With hit medical drama The Pitt finally available to watch in the UK on HBO Max, leading man Noah Wyle has shared some tantalising insight into its future beyond season two
The Pitt’s Noah Wyle drops thrilling update on season 3(Image: HBO)
The Pitt’s Noah Wyle has delivered an exciting update on the third season of HBO’s smash-hit medical drama.
He also teased his hopes for the future of the drama, hinting it could run “forever” if audiences are still tuning in.
Wyle portrays Dr Michael ‘Robby’ Robinavitch, a senior attending physician working in a crowded and underfunded emergency room in Pittsburgh.
Throughout each season, Dr Robby, along with a team of doctors, nurses, and medical students, experience a single 15-hour shift, with the second instalment taking place during a busy 4th of July.
The former ER star was in London this week for the UK launch of the series where he spilled two important rules that every episode of the hit series must follow.
Speaking to HBO Max Chairman Casey Bloys, Wyle was asked how soon the cast and crew will be ready to start up production on season three.
“Very soon, boss, very soon,” Wyle joked. “We are in the process of writing character arcs for season three for everybody.”
He went on to explain how the series’ unique storytelling format presents a compelling challenge for the writers, which includes himself and creator R. Scott Gemmill.
“It’s a very interesting show to break because, unlike a lot of shows that are 22 episodes that may play over a calendar year, this is 15 hours of one day,” he continued. “So you’re painting with a much finer brush.
“The character’s arc is not really enough to go through the courtship of a romance, but it’s enough to get your head turned.
“It’s maybe enough to lose faith, maybe enough to find faith, but these are really small arcs that happen over the course of the day but can be really satisfying if you’re engaged with that character.”
Thankfully, The Pitt quickly found a devoted audience in the States, with the second season premiere amassing an impressive 7.2 million US viewers within its first week of release.
“We have these characters who seem to be resonating on a one-to-one with audiences,” Wyle added.
“Everyone’s feeling, ‘I’m a little Javadi (played by Shabana Azeez), I’m a little Samira (Supriya Ganesh), and I have a little Langdon (Patrick Ball) in me, or I know a Whitaker (Gerran Howell)’, and that makes it really exciting to see where they’re going to go next, and to write for where they’re going to go next.”
Hinting at the third season’s narrative, Bloys and Wyle revealed that the upcoming instalment is also building to an explosive and potentially life-changing event in much the same way as the first two seasons.
“We’ve built a pressure cooker where every hour we turn up the temperature, we add more ingredients, then just when it’s about to explode we drop a piano on it,” Wyle revealed.
“You’ve done that successfully for season two and now you’re thinking about it for season three?” Bloys clarified, and Wyle confirmed “Yes”.
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“One of the gratifying things about season two is that we realised we don’t need a big ‘deus ex machina’ plot device to keep this engaging,” he said. “There’s something really satisfying about watching everyday people trying to get through the course of the day, beset by all the trials and tribulations that come over the course of that day.
“If that is satisfying television then this show could run forever, because we don’t need a helicopter to come down in the ambulance bay, we don’t need to jump the shark.”
The Pitt is available to stream on HBO Max with new episodes on Thursdays.
Despite the show’s approach to make their actors unrecognisable you might remember some from big series
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A Prime Video series that was dubbed ‘best show ever’ is finally returning with a whole new cast and approach, although there are still some faces that you might recognise.
According to its synopsis, Jury Duty Presents: Company Retreat is a comedy series that captures a corporate offsite event at a family-owned hot sauce company from the perspective of Anthony, a recently hired temporary worker.
Unbeknownst to Anthony, the entire experience is staged. Every colleague around him is performing a role and each moment whether in conference rooms or during downtime has been meticulously orchestrated. As the founder prepares to step down, the getaway transforms into a clash between big corproate ambitions and small business values, with control of the company hanging in the balance.
While the premise of the show means that all the actors involved have to be unrecognisable to the one non-actor, there are actually a few faces you may have seen before. But who are they and what have they starred in that you may remember them from? Here’s all you need to know.
Jerry Hauck plays Doug, the CEO of Rockin Grandma’s Hot Sauce. He’s described as “a lovable papa bear with Big Dad Energy who cares deeply about the company he’s built and the people that work for it.” Hauck has had memorable small roles on huge shows including ER, Seinfeld, It’s Always Sunny in Philadelphia and Paradise.
Alex Bonifer stars as Doug’s son and heir apparent to the business, Dougie Jr. He is “well-meaning but directionless” who is suddenly handed huge responsibilities. Eagle-eyed viewers will recognise Bonifer from Kevin Can F*** Himself where he played the role of Neil.
