Q&A with Lisa Edelstein

RB: Your character is a powerful woman: She runs the hospital, and she's a mother. It seems to be a trend that women don't have to be desperate housewives to be on TV anymore. You can be this powerful, strong woman who is running the hospital or even the country. Why do you think that is?

LE: I think that popular culture takes a long time to catch up to what's actually happening in the world. Women have had to take care of themselves for quite a while. Actually, not had to take of themselves, but have wanted to take care of themselves, so I think it's a big transition that our country and our society has been going through a long time. The roles that men and women play are no longer the standard traditional roles of way back when but are those of two very individual people living their lives. I think it's been a hard transition in society—just take a look at the divorce rate—to figure out what that means now. How do you resolve that? How do we redefine the roles; how do we create structure in a new way? So I think that's been going on a lot longer than it has been on television, but now because it's so much part of what we see every day it has to be a part of popular culture.