Note: This story contains spoilers from “The Pitt” Season 2, Episode 15.
The July 4 shift of “The Pitt” left Taylor Dearden’s Dr. Mel King with a whirlwind of emotions, reeling from a dynamic switch-up with her sister Becca and gearing up for another stressful deposition. But, luckily, Isa Briones’ Dr. Trinity Santos knew just the right way to get that stress out.
After an offhand comment about melting the day’s stress away via karaoke from Santos, the Season 2 finale post-credits scene saw Mel and her new friend turn the idea into reality at a karaoke bar to the tune of Alanis Morissette’s “You Oughta Know.” While Mel and Santos washed away the stressful day at the E.R., Dearden revealed the karaoke scene, which sees Santos shake out Mel’s hair and remove her glasses, was actually the first shot of the day, recalling “we were still sleepy … we [had] to pretend it’s a long day.”
“It was … only two takes, and we went for it [and it] was amazing,” Dearden told TheWrap. “After we were done, all the rest of the cast and crew were just there watching, clapping … because I think, honestly, I know from my end — I kind of lost myself there. I was in it. I was in it really hard.”
Below, Dearden unpacks Mel’s Season 2 arc, that deposition news and why she thinks Mel and Langdon are on equal footing after this shift. This interview has been edited for length and clarity.
TheWrap: This season saw Mel grapple with how much she’s prioritized her sister over herself. What was it like following that thread this season and what did the storyline teach you about Mel?
Dearden: I think something that I got from the first season, the way they wrote how Mel talked about Becca in the first season in her interactions … the most important relationship in Mel’s life is Becca, of course. And I think it’s quite a wrench to throw in that all of a sudden Becca doesn’t need her. To me, yes, it comes off as infantilization and thinking of Becca as incapable of making her own decisions, but I think it all comes from Mel suddenly realizing she’s not needed. Whenever you’re hit with something like that, it often comes off wrong, but I think it shook her to her core, and it’s just going to be rethinking who she is and what she wants, and actually trying to tap into herself and find out. Because I don’t think it’s that she’s withholding, I think she doesn’t know.
Mel even loses her temper at one point. What did you make of that moment and the fact that it was Langdon who calls her out on it?
If you can imagine, the only thing you’re certain about in your life is being taken away — that you are needed for her to survive, is not true. It freaked her out so much that she lost track of everything. [Becca and her boyfriend have] been together for six months, and that’s quite a feeling of betrayal from a sibling, especially ones so incredibly close … I mean, they’re twins, and to feel like she’s been keeping something from Mel for that long, it has to it has to hurt. It has to hurt really badly. And we don’t know why it wasn’t mentioned, Becca was just kind of like, “Yeah, I do,” and so it’s not like we find out she was keeping it from her or anything. I think there’s something also about how easy it seems to be for Becca that also hurts Mel and just like, “well, if it was so easy and nice, why wouldn’t you tell me? Why wouldn’t you tell me something good about you?” Something great happened, very happy, and you left me out of that.” And I think that just that really hurts.
By the end, it seems like Mel has accepted she needs to do something for herself. How do you imagine she’ll approach this balance moving forward?
I mean the question in the first or second episode already of 1) do you date? And 2) what do you like? And the fact that she was like, “I don’t understand.” It was like a foreign language, “what do I like? I don’t understand that.” She has to start from scratch. Most people, at least, know their hobbies. They don’t have to know what they really want to do with their lives, or how they who they end up with … But I think everyone, even by a much younger age, knows what they like. And so I think it just shows how much Mel has deprived herself of herself.
Many of Mel’s peers have doubts about their place in medicine or an E.R. specifically. Does Mel ever have those doubts?
In a very different way. I think Mel has doubts about where she fits in society more than as a doctor, and is hoping and wondering if the people around her like her … the only one who’s ever tried is Langdon still. Even though some of them find her fun and quirky now, or they understand she’s sweet, there no one’s trying to get her.
