The Pitt Season 1, Episode 12 sees the return of a major character as the hospital goes into full crisis mode.
Warning - The rest of this article contains spoilers for The Pitt Season 1, Episode 12.
The last time audiences saw Patrick Ball's Dr. Langdon, Noah Wyle's Dr. Robbie had just basically thrown him out of the ER doors after finding out that he'd been skimming medication from patients.
While that seemed like the potential end of his career, the hospital is thrust into crisis following a mass shooting event. The next thing audiences realize is that Dr. Langdon is there alongside everyone else, working to save lives, no matter the consequences to himself.
The Direct was able to sit down with The Pitt's Patrick Ball to talk about why Dr. Langdon stole that medicine and what's going through his mind as he returns in Episode 12.
Why Does Dr. Langdon Steal the Medicine in The Pitt Episode 10?
"This Is Not an Uncommon Problem for People Who Work In Emergency Medicine."
- The Direct: "Now, episode 10, [the] storyline finally culminates with Langdon, [who] seems like a pretty great doctor, but then now he's going and skimming medicine, and he gets caught, and he's spewing all these reasonings about why he did what he did. But in your own words, I want you to give it to me straight: Why would you say he stole all that medicine?"
Patrick Ball: I think this is not an uncommon problem for people who work in emergency medicine. So, when we're filming, we have med techs who are real-life nurses and doctors [where] that's their day job, and then they'll come and be on set with us to sort of make sure we do all the procedures right and stuff.
Throughout the season, I've had all the med techs and come up to me and be like, this is a real problem. This happens all the time. And you can say, why? Like, I come My parents are both emergency workers. My dad's a lifelong paramedic, and my mom's a lifelong ER nurse. And so I know, to some extent, just the toll that this work can have on somebody.
At one point, my dad held the record for the state of North Carolina for most saves in the field, like people that have lost a heartbeat, and he brought him back, and I think the number was about 90. And so if he had—it didn't dawn on me as a kid, but I think now these days—if he had 90 saves, how many battles did he lose? How many people did he lose? But as a kid, they wouldn't talk about their work to me.
They would come home and they would ask me about baseball, and you know why I was smoking weed in the parking lot. They were just good parents. But that loss, that trauma, it hits the body, and it's there, whether you speak about it, whether you have the ability to sort of digest it and move through it or not, it's there.
And so I think there are quite a few people in this field that self-medicate in one way or another. And this is how Langdon feels like he needs to do it in order to meet the demands of the moment.
- The Direct: "Do you think Dr. Robbie made the right call in that moment, and [on] how he did it, in terms of pushing you out the door, basically?"
Patrick Ball: Yeah. I mean, it's a tough situation, you know? I think he makes this an incredible liability, right, to have a doctor running around taking drugs because, you know, you don't know what that does to his decision-making process. And this is high-stakes poker that we're playing.
Like, if I'm a little bit high, and I make a wrong call, people die. And I think Langdon would say, but I don't make the wrong call, you know, I'm the best guy you've got, and I do what I got to do to do my job.
So, I understand why Robbie does what he does. It's definitely the responsible and legally sound thing to do. But, yeah, I think Langdon feels like he's definitely done enough to earn his spot and earn a little bit of trust.
- The Direct: "How is he feeling about Dr Santos? Because he obviously is going to put two and two together and be like, Oh, she ratted me out."
Patrick Ball: It's a spicy relationship, for sure. I think Santos is great. Santos comes in, and she wants the ball, and that's what you want from [an] emergency medicine doctor. [You want someone who] wants the ball. They want to be on the front lines.
Now, her appetite and her ambition kind of outreach her experience and her ability. And I think that really rubs Langdon the wrong way, but I think it probably rubs him the wrong way because she's probably coming into that hospital, very similar to the way Langdon came into that hospital. And so I think there's probably a little bit of reflection there.
And so yeah, It's fun. And Isa [Briones], who plays Santos, is amazing, and she's really fun to play with. So that's a blessing.
