In January 2019, Jennifer Beyer, a registered nurse from Kansas, arrived at an Arizona mental health treatment center believing she’d never get to see her five kids alone again. She was suffering severe PTSD from all she’d been through in her 18-year marriage. No one understood what she knew, but couldn’t articulate for so long: that Brendan was an abuser and master gaslighter—in the original sense of the word. In their small, liberal community in Topeka, most people saw him as a doting father with the right values. While she worked at the hospital—“the best nurse I ever worked with,” says a former colleague—he was a member of the grassroots advocacy group Indivisible, and was often picketing with the kids in tow. But behind closed doors, he controlled Jennifer’s every movement, she says, and was physically and sexually violent. At his insistence, she explained away her bruises and broken bones as the results of falls in the shower or down the stairs. When she let onto others the truth about his behavior, they couldn’t believe it. His line was that she was mentally ill, suffering from postpartum depression, and she was making it all up. He told her that if she revealed the truth “she wouldn’t make it.” Fearing for her life, she took out a protection order against him, and filed for divorce. This forced him out of the house, but he moved nearby and made sure she knew he was watching her.
All of that led to the haunting incident that brought her to the Arizona treatment center. She began having dissociative episodes—breaks from one’s reality and surroundings. On December 27, 2018, a date that’s etched into her brain, she was driving her car with two of her young sons strapped in in the back. Then suddenly, without realizing it, she pulled the car over, opened the door, and walked some distance. A few minutes later she came to, and panic jolted through her. “Where are my kids?!” Hysterical, she immediately called the police, who were sympathetic. Within minutes, the kids were located and she was reunited with them. The next day, she was called into the Office of Child Protective Service (CPS). Believing she was safe, she shared what had happened. But afterward, she was informed that CPS was charging her with child abandonment. She was psychotic, Brendan told people, and now there was evidence. With a divorce proceeding looming, and everything on the line, she entered a mental health facility to prove she was sane and a fit mother.
The woman sitting across from me in a Topeka coffee shop on a rainy March day is extremely fragile, soft-spoken. There’s a service dog at her feet to help her with continued PTSD. As she gets going, though, she seems the antithesis of what Brendan tried to paint her as to the outside world. She’s warm, articulate, and emotionally intelligent. Which is part of the reason she’s scared to tell her story—she’s scared of repercussions, scared of appearing so gullible to the world. But it’s also why she knows she has to. She wants to make sure that the person who targeted her can never do that to somebody else—and that person wasn’t Brendan.
The Jennifer Beyer who entered treatment is a far cry from the Jennifer Beyer of today. Then, she was unable to function—a walking live wire. She couldn’t sit with anyone or make eye contact. The mere sound of a door scared her, a sudden noise would send a flash of panic through her body. In her small therapeutic “process group,” she was unable to talk about everything that had happened. Beyer was afraid of what this meant—maybe she really was hopelessly crazy.
The therapists, particularly one named Carly, started to grasp what had happened to her. According to Beyer, Carly could see this was PTSD with dissociative episodes, and she was determined to do whatever it took to bring Beyer back to health, even if it took months. Disturbing news from home didn’t help. Brendan had been arrested and had torn up an emergency room. The kids were sent to a foster home, but after a few days, they would have to split up. They ended up with Brendan’s mother.
About six months into Beyer’s stay, a new resident arrived named Jo, and became part of Beyer’s process group. Jo—the first name of a Grey’s Anatomy character that Elisabeth Finch was researching—was also suffering PTSD after a shooting at the Tree of Life synagogue in Pittsburgh, she said. Her friend was one of the victims, she explained, and in accordance with Jewish tradition, Jo had helped clean up the body from the synagogue floor. To Beyer, the signs of Jo’s PTSD started to seem exactly like her own. Jo had to sit alone when in a big group. Jo, too, was unable to make eye contact or sit by doors, couldn’t deal with sudden noises, and struggled to talk about the details of her trauma. The similarity gave Beyer comfort. After all, if someone like Jo—who had told people she was a professional writer and who didn’t seem insane—was having the same challenges, maybe Beyer wasn’t crazy after all. The two women started talking. And talking. For the first time ever, therapists saw Beyer laugh, she recalls. Jo suggested they become roommates. It was not the norm for two people in the same process group to become roommates, but the staff could see how beneficial Jo’s friendship was to Beyer’s healing. As they grew closer, Beyer noticed that as the trauma from Pittsburgh receded, another one was coming into view for Jo—that her brother, Eric, had been cruel and violent to her as a child, something she had never grappled with until now. It was another similarity—Beyer had Brendan, Jo had Eric—and it brought them closer. (In response to detailed questions for Finch regarding information from multiple sources, her attorney Andrew Brettler contended that not all of Beyer’s claims were true, and asserted that Beyer was neither “reliable” nor “unbiased” because the two women are in the midst of a “highly contentious divorce.”)
