Alison Stewart: This is All Of It on WNYC. I'm Alison Stewart. In the hyperrealistic world of the show The Pitt, ER doctors and nurses take on everything from car accidents to kids with beads up their noses to mass casualty events. The senior attending doctor is supported by various specialists, interns, nurses, all with their unique specialty.

Fairly soon into the series, we realize that the heart of the show is charge nurse Dana Evans. She's tough, but fair, compassionate, funny, and incredibly knowledgeable, not just about medicine, but about being a good human. Here's a clip from this season when she and her new nursing student caring for a homeless man who is so unkempt that he's neglected to remove a cast, creating a harrowing outcome.

Nurse Dana: Mr. Digby.

Digby: Just Digby

Nurse Dana: Digby, why'd you wait so long to come see us?

Digby: I don't like going to doctors.

Nurse Dana: That makes two of us. We all need help from time to time. Think maybe we could arrange for some ongoing care?

Digby: I just want to get patched up. You know?

Nurse Dana: I do know, but that's today. What's tomorrow?

Digby: Sunday.

Nurse Dana: Use the system. That's what it's there for. A buddy of mine, Dylan, knows all the angles, even works the occasional miracle. You think maybe I could have him stop by?

Digby: I guess, yes.

Nurse Dana: Right. How about a sandwich?

Digby: Yes, please.

Alison Stewart: Nurse Dana is played by the actor Katherine LaNasa, who's in studio today. She won an Emmy and a Critics' Choice Award, and we're really glad to have you with us. Hey, Katherine.

Katherine LaNasa: Hi.

Alison Stewart: Noah Wyle, who plays Dr. Robby, was here almost exactly a year ago. The show was starting to get a little buzz on it. I asked him, "Why did you go back into TV?" He had a mantra, and he said he wanted to go back into TV, but he wanted to please put me in the company of first-class artists with good hearts and minds doing meaningful work.

Katherine LaNasa: Aw, wow.

Alison Stewart: What is working on The Pitt? That mantra, what does that mean to you, working on The Pitt?

Katherine LaNasa: Noah wrote something to the actors, all of whom were auditioning, and it said something like, "Bring your creativity, leave your ego," and that he wanted this top-to-toe immersion. I'll get to that part later, but I think that statement about, "Bring your creativity, leave your ego." It's funny. It seems like a small thing, but so often in television, particularly in something like this, like a medical drama.

You would feel that you were supposed to fit inside a box, and it let me feel the freedom to make really kooky choices, even in my audition. I really appreciated that. It made me feel like I could bring all of myself. I think The Pitt is a place where we really all work together. Everyone on the set even wears scrubs. We don't have actors' chairs. We go into the family room on the show, and we hang out there if there's time to hang out, or we just sit in the chairs around the hub, and we decide what shot we're going to do next.

It's just very much this group effort, like an ongoing dance. We dance around like that until it's lunch, and then we take lunch, and then we do some more of it until it's dinner. I think we really try to help each other build the scene to make the best, most dynamic scene that we can make.

Alison Stewart: What was going on with you professionally before The Pitt came to you, before the audition came to you?

Katherine LaNasa: I'd had a couple of really amazing blue-chip roles, like opposite Will Ferrell in The Campaign, Jay Roach's movie, or in Billy Bob's movie, opposite Duvall, Jayne Mansfield's Car, but none of them had really moved the needle forward on my career. I was in Octavia Spencer's show on Apple. I'd done some really wonderful jobs with wonderful, major talent, but it just hadn't been the thing to click. I found myself in COVID, having a really hard time getting a job because if you weren't a name, all of us journeyman actors weren't able to get into a room anymore. It used to be, if there was a little room, how I got both of those films, they were only going to say, see 10 or 15 people. If the casting thought I was right for it, I'd go in.

In COVID, there were no rooms like that. Where you could be the surprise and get the job, it was just send in a self-tape, with now thousands of people sending in a self-tape for your role. I was having a really hard time since COVID started getting a job.

Alison Stewart: Literally, I'm curious, the day that the audition came to you, what were you doing?

Katherine LaNasa: It's funny. I had an audition for that, and I also had an audition for-- I was living in Atlanta, where we were living because my husband had been on Dynasty. He was the new Blake Carrington. I also had an audition for The Righteous Gemstones, which was this over-the-top southern character, like my character in The Campaign. I think everyone thought I was a shoo-in for that, but I didn't feel as connected to that. When I read the Dana character, it said like, "She's a tattooed lifer." I didn't really, when I read the description, think maybe that I fit it. When I got together with my person that I run my lines with, she and I were having a conversation before we started. When I opened up and started reading the lines with her, I had said some of the very same things that Dana says in the script. I thought, "Gosh, maybe this could be me." The rest is history.

