of her memoir, “Year of Yes.” She talks to Rachel about the freedom she feels when she writes and the imaginative potential of a pantry.To listen sponsor-free and support the show, sign up for Wild Card+ at plus.npr.org/wildcard See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for sponsorship and to manage your podcast sponsorship preferences.NPR Privacy Policy

How much do you rely on the validation of others? I don't. It's never been important to me what other people think. I can't waste my time and energy caring about other people's validation. And also, when you believe the good things people say about you, you also then are obligated to believe the bad things. I'm Rachel Martin, and this is Wildcard, the show where cards control the conversation.

Each week, my guest answers questions about their life, questions pulled from a deck of cards. They're allowed to skip one question and to flip one question back on me. My guest this week is Shonda Rhymes. I can sort of sink into that creative writing space where the world sort of fades away around me. And I don't know. It's that feeling like you feel like you could fly forever. It is one thing to create massively successful shows like Gray's Anatomy and scandal.

It is quite another to create characters, stories, and language that change culture. Shonda Rhymes built shows with diverse casts and strong women at the center, which honestly was rare 20 years ago when Gray's first came out. And the character she created in Dr. Christina Yang became an avatar for every woman who has ever wanted to cast off self-doubt and live in her own power. Which is what Shonda Rhymes eventually learned to do herself. She wrote about her own journey in a memoir called Year of Yes, which is being re-released to mark 10 years since the book first. came out. It is my pleasure to welcome Shonda Rimes to Wildcard. Hi. Hi. Thanks for having me. I'm so happy to have you here. I'm so happy to do this with you. Okay. So we're going to start with round one. Okay. Memories. Okay. I'm going to hold up three cards. And you, Shonda Rimes,

pick one, two, or three. I'm going to pick three. Three. What's an early experience of appreciating beauty? You know, when I was young, we didn't do a ton of traveling. We were a family that, you know, we didn't have that kind of money, and I was the youngest of six. So we did a lot of camping trips and that kind of thing. And what I feel most excited about is my parents wanted us to still have these cultural experiences that they maybe couldn't afford to give us. And a lot of them came through the books they brought home and the poetry. My dad loved Walt Whitman.

He would recite Walt Whitman poetry to us all the time. And in the beginning, you're sort of not listening. And then I just remember, you know, you're like, Dad. And then I just remember the one day where he was reciting a poem and I could suddenly see it in my head. Ah, wow. And it was, I think, my first experience really loving poetry. Because after that, I was very into poetry and very into reading the books and going in the library and finding new poetry books.

but his love of poetry translated to us in that way because he was so passionate about it. And I think that might be my first. Yeah. When you say that you were able to imagine poetry in a new way, can you touch back to what image came to your mind or how you saw poetry because of him? Yeah, I mean, I thought the beauty of the words was one thing,

but it seeped into my consciousness in a way that I felt like, And the only way I can say is I felt like I was standing inside the poem and could experience what the author was trying to, the writer was trying to convey and get us to experience. And that, I don't know how often that happens for people with poetry. You know, I think we think of poetry as something as over here. And a lot of people absolutely love it. But for some reason, that poem, and, you know, it's Walt Whitman. It's not, you know, roomy. It's not, you know what I mean?

It's not super abstract. Yeah. But it was a really interesting moment for me because I suddenly understood the power of words and what they could evoke inside you. Yeah. Which is a powerful thing, obviously, for someone who became a writer. Yes. I imagine that was central to that whole experience. Absolutely.

Okay. Still in memories. One, two, or three. One. One. where would you go when you wanted to feel safe as a kid? Oh, that's... So I spent a lot of my childhood playing in our kitchen pantry.

Oh, I was wondering if we're going to go pantry. I've read the book. I know the pantry time. I mean, it was a very small space, you know, in our kitchen. And I... But big enough to, like, get inside and close the door. And so I spent so much of my childhood, and the most vivid memories for me

of playing inside that pantry. And I felt super safe and super happy there. My mom would be in the kitchen cooking, so she was nearby. And I would stay there for hours and hours and hours. And I built whole kingdoms in there where the cans were characters, and I'd have to give people up to die

when my mom wanted to cook like the peas or something. You've got to go. It's your time. Like your life is gone. But for me, me, it was this wonderful sanctuary of space where sort of the world was mine and I felt really safe and really comfortable. It's not that you felt unsafe either.

