Noah Wyle on honoring the Muslim community after a Tree of Life attack
SPOILER ALERT: This story contains spoilers from “9:00 am,” episode 3, season 2 of “The Pitt,” now streaming on HBO Max.
When storyline conversations for Season 2 of “The Pitt” began, star and executive producer Noah Wyle and executive producers R. Scott Gemmill and John Wells knew they wanted to honor Pittsburgh’s Jewish and Muslim communities, nearly eight years after the October 2018 terrorist attack on the Tree of Life Synagogue that killed 11 people and injured six.
During the third episode, “9:00 AM,” Dr. Robinavitch van Wyle treating a Jewish patient (played by Irina Dubova) who burned herself after being startled by fireworks. She later admits that she has PTSD from the gunshots she heard at the synagogue during the mass shooting.
“Because it was such an important event in the city of Pittsburgh, it seemed like a great opportunity,” says Wyle, who also wrote the episode. “When I started researching it, the aspects of it that moved me most were the community outrage afterwards from the Muslim community and the solidarity with Pittsburgh’s Jewish community coming together to grieve and mourn the loss. It was the most under-examined aspect of the story, and perhaps the most hopeful prospect.”
The patient, Yana, goes out of her way to point out that it was the Muslim community that funded the funerals of those killed in the hate crime, and thanks nurse Perlah Alawi (Amielynn Abellera).
“You can’t do a medical show set in Pittsburgh with a Jewish doctor and not say something about it,” Gemmill adds. “It felt like a really important story to tell. There are important elements of it that haven’t been told yet, or haven’t really made the news cycle. The fact that the Muslim community came together and paid for all the funerals, that’s the kind of information that needed to get out. We wanted to tell that part of the story and discuss the story itself.”
Wyle notes that Robby’s “lack of confidence and desire to maybe have some confidence” was touched upon during Season 1 – and was a thread they wanted to explore further and something he wanted to delve into further.
“We don’t talk about Robby’s parents at all, but we do mention that he was raised by his grandparents. And Yana is a grandmother, so she’s a very familiar energy to Robby,” says Wyle. “Through their interaction you see a level of relaxation and familiarity that you rarely see him share with anyone else, because there is such a cultural affinity, sense of humor, sarcasm and cynicism. All of that is shared and because he is on guard, when she pokes holes in his journey and wonders if this is a midlife crisis or a cry for help, it is the first in a series of earthquakes he experiences that begin to make him question his resolve.”