I remember saying to my agents after I turned both of them in, "Of course, I thought my audition for The Righteous Gemstones was mediocre. I thought maybe The Pitt was something." They said, "Oh, The Pitt, they don't know what they want. They're reading thousands of people. They don't know what they want, but The Righteous Gemstones, we're going to try to get them to offer that to you. That's yours." Look what happened.

Alison Stewart: That's amazing. Dana, how was she written in the script?

Katherine LaNasa: There was something that I actually didn't read. I don't know how it came to my attention later that it said that she was smarter than all the doctors and not afraid to let them know. I think that I come with so much directness and strength just as a person, that if I had read that, I probably would've blown it out. I'm glad that I didn't read that. I just saw her as a person who led with humility, which was her strength, her superpower, and her wisdom. I also, going back to your earlier question, felt that that was the way for Katherine to operate on the set, that it just felt like that's what Noah was calling out of us, that we were all going to work together, this top-to-toe immersion, meaning-

Alison Stewart: What does that mean?

Katherine LaNasa: It means that you're in it all the way. For me, I really like being a dancer to start working with my props and stuff like that before the camera rolls. Sometimes, I'll finish a conversation on the phone [laughs] when I'm in the background after they said cut. It's so ridiculous, or I'll keep walking the path that I'm walking, and I just keep doing it. What happens is when the camera comes around to me, I'm so lived in that it looks lived in, in the shot. That's the kind of work I love to do.

I was left on my own in a show called Judging Amy, where I was in the background as a DA all the time. I had to think, "What would a DA be doing now?" I was hours in the background, figuring out what I would do. That really led to me developing that part of my craft. You never know what you're going to learn. I find it very grounding. When they said that, I thought, "Oh, that's me. I love to do that kind of work." I want it to just be like-- The camera just popped in, and you were already fully engaged, fully living there. I don't like it when it looks stiff, or it bumps me.

Alison Stewart: I'm going to now have a Katherine LaNasa screen-a-thon the next snow day we have. Oh, my God. Judging Amy.

Katherine LaNasa: I call them puppet shows, what we do in the background. I go up John Wells. I was like, "John, would you like a puppet show over here?" Or, "How's this puppet show working for you?" He'll say, "We'll see you better if you're over at the door."

Alison Stewart: I'm speaking with Katherine LaNasa. She plays Nurse Dana on The Pitt. It's in its second season now. This is a story where we see the characters at work. It's hour by hour. We don't really know that much about their personal life.

Katherine LaNasa: Yes.

Alison Stewart: Do you know a lot about Dana's personal life?

Katherine LaNasa: They told me that her mother died when she was in her teens. Then, they also have written that Dana has been working there 32 years, and that she started working there in high school. There was an earlier script. I don't know if it's in there. It might got cut out last season, but that she started volunteering there in high school. I think that's why when she gets punched at work, it's just so humiliating and so eviscerating and unexpected.

Alison Stewart: It's her home, too. She's been there 32 years. It's not just work.

Katherine LaNasa: I have to think she's a blue-collar person, that this is a place of pride. I'm sure her whole family's like, "Go down to the hospital, see Dana." Dana bosses all those doctors around, and then to have someone hit her in the face there, I think it was just really shattering for her.

Alison Stewart: What accent does Dana have? You're from Louisiana.

Katherine LaNasa: I'm from Louisiana.

[laughter]

Katherine LaNasa: Hopefully it's Pittsburgh. I'm trying for Pittsburgh.

Alison Stewart: Did you work with a voice coach or did-

Katherine LaNasa: I did, yes, from Pennsylvania.

Alison Stewart: Tell me what a Pittsburgh accent is like.

Katherine LaNasa: There's home and hoagie. It's a different sound from home and hoagie. Robby instead of Robbie. Robby has a different sound. Sound at get him at, that doesn't sound right. Also maybe-

Alison Stewart: Your voice is also lower.

Katherine LaNasa: Up. You might say, "I'm fed up.", "I'm fed up." It's flat. It's very forward. I got to tell you, Alison, a lot of tears learning Dana. A lot of tears. I literally was crying until I found this voice because I thought that I really wanted her to be grounded in her blue collarness and in her region. I am a southerner, and people get all of our specific accents wrong so often. They'll do a Cajun in Atlanta, or they'll do just a dead over-the-top accent for certain parts of the region.

