'The Pitt's Noah Wyle Reacts to That Heartbreaking Patient Death: "It's a Funeral With a Clock"

Editor's note: The below interview contains spoilers up to The Pitt Season 2 Episode 6.

Now that HBO's The Pitt has returned for Season 2, it's clear things are only just beginning to ramp up for the doctors and nurses working in the emergency department of the fictional Pittsburgh Trauma Medical Center. While the first several hours of this Fourth of July shift were admittedly quiet, that's no longer the case as of the season's sixth hour of R. Scott Gemmill, John Wells, and Noah Wyle's medical drama, "12:00 P.M." Another hospital is mysteriously reporting a "Code Black," resulting in their patients being diverted elsewhere, and one of the ED's most frequent occupants, Louie (Ernest Harden Jr.), has just coded seemingly out of nowhere.

Ahead of The Pitt's return, Collider had the opportunity to speak with the show's creators and cast alike about some of Season 2's most pivotal moments over the first six episodes, including Wyle. Over the course of the interview, which you can watch above or read below, the show's lead and EP delves into what Dr. Robby is emotionally navigating ahead of his planned three-month sabbatical, whether the tension between Robby and Dr. Langdon (Patrick Ball) is going to boil over before the end of shift, the deeper meaning behind The Pitt's staff memorial for Louie at the close of Episode 6, and more.

COLLIDER: We can't start talking about Season 2 without talking about how Dr. Robby is coming into this shift, which is that he's leaving the next day for a three-month sabbatical, as far as we know. For you, and in playing the character, do you feel like having that storyline hovering over the shift is impacting him at all? Does it feel like a kid on the last day of school, or is he just determined to get through this shift one way or another?

NOAH WYLE: I think it's all of that. It was a wonderful device to come up with to allow the story to have something very specific that he was going through on this particular day while the day was challenging and had all sorts of obstacles that would potentially keep him from accomplishing his goal, which is to get out on the road before it gets too late.

This trip is Robby’s curated form of self-help that he has come up with for himself in lieu of going through the more traditional routes of finding a therapist and adhering to some of the prescriptive advice he’s giving his staff on the other side of their experience with this mass casualty event, and their own PTSD. So the trip becomes symbolic, both for the character's avoidance of a healthier mode of treatment and maybe evidence that he's not as well-adjusted as he's coming off. And as the season progresses, that trip gets looked at with a finer and finer lens.

Noah Wyle Teases Whether Robby and Langdon's Tension Is Going To Boil Over by the End of 'The Pitt' Season 2

"They're terrific characters in that their relationship is extremely complex."

To talk about avoidance, it seems pretty clear that Robby was hoping that the timing of his sabbatical would overlap with Langdon's return. I think he even says as much at one point. We see Langdon make the effort to broach a conversation, Robby shuts him down early on, but then, as the shift continues, they're forced into each other's orbit. Langdon obviously has the patient with the necrotizing fasciitis, and that pulls Robby in, whether he wants to be involved or not. That tension between them, though — what can you talk about in terms of how that's really simmering in the background of Season 2, and is there any point at which it's going to boil over?

WYLE: I hope so. You can't keep these tantric lovers apart for too long. They're terrific characters in that their relationship is extremely complex. Langdon's addiction wasn't just a moral failing of Langdon. It was a personal betrayal to his mentor in Robby and a breach of their friendship and the honesty that they shared. That's one way of framing it. Another way of framing it is Robby fucked up. He was supposed to look out for his number one pupil, and under his watch, this guy developed a painkiller addiction in practiced medicine, and Robby was totally oblivious. So, who's really at fault here?

Then you look at it through another frame, and you see Langdon's coming back, having already walked through the therapeutic road. He's humbled himself. He's faced his demons, and he's ready to come back and rebuild his life, all of which Robby hasn't done yet. So to a certain extent, he represents kryptonite. It's a relationship that, as the day progresses and they are thrown into each other's company, all of those begin to kind of redefine themselves.

Continuing this thread of talking about relationships with Robby, I picked up on some vibes between him and Noelle Hastings early on. I think fans will be curious to see if that develops. I did think it was interesting that Dana warns Noelle against getting involved with this man at this particular point, especially, as we've been talking about, he's about to leave for three months. Is this meant to be maybe a little fun fling? Is it potentially more? What can you tease about where that is heading?

WYLE: Well, again, on one hand, it's titillating. Robby's been having a social life. It's so exciting and probably speaks to him not being so bad off. Then you look at it for another frame, and you see somebody who's unable to have a relationship that lasts more than six weeks, who only wants to mine it for the most superficial aspects, and who, when confronted with the opportunity to go deeper or more intimate, takes an escape route each and every time, and has very few personal connections to anybody.

We very rarely ever hear about anybody socializing, if ever, with Robby outside of work. We don't know anything about him outside of work. And as the season progresses, that lone wolf, kind of do-what-he-wants thing that seems so cool and almost enviable in the beginning, we start to realize, is what's probably throwing his life so far out of balance, is he has no offset for the work that he's doing and for what he takes in and takes on through that work.

Noah Wyle Reveals the Meaning of 'The Pitt's Tribute to Louie in Season 2 Episode 6

"Robby is able to give the frame around the picture..."

To wrap up, there is a scene in Episode 6 where the staff gets together to memorialize a lost patient. It feels like this shift is often so frenetic and hectic, and everyone is being pulled in a million different directions, that it's rare that everyone gets to be in a room together to have a moment of quiet contemplation. Robby shares a lot of really moving and poignant details in their debriefing, and I was curious about the experience of bringing everyone together in that room and having that scene, because it feels really important.

WYLE: I was sort of taken with this notion of, when you know somebody, but you only know a fragment of them, you're getting a glimpse of them in this moment of time that you share with them, you may get an impression, but it's part of a mosaic that builds up a life or builds up somebody's story. All of the staff know Louie. Louie is a frequent flier who has been coming in for years. We've been patching him up and sending him back out and listening to this joke and listening to that anecdote, but nobody's really taken the full measure of the man. Nobody's had the opportunity to.

So, in Episode 6, what we try to do is, from each person's limited perspective, they fill in a piece to a puzzle that has been on their family table for years, but nobody really understands what the picture looks like and why it looks like it does. Robby is able to give the frame around the picture and say, “This was a great guy who had a real tragedy happen. As many people do when they face this kind of tragedy, it derailed his progress and his trajectory in a way that we all tried to help, but ultimately got the better of him. And as much time as we would love to take to confer this man's dignity and to wrap up his life, we've got eight more Louies out there that we can still save.” So, even though this is a funeral, it's a funeral with a clock.