No. There was just a lot of people around. It was a big family. You're right. It's a big family. And the idea that I had my own space was key, you know, because you shared a room with my sister. I, you know, there were always older siblings around.

And so there's something about that pantry that felt like its own quiet storytelling time. Yeah. I also spent a good amount of time in the pantry growing up. Really? Yeah. I remember sitting on the flower, the big plastic bin that my mom had for a flower. She had one for flour and one for sugar. And that's where I would go.

I didn't imagine in there, but it would go, that's where I went when I needed to think big thoughts. Like, this is serious. Yeah. Let's just get into this little space. Mine was kind of small. Your sounds more expansive. There was more room to maneuver. In my head, in my head, our house was huge. But, you know, years later, I went back and we drove by it. And I was like, that house is so small. How did all eight of us fit in there? Are there any characters or storylines from the pantry that we can identify in some of your later works? Well, I did write about a royal family. So maybe Queen Charlotte.

Maybe Queen Charlotte originated in the pantry. I did imagine, yeah, that kind of life in the pantry, so maybe that was it. Okay. Last one in memories. One, two, or three? Two. Two. What was the soundtrack to your teenage years?

Oh, my gosh. I think the soundtrack to my teenage years involved a mix of Madonna. Mm, classic. Duran Duran. Yes. And this little band called Level 42 that I loved. F-Fourte-2. Do you remember Level 42?

I know the name Level 42, but now I can't... Well, Level 42, they were great. And so, you know, I grew up in, like, the Midwestern suburbs. For me, like, that was, it was deep to have a band that, like, wasn't on the radio, really. Oh, yeah. No, no, no. I felt really, like, I know music, yeah. Yeah, yeah.

Can you place it in time? Like, what's a scene attached to it? How old are you? Where are you listening? Where are you? I think I'm maybe 14 in my childhood bedroom, hanging out with my best friend. We would, you know, back then there was not a lot of, I don't even know if CDs were there back then. I think we were still, like, trying to tape record from the radio at that point.

Yeah. And so you'd have these, like, bootleg recordings or you'd have, like, an album or something. And I remember we would listen to songs over and over and over again and, like, just dance around my room. And you have to imagine me with, like, two braids down the side of my head and my really thick Coke bottle glasses, and I think I wore a lot of pink. And was just this bouncy teenager who thought that, you know, everything was incredible. I was sure that the world was going to turn out okay for me. Like, my life was going to turn out okay.

And those songs always really made me feel like this is who I want to be or this is how I want to be. Before we start round two, let's talk about your book. Congratulations. Thank you. I'm really excited. So for those who didn't read it the first go-round when it came out, let's talk just about the central conceit of the book. I remember when it came out and I was, I did not read it because I saw that title and I was like, year of yes, no, ma'am. I am in my year of no.

Like I had two little kids at home and the whole idea. of like saying yes to anything besides just keeping them alive. Aligh. Yeah. Seemed totally crazy to me. But I mean, this was this revolutionary idea for you in particular because you had this, you had a big life. But remind us what it was that led you to this recognition that you were saying no or you

weren't saying yes as much as you wanted to be. I didn't live a big life. That's what's interesting. People always say that you had a big life. I did not. My characters had really big, glorious lives. And I was doing nothing except for writing those lives. So I wasn't going out. I was very shy, incredibly introverted. I wasn't going out and accepting any of those, the exciting things that happen when, you know, you're starting to get accolades. People invite you to interesting and amazing places. I had never said yes to any of those things. I would barely say yes to going to a party. Like, I don't think I was going to party.

