'Good American Family' co-showrunners on navigating different perspective in Natalia Grace adoption scandal show

Yahoo

20-03-2025

Starring Ellen Pompeo as Kristine Barnett, the new show, Good American Family (premiering on Disney+ in Canada March 19), is based on the real-life story of a U.S. family who believed the young girl they adopted, Natalia Grace, was actually an adult trying harm then. Also starring Mark Duplass, Imogen Faith Reid, Dulé Hill, Christina Hendricks and Sarayu Blue, the series shows "darker shades" of Grey's Anatomy alum Pompeo.
Speaking to Yahoo Canada, co-showrunners and executive producers, Katie Robbins and Sarah Sutherland, talked about collaborating with Pompeo, who also serves as an executive producer. In addition to crafting the show to reflect all the different perspectives on this adoption scandal.
Hi, is this Mrs. Barnett?
I see you were on the path to adopting.
We have a little girl here.
She is 7 and she has dwarfism, and what's her name?
Natalia, Natalia Grace.
I tell you, Grace, that is beautiful.
How many articles I read, I think I was still not prepared for the emotional rollercoaster that I went on still.
Um, I'd love to know when you're tackling a story where there are so many different perspectives, and we're not necessarily going to get to like the most definitive.
An answer at the end for for the audience to have.
What do you think about just in terms of really being reflective of all the different stories, perspectives, ideas that everyone kind of had that was involved?
When I first, um, dug into this, um, This story, it was, it was back in 2020 and and Hulu had said we think we might want to do a show about this.
Do you like, what do you think?
I, it, it was before it was quite as like ubiquitous in the popular consciousness as it is now.
And so I have the sort of a, a cleaner slate in terms of going in and reading articles about, um, about the, the different parties involved.
And I was so struck by the fact that like, you would read one article from one person, where one person was being interviewed and you'd be like, OK, I understand what this story is.
And then you'd go and read an article or see a television interview where one of the other parties involved was being interviewed.
You'd be like, Wait, wait, no, my perception of that was entirely wrong.
Like, this is the version of, of events.
And so, in, in crafting it, I really wanted to, um, try to, to retain that sense, that sort of like, um, shifting understanding of things, because it felt so, like, kind of familiar to.
To the way that we exist now, which is that we tend to read a headline and make a snap judgment about something and not ask a lot of questions.
And that that seems like a, a fairly insidious way of moving through the world, because in doing that, we lose, um, any sense of nuance and empathy and, and curiosity.
Um, and so we wanted to structure this in a way that it would take the audience on a journey, um, where they got to kind of grapple with their own biases.
Um, and And come out on the other end with a different understanding of things than where they started at the beginning.
Because Ellen's also taking on a role as an executive producer here, um, what is she like as a collaborator and what makes her an effective collaborator?
She's incredible, and it's, it's, it's amazing to be both a titan of television and also a great time.
We love being around her, whether it's talking about the character, and we talked a lot about the character, um, and we were always on the same page and asking.
Questions with the same kind of care, which is nice, you know, it's, we were very fortunate in that regard.
Um, but yeah, I can't say enough good things as her as a collaborator.
And because she's done this so long, she knows how to do everybody's job.
Genuinely.
Watching her is like watching an athlete and an artist, and, you know, a magician all at once, and she brings that very much to the producing side of the show, and this, you know, this show was challenging to produce.
Both from a creative perspective, but also, you know, we're all trying to make television as efficiently as possible right now.
And I think that she, um, was a really wonderful part of that process and just making sure we landed it in a way that, that, um, let, you know, led, uh, us to be proud.
Having Ellen lead this series, I think is interesting because I think for a lot of us, like, because she was on Grace for so long, I have like an inherent trust when I See her on screen somehow.
It's like, yeah, I would trust you to do surgery on me if you needed to still.
Um, do you think that helps in a story like this where you have to kind of have a certain level of like feeling for her character to really kind of believe her position that I think, you know, as we see in the, in the show does seem extreme as kind of like an assumption at the beginning.
Absolutely.
You know, I think that the an audience's experience with the show is gonna depend so much on how much exposure they've already had to the story.
Um, but if you're somebody who comes in with a specific understanding of of who Christine is, but then you see Ellen playing her, um, you are, I think, more inclined to lean in and, and empathize and, and care about her because she is such a beloved figure.
Um, and so it was really exciting to like start the journey with her there and then to see these other, like, Darker shades of Ellen Pompeo than we've seen before, but absolutely, like, you know, she is like an icon.
Um, and, and everybody knows her and loves her.
And and so absolutely we use that to our advantage.
Imogen as Natalia, I think is like such an incredible, um, person to cast here.
What made Imogen such a great choice to kind of step into that role.
Yeah, she's so incredible and it's been amazing getting to hear everybody, um, Respond as positively to her as we have.
Um, it was an international search and the show was actually contingent on casting her, finding somebody who could play this role, who could do justice to not only multiple ages, but multiple ages from multiple points of view.
As soon as everybody saw her, she was just obvious that she was the right choice.
Um, and we couldn't be, we couldn't be more grateful.
I mean, to get to see somebody at this part of their career who is so destined to be a star.
Um, take on such an incredibly challenging role as her first role, and she just shows up.
I don't know if you've met her yet, and she's as cool as a cucumber, it's, it's incredible.
Um, we're obsessed and just very grateful, kind of a lifetime achievement to get to work with her at this point.