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Ellen Pompeo returns to television to star in Good American Family, a series inspired by the controversial Natalia Grace case.
The Natalia Grace story, which exploded after Dr. Phil brought her on his show, was originally presented as a horror case, where Natalia’s adoptive family claimed that she was not a child but a grown woman masquerading as a child. They then abandoned her and moved to Canada.
The case bears many similarities to the horror film Orphan, which was released the year before Natalia was adopted. Orphan, from 2009, told the story of a family that adopts a nine-year-old girl who seems to be just what they were missing to be complete. But the innocent Esther is not what she seems, and, when more and more alarming things begin to happen, the family discovers that she is not a child but an adult woman with a strange disease, who pretends to be a child to terrorize anyone who crosses her path.
Good American Family tries to show what really happened to Natalia Grace, what her life was like with her adoptive family, and the legal and media battle that eventually destroyed the family.
Is there a trailer?
Yes! Watch Ellen Pompeo in her first TV role since Grey’s Anatomy and the rest of the actors who are part of this series, below. Pompeo plays Natalia’s adoptive mother, Kristine Barnett.
When and where does Good American Family premiere?
The eight-episode series premieres March 19, 2025, with two episodes, followed by one episode weekly, all streaming on Hulu.
Who’s in the cast?
The series features Ellen Pompeo as Kristine Barnett and Mark Duplass as Michael Barnett, the couple who adopted Natalia Grace, accused her of being an adult, and were later accused of abandoning and abusing her.
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Good American Family also stars Dulé Hill, Sarayu Blue, Christina Hendricks, and Imogen Faith Reid as Natalia Grace.
What is Good American Family about?
“A Midwestern couple adopts a little girl they believe has dwarfism. As they begin caring for her along with their three biological children, they become embroiled in a battle that rages in the tabloids, in the courts and, ultimately, in their marriage,” says the series synopsis. A release from Hulu adds that the story is told from multiple points of view “as a means to explore issues of perspective, bias, and trauma.”
Good American Family centers on the case of Natalia Grace, a child with a disability who was adopted by an American family, who, after being accused of abandonment and neglect, decides to start telling the story that Natalia was not a child, but an adult woman who behaved violently, who threatened them, and frightened her biological children.
But Natalia was found living in a precarious situation, without the necessary resources and without the supervision of an adult, so the case was taken to trial and even spawned a documentary series on Max, where it was proven that Natalia was indeed a child and the Barnetts mistreated her during the time she spent with them. Plus, they abandoned her in an apartment to avoid having to take care of her and tried to control every part of her life so that no one would know the truth.
A version of this article first appeared on GQ Mexico & Latin America.