I was doing nothing. And my excuse was I have three shows and two small children and a tween. Like, I can't. I mean, those are good excuses. They're very good excuses. But my sister, it was Thanksgiving Day, and my sister was cooking. And I was sort of going on and on about all of the invitations I'd gotten. The King of Monaco invited me here and I'm this and it.

And it was all very fancy. And she stopped and she said, Chonda, are you going to do any of those things? And I remember just being like, no, like, what are you talking about? Like, I can't possibly do any of those things. And she said, you never say yes to anything. And it was a really powerful moment for me because I'd never thought of it that way. I never thought of the fact that I was always saying no to everything. And so that started me on this idea that I would take a year and say yes to everything that scared me.

So the shyness piece is kind of throughout because it meant putting yourself out in a new way that felt really exposing and vulnerable to you. For people out there. I mean, lots and lots of people suffer from that. It's not just being shy, but you had a real, there was a real fear attached to putting yourself out in those ways. And parties or on stage or whatever, public speaking. How do you do it? How did you just get over that? Well, first of all, like, I'm going to say to anybody, I couldn't have even done this with you, like 10, 12 years ago when I started.

I think for me, what I did is the very act of doing the thing that scares you, undoes the fear. So it's horrible for the moment. And then it's done and you realize that you did not die. Your brain did not explode. You did not make a horrendous fool of yourself. Nobody's pointing and laughing at you. You know, it's that idea of you just have to leap and do it. And it's so hard to make that leap.

But the more you exercise that muscle, the easier it becomes every single time. You ended relationships through this. I did. Close ones. You know, it's really surprising, but not, actually, that people are not, you will find that there are people in your life who are not ready for you to have a new definition of yourself. They're just not. And they're not happy for you. You know, and I think it's threatening to who they are.

Like, I have a little group of very dark, pessimistic people around me who joined me in my dark pessimism, who were not happy when I stopped being an unhappy person because they didn't recognize me, but it also threatened their comfort zone. Right. And, you know, I always feel like you have to give your friends a lot of grace. You really do because you are changing, and that is different. But then there's a realization that there are people who can be confused for a while and then catch up or people who are cheering you on. And then there are the people who just aren't having it. And in a certain way, those people can't remain in your life. And I never thought I would like shed a friend or shed anybody from my life.

And so it was really heartbreaking a lot of the time. But it was also one of the best things I ever did because you realize there are friends who are amazing. if you're miserable. And then there are friends who, those same people are not comfortable with you being happy. Mm-hmm. It was a dear friend of yours. And then you also said no to an engagement. I did. Actually, no. You were engaged. You didn't say no the engagement.

Yeah. You said no to getting married. To getting married. And it was a, it was a real realization. You know, I thought I was doing this thing you're supposed to want to do. But I had, you know, when I was a kid, I imagined having a ton of kids. I never imagined a husband. You know, my Ken doll just kept Barbie shoes in his head. Like, he was not in any way, like, exciting for me when I was a kid.

So it was really interesting. And my parents have this incredible 60-plus year marriage that is just beautiful. But for me, somehow, it just felt like, I don't know. I'd never imagine it. And so when I was sort of in the place where I've met somebody and he was great, and I thought, like, yeah, let's do this. it was a stretch for me. And I remember feeling...

Because you already had your kids. Yeah, I already had my kids. I was done. I remember feeling like, what am I doing? Like, you know, a very strong, like, sense of what am I doing? And worrying about all the... You know, I have only so much energy, so much battery. Like, am I going to have energy for this other person?

And the other thing that happened was, and this was amazing for me. People treated the fact that a man wanted to marry. marry me, like the biggest celebration in the world, more than when I had my kids, more than when I won a Peabody Award, more than any accolade I'd ever gotten, the biggest thing was like, oh, there's a man that wants to marry her. You're validated. That drove me crazy. But it was really hard to break it off and to say, to have the uncomfortable conversation.

And also just tell myself, no, you really don't want to get married. Yeah. Yeah. So 10 years on, what was it like to revisit this book? What did you feel like needed to be underlined again? And what were you like, oh, I need a whole new chapter because this is something different. I need this audience to know. I mean, I think that there was a lot of me needing to reach back and look at the things that had really shaped me in these past 10 years.

