Noah Wyle Is Ready for Another Shift

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1:20Hello and welcome to Little Gold Men, a vanity fair's podcast for film, TV, and awards lovers. I'm Rebecca Ford. My guest today is Noah Wiley, the star and creative force behind the HBO Max medical drama, The Pit. Noah plays Dr. Michael Robbie Rabinovich, the chief of emergency medicine at Pittsburgh Trauma Medical Center. Dr. Robbie is a fictional character, but a growing number of fans see Noah as America's doctor and sometimes even their doctor again. Noah first put on the white coat as Dr. John Carter on ER from 1994 to 2005. And to be fair to the fans, The Pit, which swept the Emmys last year, has been lauded as one of the most medically accurate television shows of its kind.

2:05Noah and I caught up a few weeks ago, shortly before filming for The Pit's third season kicked off. He was very deep into the process. He even brought a fake leg that had been used on the show onto the screen so I could take a look at it. I was curious to know whether Noah sees himself committing to another character for as long as he did on ER, and what he makes of the intense fan reaction to Dr. Robbie's emotional unraveling in season two. And after playing a doctor on television for so many years, is Noah Wiley qualified to give out medical advice in real life? Let's find out. I am so excited to welcome Noah Wiley to the podcast today.

2:45Thank you so much for joining me. Thank you, Rebecca. It's wonderful to be with you. So I think you guys are hard at work on season three from what I understand. And how are you doing today on a scale of normal, well-rested human to ER doctor on hour 14 out of a 15-hour shift? I'm on hour 18 of that shift. What's the opposite of fresh as a daisy? Yeah, that's a good question. I don't know what the opposite of it is, but that's where you're at, huh? That's where I'm at. You're in the writer's room at the moment? We're in the writer's room. I'm playing hooky today to talk to you, but only physically.

3:19Mentally, I'm still in there. We're banging out season three. Storylines are going up on the board. We have good concept for everybody's story arc, and we're about to break episode three, which I'm going to write. Wow, exciting. Do you take a mental break from the show and from Robbie once you've wrapped season two? How much time do you allow your brain to rest? Well, I'm still kind of figuring out how to do all that work-life balance with this one. After the first season, I did go away for a little bit. My wife sent me away to a beach for a couple of days just to decompress and to become a human being again.

3:55This time was a little trickier. You know, sometimes the press demands right as soon as we finish. There's usually a trip to New York. And this has been an embarrassment of riches in terms of the requests and the opportunities to come and talk to our cast. It's been kind of almost nonstop. There was a little bit of time. I went to London on a little bit of a press tour. We launched HBO Max over there and started the show up there. And then my wife and daughter came over. We had a couple days to sightsee. So I'm taking it where I can find it. So let's talk about season two of The Pit. I thought it was so incredible.

4:27And, you know, when you do a season two of a hit show, there's a lot of eyes on you. Can you talk about how you and the rest of the team decided you'd approach the story, how you'd push it forward after that phenomenal first season? Well, a lot of us didn't anticipate a second season. So we kind of left a lot on the floor in season one. In the event that that was all we were going to be allowed to do, we wanted to do it all. So a few of us, myself included, came back with a, what now? attitude. And then, because the world is a fascinating place that constantly keeps evolving, storylines keep sprouting up, and we realized that there's a lot of more contemporary things to dive into, and that these characters have become really popular.

5:13Like, people really respond to them. And if we just stay true to their character voices and their arcs and plot them a little farther into the future, we should be OK. But the big question was, will audiences be engaged with this show if you take the architecture of the protagonist having a nervous breakdown and you take the mass casualty shooting of the last five episodes out and you just say this is a day in the life experience and the aggregate toll of the job on these practitioners lives is the thesis of the show going forward. We're not going to rely on a big external, you know, deus ex machina event to define our season.

