Grey’s Anatomy boss Shonda Rhimes responds to Eric Dane being left out of Oscars tribute
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Digital Spy GB
Grey’s Anatomy creator Shona Rhimes has responded after the show’s star Eric Dane was left out of the In Memoriam segment that aired during last night’s Oscars ceremony, following his sad passing almost a month ago.
The actor played Dr Mark Sloan, famously nicknamed ‘McSteamy’, for multiple years on the medical drama, and also appeared in films such as X-Men: The Last Stand and the latest Bad Boys.
After Dane was not included in the montage of deceased actors and filmmakers shown to the audience and viewers at home, Entertainment Tonight spoke to Rhimes and asked her thoughts.
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“He’s not a movie star, and I feel like when the Emmys come around he will be immortalised the way he should be”, she said.
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“I don’t think… we can’t fault the Oscars for the fact they are looking at movies and there were so many people we lost. But Eric was unique to television, and I can’t wait to see what they do with that.”
The In Memoriam segment that aired last night included tributes to actors Robert Redford, Catherine O’Hara and Val Kilmer, and director Rob Reiner, among others.
The Oscars did include both Dane and James Van Der Beek — who died just a few days earlier and was also best known for television — in the In Memoriam 2026 section of its website.
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Speaking more generally about her star, Rhimes told the publication: “Eric is — was an incredible human being and I still say ‘is’ because it’s very hard for me to believe he’s gone.
“He was an incredible human being, and he was a huge loss for us. He was a huge loss for the Shondaland family, a huge loss for the Grey’s Anatomy family, and for the people he knew, he was just a wonderful giving, giving guy.
“I don’t know [if] everybody understands just how amazing he was.”
The Oscars aired on ITV1 in the UK and can be streamed on ITVX.
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Joe Anderton is a freelance news writer at Digital Spy, having worked there since 2016. In his time, he’s covered a host of live events and interviewed celebrities big and small. A big fan of TV and movies both mainstream and obscure, Joe also enjoys video games and in particular PlayStation. Joe currently does not use Twitter, but he only ever used it to tell people to watch the film Help! I’m a Fish.