I wanted to honor the people of Pittsburgh by at least attempting it. That was my mission. When I finally found someone that could truly help me, it was quite a relief, but it was a lot of work. [laughs]

Alison Stewart: Your character went through a lot in Season One, and there was tension between the doctors. You had a doctor who may have been overusing drugs, you got hit in the face or really hit in the face assault. She's ready to throw in the towel, we think. Why does she come back?

Katherine LaNasa: I don't think she knows anything else. I think she gets a great amount of her self-esteem from that. I think that there are few people that can do this kind of work. I think that it's a calling. I know that I'm good around when people are born and when people die.

For some reason, I just know what to do in those situations. Having been called into that a few times, it's something that I feel is a gift, not because I'm such a wonderful human being. I feel a lot of-- What's the word? I feel very useful. It feels important to me. It's like, a lot of things aren't that important, but God, if you could help somebody die, that really matters. A lot of the nurses that I've interviewed have that calling feeling where maybe their mother was in the hospital, and they were like, "Oh, I could do this better than them," and then I literally went into nursing because of that.

Alison Stewart: Yes, I can imagine. My niece is a nurse. There's something special about nurses. I've been in the hospital a lot. My sister's been in the hospital a lot. There's something so extraordinary. The doctor comes in, he's a doctor, and he tells you all he needs to, and then he leaves. Then the nurses not only care for you, but they also look out for you.

Katherine LaNasa: Yes. There's a humility. There's a wisdom. It's incredible. They're incredible

Alison Stewart: In the show, we've moved forward several months. How would you describe Dana's state of mind when she returns?

Katherine LaNasa: I think she is hypervigilant and a little angry.

Alison Stewart: How are we seeing that? What's an example of that? I guess three episodes in, we might have seen it.

Katherine LaNasa: Yes. Have we seen it yet?

Alison Stewart: I don't know.

Katherine LaNasa: I don't know if we've seen it yet. It's coming.

Alison Stewart: It is going to-- Okay. We don't want to give any spoilers.

Katherine LaNasa: You see the hypervigilance where the first thing she's telling Emma is, "What was the acronym? Was it STAMP?"

Alison Stewart: Yes.

Katherine LaNasa: They're in a scare, and-- Those things, that's really a point of focus for her, is that nurses stay safe, and I think she feels betrayed by the system. Not enough is done to keep nurses safe. All the nurses that I've interviewed have been punched, or hit, or kicked. They say it happens all the time.

Alison Stewart: Definitely. There are new characters we see on the scene a little bit. Who are you excited for characters to watch that we are just getting to know?

Katherine LaNasa: Digby, that we see, Charlie. He's there for a bit. He's wonderful. Wow. I really like Ernest, that plays Louie. He's been there for a minute. Let's see, who else do I really like? I really like Nurse Emma. She's a new character that's incredible. I also think Lucas Iverson playing Ogilvie. He's completely obnoxious but wonderfully so. I think Nurse Emma, she was just a recent Juilliard grad. This is her first job.

Alison Stewart: Oh, really?

Katherine LaNasa: Yes. She just crushes it.

Alison Stewart: Oh, that's so interesting.

Katherine LaNasa: Laetitia Holland. Shout out to Laetitia.

Alison Stewart: It's interesting. It's such a variety of age ranges on the set.

Katherine LaNasa: Yes.

Alison Stewart: What do you learn from people who-- This is their first job.

Katherine LaNasa: I have to say, I really feel in my heart just an overflowing towards these kids on the show because they did what they do so beautifully. The Pitt, to your earlier question, it is a success because of all of us, because of all of us working together as one really great unit and figuring out how to make each other's bits better or whatever, helping each other. It's a very generous workplace in that way.

Alison Stewart: It's interesting. When did you realize that it was going to be a success?

Katherine LaNasa: When I saw the first episode with my friends, it was during the fire. The first episode came on during the fires, and we were at a friend's house in Manhattan Beach and watching it on the carpet, and everybody was like, "Wow." Because we had seen a screening of it, but I couldn't make heads or tails of it because I'm in it and everyone just loved it. I just had a good feeling when I saw the first one.

Alison Stewart: My guess is Katherine LaNasa. She plays Nurse Dana on The Pitt. It's on HBO, by the way. You wrote a beautiful piece for women's health about your own cancer, about your cancer survivor, I should say.

Katherine LaNasa: Yes.

Alison Stewart: How did your experience with the medical field inform your character?

