Who is Patrick Ball, the Actor Behind Hunky Dr. Langdon on MAX’s ‘The Pitt’?
MAX‘s new medical drama The Pitt isn’t a reboot of ER, despite the fact that both shows star Noah Wyle, are executive produced by John Wells, take place in an overtaxed city emergency room, and feature a dashing ER doc sensitively administering care to a pediatric patient. The Pitt is not ER, okay? And neither is actor Patrick Ball‘s Dr. Frank Langdon the second coming of George Clooney‘s Doug Ross. However, after watching the first two episodes of The Pitt, which debuted last night on MAX, you might find yourself harboring a tiny bit of a crush on the dashing Dr. Langdon (and actor Patrick Ball) nonetheless.
The Pitt is a brand new medical procedural created by R. Scott Gemmill and executive produced by Gemmill and the aforementioned Wells and Wyle. The first season takes place over fifteen concurrent hour-long episodes which come together to tackle one single fifteen-hour-long shift in Pittsburgh Trauma Medical Hospital’s emergency room. Noah Wyle plays chief attendant physician Dr. Michael “Robby” Robinavitch, a talented doctor and teacher who has to navigate his own grief and trauma while juggling the incessant stream of heartbreaking cases to file into his ER. Helping him during this particular shift are Drs. Collins (Tracey Ifeachor), McKay (Fiona Dourif), Mohan (Supriya Ganesh), and Langdon.
In just the first two episodes of The Pitt, we learn that Dr. Langdon has impulsively bought his young family a dog, much to head nurse Dana Evans’s (Katherine LaNasa) chagrin. (She pointedly razzes the young doctor for gifting his wife yet another chore she’ll have to tackle.) Langdon also asserts that he sees Dr. Robby as more than a colleague, but a friend. Elsewhere, he seems to take the awkward new intern Dr. Melissa “Mel” King (Taylor Dearden) under his wing, cracking jokes about a scurvy patient, while butting heads with the cocky Dr. Trinity Santos (Isa Briones).
While Langdon offers a helping hand during the most intense cases in the first two episodes of The Pitt, his big case deals with a comatose child. It’s unclear why the otherwise healthy little boy won’t wake up, but then Dr. Langdon discovers a gummy lodged in the child’s throat. The kid got into some weed gummies gifted to his dad, sparking a massive fight between his parents. Langdon ironically earns bonus empathy points, when he acknowledges his own cynicism in telling Mel nothing will happen to the family because they’re white.
If you found yourself liking Dr. Langdon this early on in The Pitt, that’s probably the point. All the doctors are likable, if not intriguing, in their own relatable ways. If you also found yourself wondering who actor Patrick Ball is, that’s likely because he’s hitherto been mostly a stage actor. A mutual actor friend told me that he was “really wonderful” and “quite excellent” in a St. Louis Repertory production of All My Sons they saw years ago. The Yale Drama School-educated Ball has only one other IMDB credit to his name: a guest turn on Law & Order. You can follow him on Instagram @patrickball_.
Will Patrick Ball’s Dr. Langdon continue to charm as the season goes on? You’ll have to tune into new episodes of The Pitt when they premiere on Thursdays at 9 PM on MAX to find out.
