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‘The Pitt’s Most Intense Med Student Breakdown Has a Much Deeper Hidden Meaning
Editor’s note: The below interview contains spoilers for The Pitt Season 2 Episode 9.
It may be hard to believe, but Noah Wyle and R. Scott Gemmill‘s smash-hit HBO medical drama The Pitt is closer to the end of Season 2 than ever. With the situation for this season’s Fourth of July shift in the fictional Pittsburgh Trauma Medical Center only becoming more dire thanks to a necessary network shutdown, frustrations for both staff and patients are at an all-time high — and the ED’s switch to doing things in an analog fashion means that some cases might end up slipping through the cracks.
Shabana Azeez‘s Victoria Javadi learns that truth the hard way when a breakdown in communication results in her patient unexpectedly coding while waiting for the case to be presented. Although the patient is ultimately revived and whisked off for emergency surgery, it’s a harsh lesson for the young med student to learn — and, as Azeez points out in our post-mortem chat prior to the premiere of Episode 9, “3:00 P.M.,” it’s a strong reminder of the intense pressures that real-life med students are facing every day.
COLLIDER: This is the episode where Shawn Hatosy is making his debut as director. Does he bring a different perspective to directing, as an actor himself?
SHABANA AZEEZ: He knows the world inside out, and he’s so giving. He’s an actor and director and writer, so I feel like he understood everybody and was a real chameleon about it. It was lovely. Also, in Season 1, I was doing a lot of the comedic load on that season, and this is different. I haven’t seen it yet, so I’m so nervous.
Shabana Azeez Reveals Javadi’s True Feelings About Ogilvie on ‘The Pitt’ Season 2
“She’s not interested in that man.”
Javadi and Ogilvie accidentally both pull the same patient, and we’ve talked before about the competitiveness of those characters, which is really fun to watch. Does that surprise forced interaction between them give Javadi a better understanding of what Ogilvie is really about?
AZEEZ: I think she can’t stand him. She’s not interested in him, which is really rare for her. Usually, even with Santos, she’s like, “I guess they’re just like this.” But with Ogivlie, she’s 20, and you know how, when you meet people for the first time, you’re like, “Oh my god, what is this version of me that’s coming out?” She’s never met somebody who’s created this dynamic in her where she’s itching to be right.
In Season 1, too, she’s not a gunner. She’s not somebody who needs to be right in the moment. She wants to do her best, and she doesn’t want to be underestimated, and she doesn’t want to be sidelined. She gets put in triage, and that’s not her favorite, but she really wants to be her best self. She’s never like, “I know the answer before Santos knows it!” or “I’m smarter than you,” or whatever. Ogilvie creates this dynamic that’s so rancid that it really gives her the freedom to not be people-pleasing or be perfect or be palatable to people. She could just be herself in that moment. For Javadi, it’s just about the version of Javadi she can be. She’s not interested in that man.
‘The Pitt’ Just Exposed One of America’s Most Brutal Truths in 5 Minutes
This insidious reality reveals an even larger social battle.
Episode 9 kicks off for Javadi with the young boy who accidentally blows his fingers off with a firework. Do you find yourself intuiting or maybe internalizing anything surprising from a younger actor who’s coming in and having to do a really tough or emotional scene like that?
AZEEZ: That’s such a lovely question. I think young performers get so much credit in some ways, and not in others. They’re so open and free in some ways, and often it’s about really good casting. There were such strange casting processes. I think we’ve got another kid who is under [anesthesia] this season, so Cathy [Sandrich Gelfond], our casting director, just had the kid lie down and poked them with straws and stuff to see if it would bother them. Casting kids is such an art form, and I think Cathy and the entire team are amazing at it.
I love having kids on set because I think they’re this great ego killer in the adult actors. Some actors are very, like, “What can I give?” and some actors are very, like, “What do I need in the scene?” But as soon as you get a kid in, the kid’s needs are paramount. If the kid needs quiet, if the kid needs safety, everybody goes, “Let’s be what we need to be for the kid.” So, I love working with kids. I think they’re amazing. They bring such a wonderful energy by being who they are. Kid performers are often really incredible young people, but also, the impact they have on everybody around them.
