'Grey's Anatomy' Spinoff Heads to New Mexico After California Says No Twice

Producer Betsy Beers told lawmakers the West Texas drama lost crew and money chasing a state credit, and its premiere slipped to 2027-28.

For 23 years, every corner of the "Grey's Anatomy" universe has been made in California. The next spinoff, a medical drama set in rural West Texas, is in pre-production in Albuquerque, New Mexico.

California turned down the show's application for a state film and TV tax credit twice, Deadline first reported Friday, and the waiting cost the show its slot. ABC has pushed the premiere from midseason 2027 to the 2027-28 season. Betsy Beers, Shonda Rhimes' longtime producing partner at Shondaland, told an Assembly committee hearing in North Hollywood on Oct. 29 how it happened, TheWrap reported.

ABC and 20th Television, the studio producing it, applied over the summer. Beers told lawmakers the state rejected the show for not "providing enough jobs for the state to consider us an asset," and said Shondaland's long run of California productions wasn't considered at all.

So they aimed for the fall round instead. Beers said that meant putting off prep, locking down stage space and losing crew. Then, she said, they were told new shows couldn't apply in that round, only returning ones. "We lost personnel, we lost a lot of time, and we lost money trying to find a way to stay where we have always been," Beers told the committee, Deadline reported.

The summer round did make room for new shows, though. On Aug. 10, the California Film Commission announced credits for nine TV projects, seven of them new series. Among them were a "Clueless" sequel for Paramount+, a "Rockford Files" reboot starring David Boreanaz and Jamie Lee Curtis' "Newlyweds." The commission said the nine would employ 3,000 cast and crew between them.

Beers' case for the spinoff was about how long it would last. She argued that a Rhimes drama was a good bet for at least six seasons, which would mean years of work for a crew that gets to sleep at home. Her example was the spinoff's co-creator, Meg Marinis. Beers said Marinis started as an assistant runner on season 2 of "Grey's" and now runs the flagship. She added that keeping both shows close together was key to Marinis being able to do both jobs.

That bet didn't count for much. Shondaland's "The Residence," which built the entire White House on an L.A. lot for Netflix, did get a California credit, and Deadline noted it lasted one season. The new spinoff, executive produced by Rhimes, Beers, Marinis and Ellen Pompeo, was built to run for years and didn't get one.

The pot is part of the problem. California caps the program at $750 million a year, and Beers asked lawmakers to rethink how they score shows and to add money. Four days after she testified, Gov. Gavin Newsom proposed raising the cap to at least $1 billion. The Entertainment Union Coalition thanked him, but the secretary-treasurer of Teamsters Local 399 told Deadline the proposal came "a day late and yet again, some dollars short."

Beers told the committee she'd gone to Sacramento herself to lobby for the credits. Some years back, she said, she'd been handed a California Golden State Award for holding on to jobs in Los Angeles. "I don't even know what to say about that," she said.

Source: TheWrap, retrieved November 7, 2026. Other sources: Deadline, State of California, Deadline (2).