5:47There's no sweeps week. It's just a shift. So John Wells really encouraged us to stay true to the original thesis and to not fall into the temptation of going bigger, badder, faster, funnier, bloodier, but just to sort of do it again and be honest. And same mandates for season three. You know, he basically came to us and said, as this show scales global, don't let your sensibilities be commensurate with that scale. Stay focused on the narrative of a small emergency room in Pittsburgh and the lives of our characters. I thought it was really smart. It was on July 4th, though. My mom was an ICU nurse, and she always said that was like the worst day of the year.

6:29There's a couple. Halloween is big. It's even big. And oddly, full moons and Saturday nights, if they ever coincide, the full moon Saturday night is stuff of legend. Yeah, it's very authentic. And as an actor, how much easier was it to step back into Dr. Robbie's shoes since, you know, you'd played him for such a large chunk of time by now? Oh, it was pretty comfortable. It was very comfortable, actually. And almost, you know, I remember watching Ewan McGregor's motorcycle show when he and his friend went around the world on their motorcycles. And at a certain point, they'd said that they got more comfortable in the saddle of their motorcycles than they did in the beds of the hotels the night between rides.

7:08I kind of felt that way after a while. I looked forward to getting back into costume and into character every day because that was more of a comfortable groove for me to be in than trying to be Noah. Huh. How interesting. I'm really struck by how this show is exploring grief, especially from a man. What has been your approach to how Robbie captures and shares those emotions? I wanted to do a character that would sort of represent a collective feeling that we've all felt since COVID of having gone through something significant and not having had the time to process it. Having something buried in our subconscious that keeps wanting to come up and manifest itself in behavior that is less than graceful and less than our highest self.

7:56And in exploring that, you know, we sort of stumbled upon the idea that a character or a person who's predisposed to reacting that way may be predisposed to reacting that way because of something that happened even earlier. And it sort of becomes a little bit of an unraveling of a toxic masculinity. Where does it come from? What's the original wound that makes somebody feel insecure or unworthy to the point where they need to act out or exert dominance or be manipulative or hide or, you know, become a doctor? A number of pathologies. And so that became a big thesis of season two. Season one is the doctor is the patient.

8:37Season two, doctors don't make good patients. Season three, doctors benefit from being patients. So that's really where our head is at now is as we're watching this mental health journey take place from total denial to acceptance of problem to baby steps up and out of his proverbial pit. That's what we're working on. How much of audience reaction do you take in? There's been some really passionate fans who I think have struggled with Dr. Robbie this season. You know, he really was the hero of the first season, but now we're seeing him, you know, struggle and lash out and things like that. And I know some audiences can struggle when a hero, you know, has flaws and vulnerabilities and things like that.

9:20How much do you pay attention to that? Personally, very little. You know, I have my son is sort of my barometer dad. They're really mad at you right now. America's really pissed at you right now. But that's about as much as I can take in while I'm working. You know, we met a guy who was drowning in season one. He is a heroic individual because of what he carries and shows up and performs and does. He's a flawed individual to be sure. And that was made clear in season one. You know, that he doesn't have any friends. He doesn't really have any family. He doesn't have any pets. He doesn't have a significant relationship that lasts beyond six weeks.

10:00The closest relationship in his life is to a kid whose mother he doesn't date any longer. He is married to his work and haunted by his past. And in that environment, he is a whole and heroic and interesting person. Outside that environment, he struggles. And in season two, as we sort of put a finer point on that, I think people became uncomfortable with watching somebody that they really put a lot of faith in struggle. And it became interesting to me how much more accepting we are of a bad guy who does occasional good things than we are of a good guy who occasionally does bad things. We put a purity test to our heroes that nobody could pass, but we give a pass to our villains that forgive unbelievable behavior.