Amy, of customer relations is played by Emily Pendergast who has a lot of experience in comedy TV. She starred in multiple episodes of Veep and Netflix sitcom Leanne. Meanwhile the eventually nicknamed Other Anthony, who is he company’s Assistant Sourcing Manager, is played by Rob Lathan who previously appeared in Inside Amy Schumer and has served as a writer on other sketch shows.
Comedian Rachel Kaly plays remote worker and web designer Claire. While her character might be obsessed with the series Bones, she herself has appeared on animated comedy Digman! and High Maintenance.
Straight talking Helen, from accounting who has been at the business from the very beginning alongside Doug, is played by Stephanie Hodge. She is one of the most experienced cast members with past credits including NCIS, Young Sheldon and Scandal. She also had starring roles in the 90s on Nurses and Unhappily Ever After.
Jackie, who works in distribution and logistics when not taking charge of her kids at home, is played by LaNisa Renee Frederick. She’s previously appeared in smaller roles on Brooklyn Nine Nine, The Goldbergs and Mom.
Jim Woods, who was a writer on The Last O.G. starring Tracy Morgan, and starred on Reno 911!. takes on the role of warehouse manager Jimmy. He may have once been the non P.C. employee but he’s working maybe a bit too hard to be a better version of himself.
Erica Hernandez plays Kate from sales and marketing, who often gives the impression she should have a leadership role herself. Hernandez previously starred in the drama series True Lies, based on the 1994 Arnold Schwarzenegger film as well as New Amsterdam.
The other half of Team Skate (Steve & Kate), Steve is a “confident salesman that plays the calmer yin to Kate’s high-strung yang.” He is played by Warren Burke who has appeared in 13 episodes of Family Reunion and eight episodes of Bigger.
Snack obsessed receptionist PJ, is played by Marc-Sully Saint-Fleur who you may have seen before in Steve Carrell starring Netflix comedy Space Force or his brief appearances in Curb Your Enthusiasm and The Good Place. There’s also HR manager Kevin who is the one who seemingly hires Anthony to be his assistant.
He is played by Ryan Perez. Perez is actually a seasoned comedy actor, writer and director. He has written for Saturday Night Live and The Tonight Show with Jimmy Fallon while he has also directed Funny or Die shorts with Will Ferrell and Kevin Hart.
Ranch manager Marjorie who is looking after the company workers while on retreat is played by Blair Beeken. She most recently appeared in Apple’s hit sci-fi series Pluribus.
Jury Duty Presents Company Retreat is streaming on Prime Video.
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This article contains spoilers for Season 2, Episode 9 of “The Pitt.”
Midway through Season 2, “The Pitt” has taken on the perils of the digital age and given me a reason to love the show as much as everyone else does.
Don’t get me wrong — I understand perfectly why so many people, including recent Emmy and Golden Globe voters, have lost their minds over the HBO Max medical drama: The propulsive day-in-the-life of a Pittsburgh ER conceit, the dazzling ensemble cast, the writers’ heroic attempts to showcase our perilously broken healthcare system, the healing power of empathy and, of course, the Noah Wyle-ness of it all. His brilliant and gentle-voiced Dr. Michael “Robby” Robinavitch is as aspirational a character on television as we’ve ever seen.
But having recently spent almost six hours passing out and vomiting from pain in the waiting room of my local ER (which was empty except for one other man), while being told there was nothing anyone could do until the next shift arrived, I confess I have watched “The Pitt” with a jaundiced eye. The regular crowd shots of the waiting room too often reduce the afflicted into a zombie-like horde bent on making life more difficult for our beloved medical staff.
Sure it’s tough to work in an ER when you are worried about your mother’s expectations, grieving your dead mentor, struggling with addiction or worrying about your sister, but no doubt many of those in the waiting room are experiencing similar issues while also in terrifying and hideous pain.
I’m just saying.
In this second season, however, “The Pitt” gave me reason to cheer. It chronicles the day before Robby is set to leave on a three-month sabbatical, and in the early hours, we meet his temporary replacement, Dr. Baran Al-Hashimi (Sepideh Moafi). Having already attempted to force those suffering in waiting rooms to create their own “patient portals,” Dr. Al-Hashimi goes on to advocate for an AI-supported system to aid the doctors with pesky paper work.
Robby, of course, does not think any of this is a good idea and since he is always right (and no television writer is going to openly promote AI), her plan backfires almost immediately. First, with a medical notes transcription that gets Very Important words wrong and then after a complete digital blackout.
After a nearby hospital is hacked and ransomed, the higher-ups decide to defend its system by shutting it down, which means business must be conducted in the old-fashioned, paper-and-clipboards way.