- The Direct: "What do you think was Langdon's first stop after he left that hospital ER after being pushed out the door? Do you think he even even left the premises?"
Patrick Ball: No, no, I don't think he went anywhere. Well, he's, you gotta think about it. I've got a wife and kids at home. As soon as I go home, I'm gonna have to explain to my wife what happened. And I don't think I'm particularly excited and eager to jump into that conversation. And so what I do whenever I'm released. I guess that's up for the audience to imagine, but I don't think I wander far.
What Is Dr. Langdon Thinking When He Returns in The Pitt Episode 12?
"I Give Us the Best Shot to Win."
- The Direct: "Episode 12 sees the hospital kind of go into crisis mode, and Langdon does make a surprise return. And this might seem like an obvious answer, but in your own words, can you explain why Langdon made that choice to come back, no matter the consequences, and what he might expect Robbie's reaction to be the moment he walks in that door?"
Patrick Ball: Sort of the same thing I was saying about Santos. What you want from a doctor is somebody who wants the ball, and Langdon wants the ball. It's like Kobe Bryant when the game's on the line. I give us the best shot to win. We got a major catastrophe here. A lot of people are in critical condition. A lot of people are going to die. And I know that I give them as good of a shot as anybody. Drugs or no drugs, I know that I'm the man for the moment. And so, I think I come in, and I do the thing that I dedicated my life to do, which is saving lives.
- The Direct: "Do you think Langdon still thinks he has a shot at keeping his job? Or does he think that might be over, but it doesn't matter because this situation is more important?"
Patrick Ball: Yeah, exactly. I think as far as, like, what happens long term, whether Robbie, what Robbie does, as far as letting me stay or not stay, or how he's going to react to me showing back up, I think there's a lot of unanswered questions there, and it's definitely, definitely a huge scary thing for me.
But as we see, like with all the characters, you know, Collins goes through a miscarriage, and then another patient walks through the door, and she attends to that because that is what needs to happen now, regardless of what's happening with her. And I think it's the same thing with Langdon.
I got a lot going on with me, but right now the most important thing is putting out the fire. And so we'll deal with the repercussions of my choices long term. We'll deal with that down the line, but right now, we just got to save the lives in front of us.
- The Direct: "We talked about your rocky relationship with Santos, but after everything happens, and now we're in crisis mode, and everyone's lives are definitely more important, would you say he's approaching every interaction with her differently now just to try to make sure he's as cool and not stepping on toes as he can, just so everyone can focus, including her and you?"
Patrick Ball: Yeah, I think it's interesting, and I think we have a lot more story to tell there.
- The Direct: "Oh, I [sense] more confrontations brewing, I think, is what I hear."
Patrick Ball: It's just really interesting because now the thing is naked, right? Like the conflict has been addressed. Which we've all, regardless of whether you work in a hospital, you're working in an office, or you work in a restaurant, you know, like, we all have that co-worker where we tiptoe around each other and we sniff each other out for a while, but then something happens, and a conflict comes out in the open, and then you got to keep working together. And that is a really interesting problem for us to have. So, yeah, I think there's a lot more story to be mined there.
The Pitt Is One Of Patrick Ball's First Big TV Credits—Where Has He Been This Whole Time?
"I Kind of Still Feel Like Somebody Made Mistake Somewhere."
- The Direct: "You are fantastic on this show. And when I was looking on your IMDB, you know, this is, like, basically, you're only, like, big, big credit. And I was like, what gives? That's great. What led you to this show?"
Patrick Ball: Yeah man, it's nuts, it's the Hollywood classic. You know, I graduated from drama school, like two years ago. I've been doing theater for about the last 10 years, sort of all across the country, but yeah, when it comes to sort of film and TV, I had done one episode of 'Law and Order' and then this, which has been just like an actual miracle. So, yeah. I mean, I don't know how I got here, but I kind of still feel like somebody made mistakes somewhere.
The Pitt is now streaming on Max.