Family weekend was approaching, and Jo’s parents planned to come visit. Two of Finch’s compartments were about to meet for the first time—it would take some tap-dancing. First, Jo needed to explain the whole name thing. She revealed to Beyer she was an important writer on Grey’s Anatomy and that she was using a pseudonym so that word didn’t get out. Jo said she had given the same explanation to her parents before their arrival, and asked that they address her as Jo, not Elisabeth. In the first meeting, when Jo went on about Eric’s cruelty during childhood, Joan and Robert listened, bewildered, Beyer recalls. Sure, there were sibling fights, but they had not witnessed any of the suffering she was describing. Still, Joan was placating to Finch’s perception of her childhood. The next day, Joan opened up about how much she had worried about her daughter over the years—about the cancer, how she would have wanted to be there for her.
Cancer?
It was the first time anyone in treatment, including Beyer, had heard about it. Finch replied that yes, she was living with cancer, but she didn’t want to talk about it. Beyer respected that. Just like Beyer, Jo was living with enormous pain.
Carly, as a matter of course, had been in possession of Beyer’s phone and had been receiving all kinds of angry, obsessive texts from Brendan. If a message seemed pertinent, Carly would sit with Beyer and read it to her, something Jo seemed to find interesting, Beyer says. Now a video came in, of Brendan saying, “I’m coming to get you.” Beyer met with the head of security. The staff arranged to have increased security around the facility. And then, in another remarkable coincidence, Finch claimed that Eric was closing in on her. Her parents had left a family photo album upon their departure. As Finch told it, she was just flipping through it, and inside she found a handwritten letter composed by him, threatening her. Beyer saw Finch holding this letter, but she didn’t ask to hear the details. There was only so much fear of men Beyer could handle. (Eric Finch and his parents did not respond to Vanity Fair.)
By early July 2019, both women were ready to leave the center and head back to their respective towns. The staff had been in the process of helping Beyer obtain a service dog, to help her keep present when she was having episodes. The dog was expensive. Finch interceded and asked Carly if she could pay for it. Beyer was deeply moved by this parting gesture. It solidified a profound connection. The women had an emotional farewell. They made plans to keep in touch—to not let their friendship die.
Finch returned to Hollywood and began filling in the contours of her newly recovered trauma. To a friend, she elaborated on the menacing letter found in the photo album, which had said, “Keep Your Mouth Shut.” She added a specific, ugly detail about Eric’s abuse—a detail that was identical to something Beyer had confided that Brendan had done to her when they were married.
Meanwhile, Beyer returned to Topeka and oh, how she missed Jo, the name she continued using for her friend. She moved into a shelter, unable to see her kids except for one hour a week under supervision, and faced numerous in-person court dates with Brendan, the thought of which terrified her. Brendan continued taunting her. He now posted pictures on social media of random spots near the shelter, signaling that he knew where she was.
Finch reeled in Beyer’s love just when Beyer needed it. She invited Beyer to come stay at her house in California—a beautiful spread she’d seen pictures of in their room at the treatment center. It was just the escape Beyer needed. The house was in Ojai, the most heavenly place she’d ever seen. There was a big gate at the entrance, a gorgeous sprawling yard with orange trees, and a swimming pool. Beyer wondered how she could afford it all. Finch told her that it was Anna Paquin’s house (that much was true), but that she owned part of it. (Finch does not own part of Paquin’s house, a source confirms, nor does Paquin have anything to do with Finch’s kidneys.) There were a couple of black cars out on the street. Finch claimed it was security, a luxury she had at all times. The pair spent the weekend cooking, swimming, lounging, laughing, and falling in love. They took dozens of selfies of their love. Wouldn’t it be great to make a slideshow and send it to Carly to show her how happy we are? suggested Finch, who talked a lot about Carly that week. And later, she did send it. “The joy I felt that weekend was incredible,” Beyer recalls.