10:51And that is an interesting American hypocrisy. That's a good point. I didn't think about the villain half of that. I got to say, the fandom around the show is quite intense from, you know, all the shows I've ever seen be loved by fans. I think, you know, it feels like people sometimes forget that you're not a real doctor in real life. How do you handle that? By just being a real doctor. You're just saving people on the sidewalk all the time now. I told the story a couple of times, so it's not exactly fresh, but I was in a restaurant the other night. I'm having dinner with some friends, and this woman, lovely woman, her husband, came up to say some very lovely things about the show.

11:29But she just recently had knee surgery and really wanted me to take a look at her incision. And so she rolled up her pant leg. And I took a look at it, and instead of saying, ma 'am, I really am not a doctor, I said, that looks like it's healing very well. Are you putting full weight on it? So we're all playing the game. But the amount of medical knowledge you must actually have is very high. Like, you would do better on the MCATs than I would, I think, at this point. Like, where would you say your medical knowledge is at? On par with a third-year medical student, for sure, with spikes in other areas that would be anomalous for a third year.

12:07You know, I don't know titation rates. I don't know medical percentages. I don't know medicine. You know, I don't know any of the pharmacology. I know basic physiology and some procedures and how to pronounce some tricky, tricky words. Do you have a favorite medical term you've had to use on the show? Superventricular tachycardia rolls off my tongue pretty easily. That's a good one. Noah Wiley wears many hats on the set of The Pit. Writer, producer, director, and actor. Which is his favorite and which does he struggle with the most? That's coming up right after the break.

12:52Hi, I'm Nicole Phelps, the global fashion news and features director and co-host of Vogue's podcast, The Run-Through. Each week on the show, our listeners get an all-access pass to the world of Vogue with the latest fashion news and the most exciting voices in the industry. On Tuesdays, join me to hear interviews with influential leaders in the industry like Calvin Klein, Daniel Roseberry, and Jonathan Anderson. On Thursdays, join Head of Editorial Content at Vogue, Chloe Mal, and Head of Editorial Content at British Vogue, Chomenadi, as they explore style and culture through the lens of fashion with guests like Martha Stewart, Kamala Harris, and Tracee Ellis Ross.

13:31The Run Through with Vogue, new episodes every Tuesday and Thursday, wherever you get your podcasts.

13:46Welcome back to Little Gold Men from Vanity Fair. Okay, so I want to widen out a little bit. Because you're a writer, executive producer, creative force behind the show as well as the lead, what does writing give to you creatively that maybe acting doesn't? They're all very different disciplines and they're all storytelling. Acting is an interpretive art, directing is a collaborative art, and writing is a solitary art. And even though it breaks collaborative in the room, you are left to sit at a blank page in a dark room. And hopefully the muse will come through you. And I love that. I love the challenge.

14:25And I love the isolation. And I love the fugue state that I get into when I'm sort of in a groove and the characters are just speaking for themselves. I love how it ends up being a rationale for everything I've ever been interested in my life. All my weird hobbies and interests and all the weird bits of trivia that I've picked up that have no real bearing in life suddenly come out of a character's mouth. And you go, ha ha! I knew there was a reason why I know a lot about zucchini. So I enjoy that. I enjoy pollinating these stories with things that make me feel good or make me laugh or come from my life.

15:02And on this show, as we talk about a lot in the writing room, we can't write characters at arm's length because these aren't arm's length characters. We're writing people who are really flesh and blood. And the more we bring our flesh and blood to these characters or the people that we know and the anecdotes that we've heard, the better served we are in terms of that texture becoming off as reality. So between all those roles you take, which is the hardest for you? It was very difficult to break into the college of a writing room. You know, when you change lanes, I'm an actor. I've been an actor for 30 plus years.

15:37You say you want to be a director and everybody goes, oh, you know, you want to be lead singer. You want to stroke your ego. But I've always wanted to be a director. I just put it on a really high pedestal and thought I need to spend 30 years studying filmmaking before I try. Writing was almost my first passion because it was the thing I did in high school. When I didn't know that I had a voice, I was experimenting, trying to find one, and I was really shy. So before I stepped on a stage, I was trying to express myself through writing. So they all are extremely rewarding, but some are more communal than others.