Katherine LaNasa: Wow. I think being a patient and being so vulnerable really gave me that perspective. When I'm playing opposite patients in the hospital, I really know now what they feel like. I also really got to see how much a nurse's small action or few words can change everything about how you feel. I had some complications after my cancer, and I needed to go back to the hospital, to the emergency department a couple of times, and then spend a few days, and then go back again. I had gotten through the cancer and the cancer treatment okay, but I was starting to feel like my disease was a zombie, and I wasn't going to be okay ever and, "How did I go from being healthy to this person that just lives at the damn hospital?"

I broke down in the second emergency visit for the first time during the whole thing. This nurse was like, "Listen to me. The first six months after cancer are really bumpy, and it's not going to stay this way. Do you need an Ativan?"

[laughter]

Alison Stewart: Every part of that is right on.

Katherine LaNasa: That mattered so much. I didn't get the Ativan. They came to me later. I had a brain scan. I didn't want to do another type of brain scan or some other type of scan on me that time, and they said, "We see you didn't get your Ativan. Do you feel like you still need it?" I was like, "Yes, I do." They gave me an Ativan. I finally got in a room. I got off the wall just like in the hospital, so I know what it is to be the patient in the hall.

I got into a curtain-off room. I had an Ativan. They gave me some dinner, some hamburger, an ice cream cup or something. I took a IV bag. I took a long nap. I woke up at 1:00 in the morning, and I was like, "Are you sure I'm getting that scan?" They're like, "We think so." Then, I said, "Would you mind checking?" They're like, 'Oh, no. You had dye earlier, so they can't give it to you today. You can go home."

I took an Uber, and I went home, but it's like, "That's comedy, right?" [laughs] I'm barefoot patting around the hospital, like, "Are you sure I'm supposed to be here? Where is everybody? What are you all doing?" I got to see what that was like to be that patient that's just in the ED for a really long time, all of it.

Alison Stewart: We're the same age.

Katherine LaNasa: Okay.

Alison Stewart: If someone is thinking to themselves, "Gosh, I really want to roll in my 50s. I've been at this for a really long time," can you give them a pep talk? What would you tell somebody?

Katherine LaNasa: Gosh, it was interesting. I saw Jeff Hiller talk about-

Alison Stewart: He's great.

Katherine LaNasa: I love him, and I was so happy to see him win and get nominated and everything. He's really special. He said, "It's no guarantee that you keep going and the thing's going to happen." I know for myself, I had an unwavering belief in myself, and I had a rage about the fact that it was so hard. I did. I was like, "Why have I been doing this this long, and I'm just still having to duke it out for every single thing? Why am I now back to doing self-tapes for guest spots on mediocre shows, frankly, just so I can keep my insurance? How has it come to this?"

It was a lot because of COVID, but I was mad about it, but I never stopped believing in myself. I really did. I don't know. I guess just, if you want to do it, if you have to do it, then keep doing it. You have to work hard. You have to work really, really hard.

Alison Stewart: Now you're high on the call sheet.

Katherine LaNasa: I am.

Alison Stewart: You're winning awards at this point in your career. What do you think it means to have this success at this point in your life?

Katherine LaNasa: It's really beautiful. Honestly, anytime someone asks me that question, I almost feel like I'm going to get choked up because I just thought it had passed me by. I thought it wasn't for me. I thought, for whatever reason, it doesn't matter really how good I am or how hard I work. I didn't, not in a negative, feel sorry for my way. That is just not my path. I have a beautiful life. I have a beautiful daughter. I'm just not one of them. Then, all of a sudden, it was like, "Hey, you want to come to this party? We like what you do."

Alison Stewart: "Hey, I'm what I am."

[laughter]

Katherine LaNasa: Literally, it was a door open. It was like, "Come over here to all the cash prizes. Would you like Louis Vuitton to dress you?" It just was bananas.

Alison Stewart: What's your favorite thing about it being so good right now? It can be the silliest thing ever.

Katherine LaNasa: Gosh, it has really been the mutual respect of actresses that I love and have often loved for a long time. Jacki Weaver hit me up on Instagram, and Jacki Weaver had been my North Star because she came onto the scene, I think, in her 6Os. No one knew who she was in America, got an Oscar nomination for Silver Linings Playbook, Animal Kingdom, at the same time. She was a powerhouse, couldn't be denied this fully formed actress who'd obviously been doing it for decades. For her to hit me up was such a full-circle moment. I was like, "Are you kidding me? I kept going because of you."

Alison Stewart: My guest has been Katherine LaNasa. You can watch her on The Pitt. She plays Nurse Dana. It was really a pleasure talking to you.

Katherine LaNasa: Oh, thank you so much, Alison.

Alison Stewart: That is All Of It. I'm Alison Stewart. I appreciate you listening, and I appreciate you. I'll meet you back here tomorrow.