I always say I founded the athlete inside me and started playing golf. I love this so much. It was such a joyous thing. I mean, I myself, I cannot stand golf, but I love that you love golf. It's funny. Like, I was a person who, if you had told me five years ago that I would be an avid golfer, I would have laughed in your face so hard because that sounds ridiculous to me. Golf, I thought was the most boring thing in the world, and now I'm obsessed with it.

And it was just being in Connecticut thinking, like, okay, I need a hobby. Like, I haven't had a hobby since I started writing shows and had kids. So I took up golf and it really turned out to be this amazing thing. It's great to be terrible at something that you then, only you can work to get better at. Like it's really dependent on your effort, how much you put in. You're responsible for your successes and your failures. And it's very humbling. So that was one of the most wonderful things.

I also talk about how important it is to sort of let go of the mentorship myth that we're told that if you don't have a mentor, you can't get anywhere. I loved that. That is so counter to what we're told all the time. And then if you don't have this like mythical, magical relationship with someone who's been down the road before you and wants to impart their wisdom, if that you don't have the singular relationship that you've somehow failed it. Yeah. Life. That you failed. You're never going to make it. And, you know, everybody says you need to have a mentor. People, you know, are always asking, like, will you be my mentor? And the reality of it is is there are a million books out there. that can help you understand people's lives and experiences. So I just read tons of memoirs and autobiographies. And those were your mentors. And those books became my mentors. I was in a business where nobody looked like me and nobody knew me when I started out. I mean, Gray's Anatomy was my first show.

So nobody looked like me. Nobody knew me in town. So I didn't have anybody to turn to to be a mentor and nobody was knocking down my door trying to be a mentor. So it feels really important to be able to pull other people's experiences in and learn from those. You can be your own best mentor, but waiting for permission for somebody to say, like, you, I pick you, like, you're going to be great, is a terrible idea because you're waiting for somebody else to start your life. Yeah. Just tick off a couple of your mentors, your book mentors. Becoming by Michelle Obama is a really great one.

Shoe Dog by Phil Knight, Bird by Bird by Bird by Ann Lamont, opened by Andre Agassi. There's some really great books there that don't seem like they might have anything to do with my life, but taught me so much. Yeah.

I love a memoir. Okay. We're moving to round two. Insights. Insights. Three new cards. Okay. One, two, or three.

Two. Two. What's your shortcut to a good cry? Oh, what's my shortcut to a good cry? You have a skip and a flip. I know, I'm thinking about it for a minute. Okay, cool. My shortcut to a good cry is anything involving, you know,

there are endless YouTube videos of soldiers coming home to their families. I'm not kidding. Like, that is a definite shortcut to a good cry. Anytime my children do something amazing, I weep. Like, standing on stage, singing a warbly little song when they're four or five years old. You know, all of those things. That's a shortcut to a good cry. And I don't know.

I live in my characters and I live in novels that I read. Almost anything moves to me, I have to say. I'm not like a mushy person, but I really do fall for the emotion every time. My staff and I often have this conversation like, what makes a cry good? What is your answer to that question? A good cry. One where you feel sort of almost relieved afterwards. Yeah. You know, one that really can evoke emotion, I don't think you can never force a good cry.

So when a good cry comes along, you know, take it. Because usually it means that you're experiencing something in a really big way. So I love that. Yeah. Three more. Still in Insights, one, two, or three. Three. Three.

How much do you rely on the validation of others? I don't. I don't. You know, I think you reach an age where, I mean, it's never been important to me what other people think. Really? I mean, I say never, but to degrees. And I think I've reached a place in the last five years, maybe it's turning 50 or something. that made me just go, like, I really don't care.

Life's too short. You know, you reach this age of wisdom where you just don't care anymore. And I can't waste my time and energy caring about other people's validation. Because then when they- Even professionally with the stuff you make, you need people to like it.

