Grey's Anatomy: How Did Giacomo Gianniotti's Dr. Andrew DeLuca Die?

This article contains a discussion of mental health.

At this point in the run of "Grey's Anatomy" (which, yes, is still on), a lot of the show's original cast members have left the fictional Seattle hospital that employs Dr. Meredith Grey, the titular physician played by Ellen Pompeo. Hell, even Pompeo has technically left the series, and other OG surgical interns like Dr. Cristina Yang (Sandra Oh) have "moved to Switzerland" or, in the case of Dr. Alex Karev (Justin Chambers), left Seattle to reunite with an estranged love. (Meanwhile, poor Dr. George O'Malley, played by T.R. Knight, got hit by a bus, whereas Patrick Dempsey's Dr. Derek Shepherd was killed off in a violent car crash; I didn't say all of these exits were peaceful, necessarily.)

Besides those original players, other actors — and their associated characters, obviously — have dipped in and out of Grey Sloan Memorial Hospital (née Seattle Grace Hospital) over the years, and that includes Giacomo Gianniotti's Dr. Andrew DeLuca. Introduced at the very end of the show's 11th season in 2015, Andrew becomes a huge part of "Grey's Anatomy" in season 12 — earning Gianniotti a promotion to the main cast for that season — and was part of yet another B-team of new surgical interns eager to learn from their talented superiors at Grey Sloan.

Andrew is best remembered for a few things. One is that he speaks fluent Italian (as does Gianniotti), and frankly, it's very attractive. Another is his doomed love affair with Dr. Sam Bello (Jeanine Mason), a fellow intern and DACA recipient who self-deports before immigration authorities can get to her. Perhaps the most important, though, is his relationship with Meredith, which turns her entire dynamic on its head — in that she's now an attending dating an intern and once was intern dating Derek, an attending. Andrew and Meredith date for a while but ultimately part ways when he realizes she'll never fully respect him as much as she respected Derek, but their relationship is still very important.

The two things that ultimately loom large over Andrew's character are ... dark. First is the fact that, in season 16, Andrew struggles with a diagnosis of bipolar disorder, and the second is that he dies after being stabbed by a human trafficker. Let me explain — with some help from Gianniotti himself.

If you or someone you know needs help with mental health, please contact the Crisis Text Line by texting HOME to 741741, call the National Alliance on Mental Illness helpline at 1-800-950-NAMI (6264), or visit the National Institute of Mental Health website.

In both the "Station 19" episode "Train in Vain" and the "Grey's Anatomy" episode "Helplessly Hoping" (the latter of which takes place in season 17, with both episodes airing one week apart in March 2021), Dr. Andrew DeLuca is tragically killed, marking a crossover between the two shows. In the previous season, Andrew suspected that a woman named Opal (Stephanie Kurtzuba), who brought a young girl in for medical treatment at Grey Sloan's free clinic, might be a human trafficker, and in "Train in Vain," he sees her again. While Andrew tries to apprehend Opal, he's fatally stabbed by one of her accomplices; the stabbing itself happens on "Station 19," and in an episode of "Grey's Anatomy" titled "Helplessly Hoping," the doctors try and fail to save his life.

In an interview with Deadline after "Helplessly Hoping" aired, Giacomo Gianniotti said that the reason that "Grey's Anatomy" and "Station 19" revived the Opal storyline is it was popular with fans, and it seemed like the perfect way to orchestrate Andrew's exit from this shared universe. "The story is that this human trafficking storyline that we had last season was so well viewed, and everyone really connected with that storyline because human trafficking is just such a huge problem globally, but also in the United States, and I think California is No. 1, where I live right now," Gianniotti told interviewer Nellie Andreeva.

"Grey's Anatomy" halted filming in March of 2020 when COVID-19 first hit, and according to Gianniotti, it felt right to revive that deeply dark storyline when the show's cast and crew resumed filming in June of that year. (A medical series like "Grey's Anatomy" was able to film in relative safety, seeing as the actors could simply wear protective medical gear on set.) "What if we could catch that woman that trafficked that young girl, and what if DeLuca was to save the day but to lose his life in the process, to die a hero saving all these people and all these children who potentially could've been trafficked, but now will not be because the traffickers were stopped?" Gianniotti remarked to Andreeva. "And I just thought it was a beautiful storyline, I thought it was a beautiful way for the character to exit as a hero."

Dr. Andrew DeLuca officially exits the show after "Helplessly Hoping" — well, technically, because Giacomo Gianniotti briefly appears in the season 17 episode "In My Life" while another character is experiencing PTSD-related hallucinations — and as he told Nellie Andreeva, he came to the decision alongside then-showrunner Krista Vernoff and executive producer and director Debbie Allen, the latter of whom also appears on the series as surgeon Dr. Catherine Fox. "We got together quickly, working on exactly what it would look like and what episode, when it would be, but I said, 'Absolutely,'" Gianniotti stated, at the time, of his decision to leave. "I've been on the show for six years, seven seasons. It's definitely been a long time, and I'm a young guy. So, I think this was a good time to depart, and I'm happy that Krista and Debbie and all the writers did such a great job with telling the story. I think it's going to do justice to a lot of people and help a lot of people."

While the Grey Sloan doctors are feverishly trying to save Andrew's life, he appears on what "Grey's Anatomy" fans have dubbed the "coma beach." I'll explain. In season 17 of the series, the show depicted the COVID-19 crisis in pretty much real time and made the (somewhat baffling) choice to stick Meredith into a coma and see a bunch of her dead friends and loved ones, including George and Derek. Andrew briefly visits her there before seeing his own deceased mother, and when he chooses to walk away with her, he dies in the "real world."

Gianniotti, for his part, told Andreeva that closing out his time on "Grey's Anatomy" alongside Ellen Pompeo was really lovely, especially after the romantic journey between Meredith and Andrew. "So, we got to spend a couple days out on the beach together, just me and her, and it was so beautiful, just as friends and as actors, to share in those moments together," Gianniotti added. "It felt like it was a full-circle experience to have started as an intern on the show and largely far away from Meredith Grey, and then getting to where I end on the show, and I'm about as close as I could ever be to her, both as an actor and as a character."

"Grey's Anatomy," including Andrew's multi-season arc, is streaming on both Netflix and Hulu now.