Shonda Rhimes wakes up at 6 a.m. every morning. She makes sure her younger daughters are up and getting ready for school. Then she tries to make time to get back into bed with a cup of coffee to watch the sun rise. “That’s my most meditative moment before people come barging in my door to tell me whatever’s going on with them for the morning,” says the entertainment executive, 52. A successful multi-hyphenate, the director, writer, author, and producer reportedly has a net worth of $140 million (Celebrity Net Worth). Shonda Rhimes net worth.
She has breakfast and does a quick workout before sitting down to write from 8 a.m. until noon. Her key to focusing is listening to music that she knows by heart on noise-canceling headphones. Right now, it’s the Encanto soundtrack, but Aretha Franklin, Stevie Wonder and Adele have all taken turns as her go-to. “It’s almost Pavlovian,” she says. “It helps to be in a lovely, sunny space. But if I’m wearing my headphones and I have my computer, I can write anywhere.”
Rhimes was born in Chicago and grew up outside the city. After graduating from Dartmouth and completing her M.F.A. at USC, she worked as a scriptwriter and at a variety of day jobs before creating Grey’s Anatomy, the hospital drama that debuted on ABC in 2005 and is now in its 18th season. She founded her production company, Shondaland, in 2005. Her shows Scandal and How to Get Away with Murder, starring lead actors Kerry Washington and Viola Davis respectively, cemented Rhimes’s reputation for developing hit shows with complex female leads.
In 2017, Netflix and Rhimes announced an exclusive, multiyear development deal, which was reported to be nine figures. [Netflix declined to comment.] At Netflix, Shonda Rhimes is executive-producing the Regency-era romance series Bridgerton, which is based on the book series of the same name by Julia Quinn. It became the streaming platform’s most-watched English-language original series ever when it debuted in 2020 and returns on March 25 for a second season. Rhimes also created and executive-produced Inventing Anna, the drama inspired by Anna Sorokin, who scammed New York City elites by posing as a German heiress.
Here, Rhimes speaks to WSJ. about the health trick she started trying because of Beyoncé and how she balances being creative with being a good leader and manager. Shonda Rhimes
Here are some things Shonda Rhimes revealed to WSJ. Magazine…
On the amount of sleep she needs:
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I like to get as much sleep as possible, minimum eight hours of sleep. If I could get 10—I mean, I’ve never gotten 10 hours of sleep in my life—I would be so happy, I don’t know what I would do with myself.
On breakfast and fitness:
I just started drinking this anti-angiogenesis tea that I got from Brooklyn Tea, which is supposed to be this cancer-fighting amazing tea. So I drink that and I have a piece of toast and I drink Athletic Greens, which is a powder that you put in a shake. And then I either get on the treadmill or I get on my Peloton bike and try to work out. I’ll be honest, I’m not an “I’m going to get in there for 45 minutes” kind of person. Fifteen minutes is all I’ve got most of the time. I try really hard to be good and stay on and try to do something longer. But I’ve given myself this rule that if you can do it for 15 minutes, you can call yourself proud and let it go for the rest of the day. Shonda Rhimes net worth 2022.
On the health trick she’s adopted because of Beyoncé:
I don’t actually. I’m not a big vitamin person. I’ve started drinking olive oil, because I read it was good for you and also, I’ll be honest, I read Beyoncé did it. And I do drink a little fish oil. I put those in my Athletic Greens drink.
On whether she sets aside a specific time to brainstorm or reflect or journal: Shonda Rhimes net worth 2022
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I used to journal like crazy, and I just found them all. I used to journal every single day. I have like 20 of these journals. And then I had children, and I am not kidding, never journaled again. So this year I made a New Year’s resolution that I was going to start journaling again. I bought myself a beautiful journal. And it’s sitting by my bed with a beautiful pen on top of it, and I have not yet cracked it open. I think it’s really hard to navel gaze when you have to keep three other people from killing themselves or killing each other or, you know, eating paste or whatever you have to do when you’re raising children. When I wrote my book Year of Yes, that was the closest I came to journaling again, and it was so healthy and helpful. I learned so much about myself by doing it. But I had to get up at 5 a.m. every day to write that book. I’m not sure I’m ready for that yet with the sleep situation. Shonda Rhimes
On how she balances being a leader and a manager with being creative:
That is a constant struggle. And I feel like it’s important to acknowledge that it’s a struggle and to not try to pretend that it’s simple to do. Really trying to find the time to have that creative time is important, but so is acknowledging that I’m not a natural-born leader. I don’t have an MBA, I wasn’t trained to run a company. Surrounding myself with people who really know what they’re doing in a lot of those areas is important so that (a) I can do what I do best, but (b) be equipped to handle what needs to be handled on the company side.
On the most important thing, she’s learned about negotiating over the years:
Never enter a negotiation you’re not willing to walk away from. If you walk in thinking, “I can’t walk away,” then you’re not actually negotiating. You’ve already lost. And that’s a hard thing to say, but it works in [real estate] negotiations, it works in negotiations with a 3-year-old. It works in every negotiation. But I do think it is an important thing to think about: What’s your limit? What are you willing to walk away for, and what aren’t you willing to walk away for? Because that’s the other thing—people stomp their feet and threaten to walk away for reasons that make zero sense. And you can’t be one of those people, either. You really have to understand what’s important and what’s not.
On whether her daughters have ever binge-watched Grey’s:
My youngest daughters are 8 and 9, so they’re far too young to watch it or even care, which is good. And I have a 19-year-old who finds it horrifying that I’ve written a show that all of her friends have seen multiple times. And so she has never seen it. And I have to say, I think that might be the best compliment ever. I think about it like, her mother wrote a show that tells all her friends what to think about love and sex. So she’s not interested in watching it, and I think that that’s a very good thing.
On the one piece of advice that’s guided her:
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To start to enjoy myself. That’s as of late. If there’s one thing that the pandemic has taught me is—I was really spending so much time being very seriously focused on succeeding and making it and getting it all done and being perfect and making sure I was doing my job that I wasn’t spending any time at all enjoying any of the success. Not enjoying the fact that the shows were doing well or enjoying any of the moments that came with them. And so I’m really just trying to enjoy it. Life is short. We’ve all learned that the hard way right now.
On what she does to celebrate and relax and enjoy it:
I have more hobbies. We have dogs, which is very new for us. I got chickens. I’m learning to play the cello. I’ve started cooking. I’m seeing my friends more. Those things feel small, maybe, to most people, but to me, they feel huge. Now I’m trying to live a very full life and, you know, I’m terrible at playing the cello and it sounds horrible and my kids cover their ears. But it’s still pretty awesome that I’m doing it. Shonda Rhimes net worth in 2022.
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