It's like this fine line. I do need people to like it, but I don't do my job so that people will like it. You know what I mean? Like, I don't write the shows thinking people are going to like this. And then I don't, when the shows come out, I don't sit around sort of waiting to see if people like this. It is a wonderful byproduct.

A wonderful byproduct of my shows. But I just, I can't live like that. It's a little exhausting. And also, when you believe the good things people say about you, you also then are obligated to believe the bad things. Oh, that is a powerful idea, isn't it? Yeah. And to me, that's not a way to be created. pursuit creativity. It's not a way to do business. You know, it's wonderful that people watch the shows.

And I think that it's a byproduct of how much hard work and how much we love doing and how we do it, maybe. But it should not be the goal. The goal is to make a great show that I'm proud of. How did you come out that way? I mean, you said you've always been like this with the ability to be like, I am valuable in and of myself and I do not need. external validation from other people? Was it your family? I was raised by very amazing parents. Yeah. Really, you know, my father was a guy who was always saying, the only limit to your success

is your own imagination. And my mother was a woman who I used to say that she was my secret advanced man, you know, moving through the world, knocking obstacles out of my path that I didn't even know existed. You know, she was, you know, like any racism in the 70s, I did not, I was not totally aware of it because my mother had already taken care of it ahead of time. People who, like the woman who said. that I shouldn't be going to Dartmouth, my guidance counselor.

You know, they're not Ivy League material. Not Ivy League material. And my mom, like, came in and took care of that and was like, apply anywhere you want to. So there's a lot of that, and a lot of that really had to do with us understanding our worth and my parents making sure that we understood our worth in the world. So I have some very confident sisters as well because of that. I think we all grew up that way.

And it shapes your parenting, no doubt. It does. It does. I want my girls to know that they're powerful people, that nobody's, you know, other people's judgments about them are not as important as how they judge themselves. And, you know, I want them to be great people. I don't want them to be, you know, cruel or mean. I want them to be kind. But I also don't want them to be stepped on. Yeah. I know this, too. I have an 11-year-old and a 13-year-old boys. Oh, I have an 11-13-year-old girls. Oh, yeah. So we're right in. it. And that age in particular, they care so much what other people think. And you remember when you were 1113, you're like, I get it. It's real strong. This desire to fit in and to be accepted in this group, this group is a hard thing to teach a kid that age that you are enough. And if people can't see it right now, then tell them to go pound sand and live your life. My daughter, Beckett calls it fitting out.

She's always like, I'm fitting out. And for her, she's very much her own person in a lot of ways. I mean, obviously, subjected to all the horrible things that tweens feel and have to deal with in terms of self-esteem. But she's still very much her own person, marches to her own drummer, and she calls it fitting out. And the way even you say that, she feels good about it. There's like a strength in that. It used to bother her when she was little, like really little. I mean, that's where fitting out came from.

She must have been like four or five years old. But as she's gotten older, fitting out has become a thing that's very comfortable for her. I love it. I love it. I'm going to use that. Can I use that? Yes, like it. Beliefs.

Final round. Beliefs round. Three new cards. One, two, or three. One. One. Have you ever experienced a divine power? No.

Maybe we should skip that one. Skip? Okay. Okay. Here we go. Where do you feel most free? Oh, I feel most free when I'm writing. So I don't know if there's a wear to that, but to me it's like, because I can write anywhere as long as I'm wearing headphones. What does that process look like for you? Do you need to be, does it need to be quiet? Do you listen to things? So I trained myself to the, and I don't think I thought. I thought. of it consciously. But I've trained myself so much that if I'm wearing my particular kind of

headphones and I'm listening to music and that music can be different based on one as I'm writing, I can sort of sink into that creative writing space where the world sort of fades away around me. And I don't know. It's that feeling like you feel like you could fly forever. It's that feeling. And it's, to me, it's the best feeling in the world. It's almost like a runner's high. but it is it's where my brain lives and feels most comfortable. So whenever I'm living inside one of these made-up worlds that I've created, there's a joy there and a freedom there that feels so good. I mean, I'm sure somebody would have something to say about the fact that, like,

I'm creating worlds and my own rules and my own environments. That feeling is like no other feeling. Do you grieve it when it's gone then? I don't know. I think I feel such a satisfaction when it's, because it's never gone because you're writing and then you're taking the thing that you created and creating it in a production with actors and everybody. And then you're taking the thing you created and really sort of finally creating it in the editing process.