I’m trying to think of a lesson I’ve learned. Definitely Harrison, McKay’s son. The actor who played that role, [Henry Samiri], was incredible. One of the best Australian accents I’ve heard in my life. I think it’s often really great parents, too, who create these kids who are like, “It’s going to be fun!” I really wish I subscribed to the tortured artist mentality. I mean, I do do things to myself for work that’s not healthy, but I want to live a fun and impactful life, I want to do good, and kids are really great at being like, “What are your priorities?” It’s not about showing everybody the work. I don’t want to show everybody how hard I’m working. I want everybody to feel like it’s effortlessly chill and be whatever anybody needs me to be. I think that child actors are really great at that, too.
Javadi’s Crashing Patient is a Turning Point for Her Storyline in ‘The Pitt’ Season 2
“The stakes are life and death pretty consistently, day in, day out, on these 15, 20-hour shifts.”
Javadi’s patient, who presents in Episode 9 with mild abdominal pain, is one of those cases where everyone’s running in a million different directions, and then this, as Whitaker says, falls through the cracks. You can see, in your performance, that you’re walking a very fine line between feeling like you’re going to cry, but you can’t let yourself cry. Is it harder to bring yourself to the threshold of needing to hold back the tears than it is to do a scene where you can just let it all go?
AZEEZ: I think so. And I think so much of those moments are surrendering to if it happens or if it doesn’t happen. They both are okay. I don’t know what ended up in the edit, because we did so many different takes. I’m definitely an actor who wants to give versions and options, and the editor can make that call in the room. Performances are made in the cutting room, not on the soundstage — for the screen, at least.
For Javadi, particularly, the degradation of her mental state over the day, like how quietly things get exhausting and how you have to compartmentalize as a doctor, but you are still getting more and more heightened and more and more exhausted… she has a really horrible day, and I think that last season there was community in that. It was a shared trauma in what happens to them, but I think this season, Javadi is quite alone in the things that happen. Then also, the pain in this particular context, and we say it in the show all the time, but the emergency department is like a team sport, and this particular situation, where it’s like, “Well, the nurse didn’t write the name down. I didn’t clock that, but we all fuck up, and that’s why this happened.” It’s not all her fault, but it’s also not not her fault. You’re meant to just be on top of everybody, helping everybody out all the time, and so it’s so lonely.
I’m excited to see it. I’m very nervous. But I think there is something really heartbreaking about the amount of people you let down. The stakes are so high. And in a story, you can be like, “Oh, well, that’s the one time that’s going to happen today.” But actually, in the ED, she could make that mistake four times in a row today. The stakes are life and death pretty consistently, day in, day out, on these 15, 20-hour shifts.
The dominoes all fell for this patient to be on a bed crashing, and no one knew. How does a mistake like this impact Javadi’s mindset now that we’re heading into the second half of this shift?
AZEEZ: I really want med students to be able to tune in to The Pitt on their worst day of med school and watch Javadi and feel better about themselves. That’s really important to me. Med school is so intense, and it takes so much. Mental health outcomes, even for students, are so wild. I remember vividly when I was at uni, where I grew up, they were getting rid of grades in med schools because of the amount of self-harm and suicides that were happening on campus. It’s so intense to imagine that kind of pressure.
Usually for The Pitt, it’s always been like “We’re trying to do our best, we’re trying to do our best, we’re trying to do our best,” and I kind of actually want that to crumble. For Javadi, she’s always trying her best. She’s always capable of that. I really want this second half of the season to be more complicated than that, because sometimes people do want to quit. You can have all the strongest why in the world and all the integrity and all the gumption and the grit to just try and try and try again, but a system like this that seems so hopeless in so many ways is going to get you down. I really want the second half of the season to be messy and imperfect. She’s not committed to anything yet. She doesn’t know what she wants to do. If you give so much of yourself to something you’re not even sure about, it’s going to take a toll on your mental health, and you’re going to develop an attitude about it, and that’s not unfair.
Roxie, the patient that Javadi and McKay are dealing with, doesn’t want to leave the hospital. There’s not much more you can do for her pain, even after talking with Robby about it. Has Javadi even allowed herself to think about what the logical ending looks like for this particular case, or is she just, like you said, compartmentalizing?
AZEEZ: I think she, as the day goes on, gets more and more tired and ground down and reactive, and she’s not thinking anymore. This particular storyline is so hard for a 20-year-old. I think Roxy’s kids are 12 and eight. We’re eight, nine years apart. It is huge, I guess, at that age, and any age, but I think that parent-child dynamic is quite complex for Javadi, which we’ve seen a bit of already, and we’ll explore as we go on, but she’s never had loss like this. She’s never witnessed it. She doesn’t even know what she doesn’t know.
New episodes of The Pitt Season 2 premiere Thursdays on HBO Max.