When Beyer returned to Kansas and the shelter, Finch love-bombed her with texts and sentimental gifts, including a purple stuffed kidney. As they talked about the future, Finch underlined the importance of honesty, writing in a text that channeled Shakespeare: “My expectations are and always will be this: don’t lie to me. That’s all I ask…It can annoy us or bum us out even hurt us. But the Truth Will Out. Always.” After Brendan, Beyer was scared of getting close to someone again. These were the exact words she needed to hear.
Finch’s love fortified Beyer as she faced her demons. In preparation for the first court date, Finch came out to Kansas for emotional support. She stayed in the Cyrus Hotel, Topeka’s nicest, where the lovers’ relationship flourished. On the day, Beyer entered the courthouse, accompanied by Finch and a couple of close friends. She was terrified to see Brendan, and there he was. He got in Beyer’s face, repeating in an urgent monotone, “I need to talk to my wife. I need to talk to my wife.” Finch physically got between them and told him to back off. “You need to go.” Finch seemed so fearless, so in charge. Beyer’s friends were completely bowled over. Beyer was so lucky to have this woman in her life, they thought—this tough, famous Hollywood writer, who was willing to come all the way here to support the woman she loved. As a friend recalls, after all she had been through with Brendan, “We felt like Jenn deserved something good.”
September 5, 2019. Another court date with Brendan was approaching, and Beyer needed the hit of support that only Finch could provide. Beyer flew to Los Angeles and was being driven to the Grey’s Anatomy production office, when she got a phone call from the Kansas Department of Children and Families (DCF) in Topeka. She was told to return to Kansas immediately. Your husband has killed himself. Your kids are safe. Hysterical, she texted Finch with the news. When the car pulled up to the Grey’s Anatomy building, Finch came running out, hugged her, and then quickly ushered her into her private office before she could interact with anyone. Once inside her office, Finch got Carly on the phone. Meanwhile, Finch bustled around the office, telling people an emergency had come up and she needed two tickets back to Kansas, immediately. Finch returned to Kansas with Beyer, and stayed while Beyer processed the news with her children. Finch was meeting them for the first time. Brendan had trashed every inch of the house, which Beyer would soon be moving back into.
Two weeks after the suicide, still in Topeka, Finch—unbeknownst to Beyer—wrote the following email to the writing staff at Grey’s Anatomy:
Hey all,
I’ve been absent and coming back tomorrow…I just don’t know who’s looped into what and I’d rather put it out there so no one is in the dark or feeling egg-shelly. I’ve gone bc my brother died by suicide. He was on life support for a short while but ultimately did not survive. I say this not bc I need or want anything from anyone, I’m not a delicate flower or whatever, I just want people to know I’m still here, still part of the team. (I intended to just power through my episode shoot, but I recognized I needed to just take a bit of time away to process.) …Missed y’all.
Finchie.
She later elaborated to her Grey’s Anatomy friends that because Eric was a doctor, he knew exactly how to shoot himself without killing himself, forcing her to be the one to pull the plug. It was his final act of vindictiveness—like trashing a house. “We cried with her,” one recalls.
Finch was now fully committed to two divergent realities—one with her girlfriend and another with her Grey’s Anatomy family. Keeping both realities intact required a bold sleight of hand. Shortly after Brendan’s suicide, Finch took Beyer on a trip to Hawaii, where they stayed at the fanciest hotel she’d ever seen. Finch told Beyer it was a work trip. Meanwhile, she told work she was going to Hawaii because she had to reunite her dead brother’s illegitimate Filipino baby with the baby’s mother in Hawaii.