16:12I would say the hardest one is directing because that's the only time I've gone to work scared, where I didn't necessarily know what the day was going to throw at me. I knew what I needed to accomplish. and somewhere in between your homework and the plan that you have to go with, you figure it out. And that sense of spontaneity is super exciting, but it's super out of your comfort zone too a lot of the time. So I would say directing is the hardest. Writing to a deadline can be extremely frustrating and difficult. Acting I've never found particularly difficult, only when you're working with difficult people.

16:47Dr. Rabian, you, I think, have something in common because you're both the veterans, the leaders, whether, you know, that's on the show and among your cast. Because some of these actors are relatively new in their careers. How do you approach the responsibility of sort of being the leader? By leading by example whenever I can, you know, I've tried to make this a really democratic process. There are not a lot of frills on our set. There's no cast chairs. You're not allowed your cell phone. We don't distribute sides. Everybody's expected to know their lines and come prepared every day. drone props on set your watch to company time all of that i model all of that you know i'm the first one on set usually every morning and usually one of the last to leave that said i like the adage that george clooney taught us all in er that we should take our work seriously but not take ourselves seriously so it's a fun set but you have to have that internal metronome that says fun time's over time to hook into work and be able to do that the weirdest thing was i put out this sort of call to a certain type of artist.

17:50And to the man, woman, child, and person, they have shown up and performed admirably. So I think it was a real thirst to be involved in a creative process like this for actors, especially in Los Angeles, where work has been scarce the last couple of years. So the buy-in has been total. And I think some of that enthusiasm and gratitude for the work comes across on the show. And you're watching a family that's really enjoying being together and a party that looks fun to attend. And so people keep tuning in. So you were on ER for 11 seasons. That's a lot of time, a lot of life. Did that change the way you're approaching this?

18:27Like, do you have an exit plan? Would you be fine with being on this for 11 seasons? You know, I mean, how are you viewing it after having done that before? One day at a time. One season at a time, certainly. Although that said, I do feel like the architecture is here for a five, maybe six year mental health journey that we're taking this character on. In the context of a hospital show, I think that there's a Robbie arc that I'm personally invested in that I would love to see. We arrive this guy at a place of having the capacity for a committed relationship, finding the balance between work and life that's been so evasive to him, finding some inner peace to the demons that, you know, have haunted him and some forgiveness in himself for the things that, you know, he felt he was responsible for.

19:12Speaking of that, I know you can't say much about season three, but is there one thing you're excited to put Robbie through in the season that maybe the character wasn't ready for in one and two? I don't think this is divulging too much. You know, there's an interesting parallel between the Robbie and Langdon characters because in season one, Langdon was very much the protege who disappointed the mentor. And that betrayal falls on a couple levels. Season two, Robbie was not necessarily welcoming to Langdon coming back. That's putting it lightly, yeah. But again, for a lot of reasons. Yes. The mentor disappointment.

19:47You can see it in the mentor feeling that he failed himself and his student by not being better at his job. Or, you know, that Langdon now represents the analyzed road. He's gone off and done the work that Robbie hasn't done yet. So he shows up as a big lump of kryptonite reminding Robbie about how far he still has to go on this mental health journey. So keeping those characters apart, almost like polar ends of a magnet, was a great device in season two. You want to bring those characters together somehow in season three, and yet it's going to be flipped. Robbie's coming back now to an environment he hasn't been in for a couple months.

20:25We don't know what kind of ring rust he has as a physician or what type of shame or embarrassment he's walking back into an environment that he wasn't acting his best self at the last time he was in. So it's baby steps, you know, for everybody. But that's one relationship I'm really excited about exploring. Oh, that makes me really excited. I think their dynamic is so incredible. I love working with Patrick. I love working with all of them. We were sort of tantrically kept apart at Club Lovers last year. And as a result, I didn't get to work with him as much as I would have enjoyed.