The result is chaos, and a few too many jokes about young people not knowing how to work a fax machine or manage paper. Some of the more seasoned staff, including and especially the indefatigable charge nurse Dana Evans (Katherine LaNasa), remember the days before everyone carried an iPad well enough to keep things moving. Even so, Dana wisely calls upon the services of “retired” clerk Monica Peters (Rusty Schwimmer).
When the computer system at the Pitt is shut down, Dana (Katherine LaNasa), center, calls in Monica (Rusty Schwimmer), far right, who arrives to help.
(Warrick Page / HBO Max)
“Laid off by the digital revolution, not retired,” Monica corrects her. “And how’s all this digital s— working out for you now?”
This is where I cheered. I love the digital world as much as the next person currently typing on a computer to file a story that I have discussed with my editors on Slack and that I will not see in hard copy until it appears in the physical paper. But like pretty much everyone, I have suffered all manner of digital breakdowns and mix-ups, not to mention the inevitably increased workload that comes with the perception that I can do the work of previous multitudes with a few additional strokes of a keypad.
Except, of course, that’s a lie — a keypad is capable of nothing on its own. Neither are fingers, for that matter. They must be manipulated by someone whose brain has to figure out and execute whatever needs to be done. This requires an ability to navigate the ever-changing tech systems that store and distribute information (often in ways that are not at all intuitive) while also understanding the essentials of the actual work being done.
In “The Pitt,” that is the emergency medical treatment of human beings, which requires all manner of physical tasks. As this storyline makes clear, many of the medical staff do not quite understand how to order or handle these tasks without a screen to guide them.
Hence the need for Monica, representative of a large number of support workers who do understand because it was once their job to keep everything moving, to answer all manner of questions, prioritize what needs to be fast-tracked and make sure nothing falls through the cracks while also engaging with all and sundry on a human level.
The shutdown is obviously an attempt to underline the limits of AI but it also serves as a fine and necessary reminder of how readily we have surrendered people like Monica, with their knowledge and experience, to keyboards and touch pads (which, of course, don’t require salaries, benefits or lunch breaks).
But — and this is important — computers are tools not workers. Alas, that has not kept companies in virtually every industry from drastically cutting back on trained and experienced employees and handing large portions of their work (mental if not physical) to people, in this case doctors and nurses, who already have demanding jobs of their own.
But hey, you get a company iPad!
Nurse Dana (Katherine LaNasa), left, and Dr. Baran Al-Hashimi (Sepideh Moafi) have to resort to paper, clipboards and white boards to keep track of patients after the hospital’s systems are shut down.
(Warrick Page / HBO Max)
Often, including with those patient portals, what was once paid labor lands in the lap of the consumers, who in “The Pitt” are people sitting in an emergency room and likely not at the top of their game when it comes to filling out forms about their medical history or coming up with a unique password.
ER dramas, like the “The Pitt,” are inevitably fueled by the tension between the demands for speed and the need for humane care, something that is increasingly true, if not as intrinsically necessary, in all facets of our culture.
With computers in our pockets, we now expect everything to be available instantly. But when something in our online experience goes wrong, we need an actual human to help us fix it. Unfortunately, as the overwhelmed staff of the Pitt discover, those people are increasingly difficult to find because they have been laid off — even nurse Dana can’t do everything!
Dr. Al-Hashimi, like many, believes that patient portals and AI-assisted medical notes will save time, allowing the doctors and nurses to spend more of that precious commodity with their patients. But, as Dr. Robby and Dana repeatedly argue, what they really need is more staff.
There’s no point in saving a few minutes at the admittance window, or on an app, if you are then going to have to spend hours waiting for or trying to find someone who can actually help you when you need it.
That is certainly true in the medical sector, where digital technology has done little to eradicate long wait times for medical appointments or in emergency rooms. Being treated in a hospital hallway by people who can barely stop to talk to you is not an uncommon occurrence for many Americans. The U.S. is facing a critical shortage in hospital staff, with the ranks of registered nurses and other medical personnel having plummeted post-pandemic, often due to burn out.
The amount of time the staff of “The Pitt” spend with each patient, while dramatically satisfying, is almost as aspirational as the wisdom and goodness of Dr. Robby.
None of these problems is going to be solved by AI or any other “time-saving” device. We have not, as far as I know, figured out a way to extend an hour beyond 60 minutes or modified the human body so that it does not require seven to nine hours of sleep each night.
Medical institutions aside, I can’t think of any place I have visited lately that wouldn’t have benefited from more paid and experienced workers, especially those who know how to do things when computers glitch or fail.
The minute Monica sits down and starts barking orders in the ER, everyone feels much better. Here is someone who understands what needs to be done, why, and how to make it happen. Moreover, she has eyes, ears, hands and human experience enough to know that, in the end, people are less interested in saving time than getting the care they need.