Back in the Beyer reality, Finch’s brother was very much alive—but dangerous. On one visit to Finch’s apartment in Santa Monica, the women entered to find a pigsty, strewn with empty alcohol bottles. Beyer was upset—she had made clear to Finch that she hated alcohol, that the smell of it was triggering for her. Finch came up with a quick explanation: Eric must have broken in and trashed the place. At this point, Beyer panicked about their romantic involvement. Getting her kids back was her number one goal. After Brendan, she couldn’t afford to be with a person who had someone so dangerous in her life. Sometime later, Finch assured her that everything was going to be okay. Eric had gone to the Philippines, and per a legal order, he could not return without her being notified. Beyer accepted this explanation and went on. After all, she needed Finchie, and Finchie loved her.
Then, Finch, in a curious move, brought her worlds together. In November 2019, Finch was to receive a Sentinel Award—an award for television that educates viewers to make safer choices for their lives—for her first Jo episode, “Silent All These Years,” and she invited Beyer to come out. Beyer was reluctant—a red-carpet Hollywood awards thing was beyond intimidating. But Finch said she wanted her to have a dazzling evening and to get all pretty. She bought Beyer heels and took her to the hairdresser, a friend let her borrow a dress. On the way into the event, Finch led the way. Beyer noted how she breezed them in quickly, so quickly they didn’t talk to anyone, and went straight to their seats. On their way home, they shared a car with Debbie Allen, who sat between them. Finch breathlessly controlled the conversation, asking Beyer to show Allen pictures of her children and their talents. The television star oohed and aahed over them—a surreal moment for Beyer.
Later that month in Kansas, in preparation for the kids coming out of foster care, Beyer led the cleanup of her house Brendan had trashed. The act had become a ceremonial, communal affair. A dumpster was delivered. Many people, including nurses from the hospital, helped fix doors and faucets, and scrubbed every inch. Finch, in her yellow rubber gloves, took a starring role. A friend had brought a chain saw, which Beyer used to cut up her bed, the site of marital rape. Finch took the video of it all, which they discussed sending to Carly. Like that day in court, Beyer’s friends couldn’t believe how generous Finch had been to fly in from Hollywood like that…especially after she told them that she was missing the Emmys that night, and she had been nominated for one. An Emmy? They all knew this was a huge deal, although no one bothered to check the internet—the Emmys had already taken place two months earlier. Beyer’s daughter, her oldest child, was so touched that she made up an Emmy victory dance for Finchie in front of the dumpster. As one Kansas friend who was there posted on Facebook, “The more I get to know [Finchie], the more I realize she is actually a superhero masquerading as a regular person.”
On Thanksgiving, Finch proposed. They wanted to get married as soon as possible, so that they could set the wheels in motion for legal adoption. If something ever happened to Beyer, Finch said, she wanted to make sure the kids would never end up back in foster care. After all Beyer had been through, the thought soothed her. Finch consulted Rhimes about her adoption lawyer. The kids started calling Finch Jo Mama.
Soon after their engagement, Beyer had her first doubt about Finch’s veracity. Beyer’s oldest son had landed a role in The Nutcracker, to be performed over Christmas at the Topeka Performing Arts Center. It was a momentous occasion for Beyer, who hadn’t seen him dance in a year. She’d planned a party with family and friends to celebrate his accomplishment. During the party, Finch said she was having excruciating pain. It’s probably kidney stones, she said. Beyer said she should go to the hospital and that she’d go with her. Finch vehemently resisted the idea, but Beyer insisted.
When they were face-to-face with the doctor at the hospital, Finch, to Beyer’s exasperation, wasn’t saying anything about her medical history. Beyer stepped in to say that Finch had cancer, and only one working kidney. The doctor said, “Let’s go into the doughnut of truth,” referring to the doughnut-shaped CT machine. When the results came back, he looked at Beyer and asked, pointedly, “Are you married?” Beyer said no, but that they planned to be soon. Looking squarely at Beyer, the doctor said, “Her kidneys look fine,” stressing the plural. After they were discharged, Finch dismissed his wording. “He probably just meant that my one working kidney looked fine,” she said. Finch later groused, “They don’t care about my pain.”
Beyer pushed the strange incident to the back of her head, and in February 2020, they got married on the beach in Palos Verdes. It was just them and two sparkly Hollywood names. Mickey Rapkin, who wrote the book on which Pitch Perfect was based, and Rapkin’s husband, the actor Jason Butler Harner, who performed the ceremony. Soon, the women would start looking for a house in Los Angeles, big enough for the whole family. Rhimes excitedly shared with Finch information about which Los Angeles schools would be a good fit.