So there's a lot to it. And by that point, I think I'm ready to be done, you know, by the time we've done editing it. Yeah. But I, you're ready. I miss the feeling. I definitely do. I don't grieve a project, but I miss the feeling. Of when you first birthed that idea.

Yeah. That's lovely. Okay. Three more. Okay. One, two, or three? Two. Two.

What do you look forward to when you're older? Oh, wow. I think I look forward to seeing who my children are going to become. And I look forward to grandchildren, which is not a thing I ever thought I would ever say, that I would be thinking of myself like I can't wait to be a grandmother but that sounds really cool at this point love the baby, hand them back

and I think I'm looking forward to not being on the wheel that is television as much as I love it I think there's going to be a time when I just want to live on a farm somewhere and write whatever I feel like writing you know and not

be doing it for somebody or for a project but just for myself. Yeah. That feels like a nice thing to look forward to. Yeah. When will you know to take yourself out of that wheel? I think I have to want to. Yeah. And right now I don't totally want to. Right now I feel like I'm, I love what I do and I'm enjoying the process, and I think the minute I stopped loving what I do, that's the time. You know, and maybe that'll never happen. Maybe I'll be like Norman Lee are still making shows at 100. I mean. Which is just amazing and brilliant. Or maybe I'll, you know, there'll be a moment when I say like, okay, I'm done. Like, I'm done. And I'm good with that. I've said everything I want

to say in this medium. Maybe that'll happen. I don't know. But I do look forward to just writing for myself. Okay. Last one. One, two, or three? Two. Two. What's an experience you wish you could give every person? That's a big one, but I like it. That is. I think I wish I could give every, and this is very vague, I think, but I wish I could give every person the opportunity and the ability to understand that just because someone's different from you, that doesn't mean that their differences make them unknowable to you. You know, I feel like I'd love it to live in a world in which people were more curious about people who are different than them than angry or frustrated.

We're so divided right now. So I think that might be an experience I'd want to give everybody. Curiosity. Yeah. Yeah. Like approaching people with that. Yes. Shonda Rimes.

We end the show the same way every time with a trick. In our memory time machine, in the memory time machine, you pick one moment of your past you would like to revisit. It's not a moment you want to change anything about. It's just a moment you'd like to linger in a little longer. What moment do you choose? The days I brought my children home. I mean, I think that those were such beautiful, such peaceful days. You know, that moment when somebody hands you a baby that's now a member of your family,

I think I would love to live in those moments again. Is there a particular scene, moment, color, smell, detail that you can share of one of those days? I think probably one of the best moments is watching my daughter stare at her new sibling. And Emerson was about, I don't know, not even one years old or just one year. years old. And, you know, I was at the hospital and I sent a video, you know, of the baby crying and sort of the first moments. And she watched that video a thousand times with a little bit of horror and a little bit of wonder. Like she, you know, it was that thing where you keep swiping and keeps up. She just kept watching it. And I thought, like, the wonder and amazement

on her face was so precious. And it's something that, you know, can't be recreated. You can't capture it. But it was so beautiful. Re-release of her memoir, Year of Yes, is out now. It has been 10 years since the book was first published. Thank you. Thank you so much. If you like this episode, go back and check out our episode with Uzo Adduba. Uzo stars in the most recent show that Shonda produced, The Residents.

Both Shonda and Uzo are women who've got all this confidence, and it comes across in both their work and their personal lives. This episode was produced by Summer Tomad and edited by Dave Blanchard. It was mastered by Patrick Murray and Quasi Lee. Wildcard's executive producer is Yolana Sanweni, and our theme music is by Rom Tien Arablee. We'll shuffle the deck and be back with more next week. Talk to you then.