21:00We're going to take another break. When we come back, Noah reflects on how he's changed since his ER days and reveals his soundtrack for getting into Dr. Robbie's head. Stick around.

21:21Hi, I'm Nicole Phelps, the Global Fashion News and Features Director and co-host of Vogue's podcast, The Run-Through. Each week on the show, our listeners get an all-access pass to the world of Vogue with the latest fashion news and the most exciting voices in the industry. On Tuesdays, join me to hear interviews with influential leaders in the industry like Calvin Klein, Daniel Roseberry, and Jonathan Anderson. On Thursdays, join Head of Editorial Content at Vogue, Chloe Mao, and Head of Editorial Content at British Vogue, Choma Nadi, as they explore style and culture through the lens of fashion with guests like Martha Stewart, Kamala Harris, and Tracee Ellis Ross.

22:00The Run Through with Vogue, new episodes every Tuesday and Thursday, wherever you get your podcasts.

22:15Welcome back to Little Gold Men. I have one more question, then we're going to do a few lightning round questions. How have you most significantly changed as an actor since working on ER? I think I'm way more relaxed on set. I think I'm less anxietal about performance in general. I have a lot more curiosity about what is happening emotionally to me in a moment or around me in a moment than I used to be intimidated by it or provoked by it. Yeah, just sort of a work smarter, not harder attitude. I remember when William Hurt won his Academy Award for Kiss of the Spider Woman, I read this article that he went back to a very basic acting class after that to try to remind himself, like, yeah, once you touch, you know, the top pinnacle doesn't mean you stay there.

23:04You know, you have to go back to the gym and you have to keep muscles fresh and you don't want to take anything for granted. You always want to approach things with fresh eyes. And the nice thing about a character that's in the process of an evolution who's forcing himself to look at things with fresh eyes, not make assumptions, not fall into old patterns, I'm allowed to do that as an actor. And keeping myself sort of humble in the process and thinking about all the things I don't know is a big part of that. All right. We're going to do a little lightning round. I'll do my best. Gemini, 6-1, brown and brown, Los Angeles, California.

23:37Easy. You're done. That's all we wanted to know. All right. I saw the video where you talked about the library you started on set. So what are you reading now? I am reading things mostly that I can mine for the things that I want to write about. And they're very far afield at the moment. There's specific as there's a book by a fusion jazz bassist named Victor Wooten called The Music Lesson that I read a long time ago. that I want to read it again because the way he breaks down aspects of musicology, I really want to use for a particular character. I'm writing a book on insects because I don't know if you know about the lanternfly, but the lanternfly is an infestation problem in the city of Pittsburgh, started on the eastern seaboard and has made its way to Pittsburgh.

24:26And you're encouraged to squash them if you can when you see them because they're so invasive and they have really hard exoskeletons. And yet we haven't really touched on the fact that there is such a thing in Pittsburgh as a lanternfly. So stuff like that. Stuff that is more research-based. I knew I was going to learn something today. I didn't know it would be about lanternflies, but I'll take it. Yeah, beautiful to look at. But when we went for season one and we would go up on the helicopter pad with our white trauma gowns waiting for the helicopters to come back, in between tanks we'd have to knock them off each other's backs like leeches and stand by them.

25:02That's what it felt like. All right, next one here. Who's your favorite TV or movie doctor? Hawkeye Pierce. Oh, from MASH. Why? I grew up watching Alan Alda in that role, and he was at turns funny and tragic and touching and sarcastic and wounded and heroic. Beautiful, beautiful performance that lasted 11 seasons, you know. The writing on that show was so spectacular. I mean, there are a lot of TV doctors whose work I really enjoy. And I grew up watching St. Ellsworth, and I grew up watching, you know, I loved House. And, you know, there's been other ones along the years. But the most influential one for me was Hawkeye.