Those first months of marriage coincided with the arrival of COVID. Finch’s cancer took center stage. Grey’s Anatomy producers talked about getting her a hotel room in Topeka to protect her from being around the kids—her colleagues were “perpetually worried” about Finch and COVID, according to one. Meanwhile, Beyer’s kids took pains to protect her. Her daughter chose to stop attending school in person for her benefit. When one of Beyer’s sons came down with COVID, the boy’s main fear was for Finch, that he might cause her death. The summer and fall of 2020 brought more stress. The anniversary of her brother’s suicide was so traumatic that she wouldn’t be able to meet deadlines, she told coworkers. As the National Guard rolled into cities, and George Floyd protests turned violent, Finch found fresh triggers for the Pittsburgh trauma. Firecrackers, loud sounds from movies, a rainy night—all could bring her crime scene back. A dream catcher with a Tree of Life design that Beyer had on the wall was too upsetting for Finch. She made Beyer take it down for a period. On one occasion, Beyer’s daughter’s school suddenly went on lockdown when a suspicious character was spotted on school grounds. While Beyer and other parents descended on the school, confused and panicked about their children’s safety, Finch stayed home, citing her Pittsburgh trauma.
One day, with a tinge of suspicion, Beyer began scrolling through Finch’s Facebook. She scrolled all the way back to the day of the shooting, October 27, 2018, and found that Finch had been out with Rapkin. The next day—the day she was supposedly cleaning up her dead friend’s body—she was again out with friends. A chill went through Beyer’s body. She continued scrolling, more frantically now. Here were pictures of Finch when she had a bald head—yet her eyebrows and eyelashes were still full. As a nurse, she knew that chemo patients who lose their hair often experience the loss of other body hair, like brows and lashes. She found pictures that showed the bandage over what was presumably a port scar. A port scar? Finch didn’t have one; Beyer knew her body as intimately as a person could. The bandage itself looked shoddy—wrinkled, and open at the edge in places, which would allow for infections. She’d put such bandages on patients many times and knew the correct way to do it. This was not it. A hideous fear began sinking in.
Beyer gathered herself as she prepared for a confrontation. She had a plan in mind—to love Finch harder in the weeks leading up, to let Finch know she could trust her, and to take baby steps. They were in the Topeka house, having just woken up. Beyer said, as gently as she could: “It would be good to know what medications you’re on.” Beyer had asked the question before, but Finch had found the query too triggering as it reminded her of her brother. But that morning, Finch listed them off. In response to one of the drugs, Beyer said she highly doubted she was taking it, even if she had a bottle of it. Beyer knew the drug to be extremely toxic, especially to one’s kidney function, and that any doctor prescribing it would need to be supervising that patient regularly; Finch wasn’t under such care. It was getting tense. With the kids getting up, Beyer suggested they take a drive and continue the conversation in the car.
They parked by the mall. Beyer, holding back on all she knew, listened patiently as Finch made a confession—well, a partial one. Finch “admitted” that she had at one time had cancer, but that she got chemo, and recovered. She explained how she loved the attention so much that she continued to pretend she had it. Beyer upped the ante. So if you had chemo once, then where’s your port scar? There was nowhere for Finch to go with this one. Beyer said, “I think there’s more that you need to tell me.” They were leaving the next day for Los Angeles to look at houses. Beyer demanded that while they were in California, Finch tell her everything.
While looking for the perfect house to spend the rest of their lives in, Beyer privately agonized. Later, at Finch’s Santa Monica apartment, she unloaded with what she knew as well as what she suspected: I know you were targeting me, mirroring me. I think you yourself wrote that threatening letter from Eric. I don’t think the details about the shooting were real. Finch replied, “Yes. Yes.” (According to the coordinators of the two Chevra Kadisha burial societies that conducted the cleanup in Pittsburgh, nobody named Elisabeth Finch was involved.) As Beyer recalls, there was no emotion, no tears. Finch maintained that she was a victim of her brother’s childhood cruelty—the one piece she held onto, as if this fact somehow explained the rest. Beyer told Finch she couldn’t live like this, keeping all this to herself, and that she needed to confide in someone else.