It’s much more about the world she’s living in and like the anti-vaxxer thing of just not understanding that part of the world. I think Mel, as most doctors and medical professionals do, think there’s black and white … so when people approach someone like Mel, someone who’s also neurodivergent like me with gray, it gets very confusing, and really, it just takes a lot longer to understand, and it’s tougher and more anxiety to understand.
From Mel’s interactions with Becca, it seems like Mel talked about Langdon a fair amount for meeting him for just one shift. What did you make of that?
It’s been 10 months of no one trying like he did. To have just proof for herself that someone tried, and I don’t think anyone really tried — she liked Al-Hashimi and Mohan at the VA but they didn’t try to understand her. And so I think Langdon served as kind of a beacon of this idea that there will be people who try to get her and will not abandon the quirks and the neurodiverges — they won’t just judge her … I think the reason that he’s been talked about is just over these 10 months is Mel kind of being like … there was someone so that could happen again.
Langdon’s return seems to be a comfort for Mel but they also have some tense moments, which wraps up with an apology in the finale. Where do they stand by the end?
Both Patrick and I were talking about it — and Scott [Gemmill] was amazing … I think both Patrick and I really wanted there to be more equality in the relationship, because the first season was mentor-mentee, and because of how far Langdon had fallen, as well as Mel moving up in medicine … they’re finally on equal ground … it’s still Langdon kind of fighting to be on top, but with Mel, he doesn’t have to do that; and Mel’s still trying to get people to even try to understand her, and with Langdon, she doesn’t have to do that.
We both were talking, and asked Scott — which was so amazing that we were able to do, no one gets to do that stuff — and kind of figure out the way where we wanted it to just be two friends, no one having specific advice for the other. It’s just a download of a day, and … I feel like they both realize in that moment that they’ve kind of balanced out now … we’re moving forward now as equal partners in our platonic friendship and work relationship, too. I foresee one of us having a really tough call or something, and the same thing happening — maybe we know exactly where to look for each other, what rooms we go to, and just how to say things and and I feel like that ends up being one of the two saving graces for Mel — that and Santos.
There’s always the fanships, but do you think that there’s ever anything more between Mel and Langdon beyond platonic?
No, I don’t. Patrick and I have talked about this a lot, and … I understand the want. But the thing both of us don’t see that we want to see a lot more of is opposite gender platonic relationships, because I have best guy friends and he has best female friends, and we don’t see it. They always have to be in a relationship. It’s not true for real life. People forget that he’s married with children, and Mel would never.
On top of the conflict with Becca we have the deposition going on, which Mel has been told the hospital will protect her from but it still gets to her. Is there anything else deeper beyond typical nerves happening there?
It is true that pretty much every doctor has experienced this at some point, from private practice to emergency … so it’s something that’s deep and scary, but it’s still just the first time … usually you don’t have to do this quite yet. Maybe it’s a little later in your career. And I think especially something that isn’t a political thing at all for doctors, it’s an absolute fact, as it is for me and everyone who works on the show — vaccines work and medicine works … and you can’t know treatment without the test.
The spinal tap was performed perfectly, and the injury has nothing to do with that. It actually has everything to do with a non-vaxxer. I don’t think Mel thinks she did something wrong, but she’s just confused as to how someone could sue over that. I also I feel like … people have forgotten that Mel thought she had permission, because the dad said, “do it.” I don’t think Mel ever thought she was being sneaky, until the mom burst in. And then I think that was the first time in Mel’s life that she went, “I’m gonna do something sneaky, because I know what’s right,” and I think there was pride in it. To have the thing that Mel was really proud of herself for doing anyway …. that’s the thing that I’m might lose my license for it’s just extra hard.
What can you tell us about Season 3?
We’ve been told that they really want to stick with the same schedule, so starting pretty much right away, first of June ish … airing in January. They want to keep that consistent. That’s literally all I got, I was telling someone else I found out about the July 4 [shift] through an interview, because they don’t tell us anything.
“The Pitt” Seasons 1-2 are now streaming on HBO Max.