Upon their return to Kansas, they began telling a few key friends—the same support group who’d been there for court and the house cleanup. But the whole thing took a chilling turn. The friends accepted that Finch lied, but it all seemed to roll right off. In the scheme of things, they still considered her to be Beyer’s dazzling savior, a misapprehension that made Beyer spiral further. Finchie meanwhile told them that Beyer was falling apart because of her own past trauma, that Beyer was conflating her, Finch, with Brendan. And they seemed to believe it.
Beyer was desperate for someone to talk to. Her longtime local therapist had just retired after an injury. She reached out to Carly—dearest, devoted Carly—who told her she’d provide some referrals. Then Finch dropped a bomb: Finch had hired Carly to work with Finch; Carly had started a private practice, Finch explained, separate from the treatment center. Not only had Finch stolen details of her life, stolen the trust of her friends, she had now taken her therapist, the person Beyer had trusted most in the world. In fact, Finch was about to set off for a four-week stint with her in Arizona.
There was an extra dark twist here. Although Beyer physically had her kids, she still legally shared custody with DCF. In order to regain full custody, she relied on Carly’s reports to show the court that she was stable and fit. Now Finch, out in Arizona, was in her ear. Who knows what she was telling her? While that nightmare played out in her imagination, another played out on the television screen. Beyer called up an episode of Grey’s Anatomy written by Finch after she’d left treatment, and watched in horror: In flashback scenes, Jo works with her beloved therapist, a new character named Carly, at a mental health facility. “I had a husband who beat me, but he’s dead now,” Jo tells Carly. Jo is “a runner,” Carly declares in one scene, referring to someone who bolts under stress. They do EMDR (Eye Movement Desensitization and Reprocessing) therapy together. Beyer had used EMDR tappers—hand-held paddles that vibrate and buzz—not the device in the episode. Aside from that detail, so much seemed to be Beyer’s story. (Finch gave an interview to Self in which Finch claimed she, too, used EMDR therapy after Pittsburgh.) Another person might have hollered the injustice from the rooftops.
Feeling utterly defeated, Beyer got a sitter for her kids, checked herself into the Cyrus Hotel, and planned to take her own life. But she couldn’t go through with it. Instead, she got in the car and drove—three days straight to the same Arizona facility where she’d met Finch. She called Finch on the way to tell her that she, Finch, had won—that she should go back and take care of the kids, that’s what everyone wants anyway, and the kids loved her. She asked only that she not post pictures making herself to be the hero, rescuing the children from her sick wife. When Finch returned to Topeka, Beyer’s daughter, still coping with the suicide of her father, now feared the worst about her mother. Would she ever get better? According to Beyer’s daughter, Finch subtly nursed these fears, and led her to believe that she, Jo Mama, was the only one she could count on.
Beyer reentered treatment, in March 2021, with a single goal: to be wherever the kids were going to be. She felt she had to make it work with Finch, who could legally retain visitation rights or petition for guardianship. Her therapists advised that if she was to remain in this marriage, she needed to explicitly say what she could and couldn’t tolerate. With this plan in mind, she went with Finch to a weeklong Marriage Intensive therapy, a last-ditch effort to save the relationship. Beyer told her that she could not tolerate living a lie, and made a list of everyone Finch had to tell the truth to—Finch’s parents, and her core people from childhood and L.A. friends. Finch wasn’t happy about it, but she promised to do it.
Finch dragged out confessing for months and months. When Yom Kippur rolled around Beyer suggested this would be an appropriate time. Finch pushed back, saying Beyer shouldn’t be calling the shots, that she had to do it on her timeline. Eventually Finch ran out of excuses. Beyer held her feet to the fire to confess to a small group of friends, one by one—a confessional tour. In each conversation, she owned up to her lies—there was no cancer, no friend killed in Pittsburgh, no lifesaving abortion. But she held onto the bit about Eric’s alleged original sin. None took it in the way she apparently hoped. According to a source, she demonstrated what seemed like practiced remorse, but when asked more questions in detail, shut down. News of her confessions started spreading to a wider circle of friends. According to a friend, “We all went through this really traumatic thing for ten years, thinking our friend was going to die. And then in a way she did. But we lost her in a way we surely did not expect.”
Finally, Finch had to face her parents. Beyer sat beside her in the car for a FaceTime call with them. When she felt Finch dodging, she spoke up. “I have something to say.” She gave the play-by-play about how Finch had mirrored Beyer, with Eric taking on some of the monstrous acts of Brendan. Finch sat there quietly, and confirmed it. They were in utter shock, and demanded that she rectify it with Eric, somewhere, somehow.
Finch did not rectify anything with Eric, according to Beyer. She did not come clean to her coworkers, and according to numerous sources I spoke with, never seemed to grapple with what she had done. When Beyer refused to let up the pressure, Finch announced she was divorcing her. Beyer asked for one final thing before they parted—that Finch tell the kids the truth, and say goodbye. Finch went through with the confessionals, in two sessions with therapists present. She did not seem contrite, says Beyer. Rather, at the conclusion of one of the sessions, she stomped around angrily, and later accused Beyer of leaving her stranded. Beyer continued to fear that Finch would sue for custody or visitation rights.
In February, Beyer received a forwarded email from someone in Finch’s inner circle that was making the rounds. It was the email from Finch to her coworkers, telling them about her brother’s suicide—weeks after Brendan’s. As bad as Beyer believed Finch’s machinations had been, only now did she grasp how completely Finch had siphoned off her life. She found Rhimes’s email address, and composed an email: Please stop letting Finch tell “her stories” anymore, because they’re other survivors’ stories. When she didn’t hear back, she texted showrunner Krista Vernoff the same message. Shortly thereafter, Beyer got a call from Disney H.R.
With rumors about Beyer’s claims swirling, the folks at Grey’s Anatomy went Criminal Minds. Her colleagues quickly learned that Eric Finch was alive and working as a doctor in Florida. They reevaluated everything—like her wild laughter in the room when she said something tragic: Was she laughing at them for believing her? And the title she gave to her first cancer episode: “Anybody Have a Map?” It was from a song in Dear Evan Hansen, a musical about a compulsive liar. In late March, on the day before her 44th birthday, she posted on Instagram the album cover of The Greatest Showman, about huckster P. T. Barnum. As the post showed, she was listening to the song “From Now On,” about the end of the showman’s glory days. Was all this to be taken at innocent face value or had she been dropping clues along the way this whole time?
As Finch and Beyer’s divorce negotiations got under way, Beyer started seeing similarly cryptic posts—including one that seemed straight out of Brendan’s taunting playbook. In March, Finch posted a picture of the bed at the Cyrus Hotel, with #onelasttime, an allusion to the Ariana Grande song that begins with the lyric, “I was a liar, I gave it to the fire.” She still fears that Finch will somehow jeopardize her rights to her own children. “You took those kids from me,” Finch wrote in a recent text.
Finch has hired Andrew Brettler, a high-powered L.A. litigator who has represented Prince Andrew, Chris Noth, and Armie Hammer. Though the network considered an investigation into Finch, it did not proceed with one after Finch said she would take a leave of absence. On March 31, she said in a statement to Hollywood trade outlets, “‘Grey’s Anatomy’ is one big-hearted, brilliant family. As hard as it is to take some time away right now, I know it is more important that I focus on my own family and my health. I’m immensely grateful to Disney, ABC, and Shondaland for allowing me to do so and for supporting me through this very difficult time.”
People who loved and cared for Finch are grappling with the why of it all, and the fact that dozens of people were damaged in Finch’s wake. But as a former coworker of Finch’s puts it, “Searching for the ‘why’ puts her at the center of our thinking, instead of the people who have been hurt.” That person recently had a cataclysmic dream in which a therapist then showed up and said, Some behaviors you’ll never make sense of.
“I felt like it was my subconscious telling me, ‘If I go down the road of trying to understand her, I will only be in a circle and I will never get a satisfactory answer.’ Whatever her motivation, whatever her Rosebud sled is, if we find it, even if she tells us, how could we believe it?” the source says. “At this point, she may just be a shell.”
Read Part 1 of Scene Stealer: The True Lies of Elisabeth Finch
This story has been updated.
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— Will Smith Banned From the Oscars for 10 Years After the Slap
— Netflix’s The Ultimatum Offers a Sadistic Twist on Reality Romance
— From the Archive: How David Zaslav Became America’s King of Content
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