ST. DENIS MEDICAL Season 2 Key Art | ©2025 NBC

NBC’s comedy series ST. DENIS MEDICAL has its second-season finale on Monday, April 6. Fans need not fear: ST. DENIS MEDICAL has been picked up for a third season, and the first two are available for streaming in their entirety on Peacock.

Created by Eric Ledgin & Justin Spitzer, ST. DENIS MEDICAL is a mockumentary that follows the overworked but mostly dedicated staff of the underfunded title hospital.

Allison Tolman stars as warmhearted nurse Alex, whose dedication to her patients often conflicts with her family commitments. (Other stars include David Alan Grier as seen-it-all chief of surgery Ron and Wendy McClendon-Covey as ambitious hospital administrator Joyce.)

Originally from Sugar Land, Texas, Tolman had the lead in the short-lived 2017 sitcom DOWNWARD DOG. However, prior to ST. DENIS MEDICAL, she was primarily for bringing a leavening but still serious tone to dramatic fare. This includes her Emmy-nominated performance as a small-town sheriff in the first season of FARGO and a small-town police chief in the science-fiction series EMERGENCE, as well as the late real-life journalist Winnie McLendon in the miniseries GASLIT.

Tolman participates in a Q&A session for ST. DENIS MEDICAL arranged by NBC for the Television Critics Association (TCA). Later, she makes time for a one-on-one follow-up conversation. This interview combines that discussion with comments from the panel.

After so much drama, was Tolman actively looking for something different at the time she got ST. DENIS MEDICAL?

“I wasn’t, really. It just kind of fell into my lap. Certainly, I’m as surprised as anyone to find myself on a network sitcom. I think, years ago, I would have said network sitcoms were probably dead. But I think they’ve been revived in recent years, and we’re riding that wave. But I wouldn’t have seen myself on a network sitcom, or even really back on a network. I was trying to head more towards streaming and HBO, where everybody wants to go do dramas.”

What made Tolman gravitate towards half-hour humor was bonding with her mother over TV comedy during a period of time that also gave her insight into nursing and hospital operations.

“Just before I took this role, my father was very ill. He’s okay now, [but] I went home to Texas for several months to be with my parents while he was sick, so I was really entrenched in the hospital and in the healthcare system for the first time in my life. My mother would come home from being in the hospital at night, and all she could handle was watching a half-hour comedy. That’s all that was palatable to her, and so we watched a lot of sitcoms together.

Allison Tolman in ST DENIS MEDICAL – Season 2 | ©2026 NBC

“When I got this script, it felt like kismet. It felt like, this is exactly the show I was supposed to be doing. I really felt like it’s an homage to that time with my mom, was a perfect little half-hour comedy.”

Tolman especially enjoys the mockumentary format. “I always know that I can comment on [scenes] to the camera. So, it’s just part of how I work now. It’s such a treat, because we get to acknowledge the cameras in every scene. It’s so much fun.”

Getting to talk directly into camera is an aspect of ST. DENIS MEDICAL Tolman loves “so much. Every Monday, I have to remind myself that we get to do that. Because [on most shows] you never look down the camera. If you look down the camera, you’ve blown the take.”

That said, having the characters know they are being videotaped is “a hard line to walk, because they have to be aware of the camera, but they’re also doing things they probably wouldn’t do with a camera there. So, it’s a delicate tightrope walk.”

On the other hand, Tolman tries to avoid being aware of the camera, at least in terms of her own appearance. “If you think about how you’re going to look on camera later, you’ll lose your mind. I can’t think about it.”

Playing a skilled nurse has been an educational experience, Tolman relates. “Every week, I have to learn something new. We have two med techs, Jamie [Watkins] and Rachel [Daigh], who are nurses, with us every single day. They teach us how to do medical procedures, they teach us how to pronounce things correctly, they teach us what the proper protocol is. We wouldn’t be able to do it without them. They keep us honest.”

The tension between hilarity and mortality is something Tolman appreciates about ST. DENIS MEDICAL. “The fun of it is, we get to play these folks who are reattaching arms, but then also just have to eat, like, it’s lunchtime. Also, I need some coffee, because I was up all night with the baby or whatever. I find something really charming about the mundane in the most extreme circumstances.

“Everyone who is visiting the hospital is in extreme circumstances, but as extreme as they are, they’re not extreme for us. It’s just another day, and someone has a day off, and it’s somebody’s birthday. For me, every episode has a moment where that sincerity and that heartfelt core shine through. I think we’re really lucky in that way.”

Allison Tolman as Jo Evans in EMERGENCE – Season 1 | ©2019 ABC/Frank Ockenfels

Tolman reports that her enjoyment with work is less about the tone or genre of the project than about her colleagues. “I think that I have as much fun shooting a comedy as shooting a drama. For me, it has to do with the people that you’re with, not necessarily the material that you’re doing. It’s certainly fun to do a comedy, because you’re cracking up more between takes about what’s happening on camera. But you can keep things light while you’re shooting a drama as well. It just depends on the tone of the set.”

FARGO and GASLIT had definite conclusions, but EMERGENCE was designed to be ongoing. Is Tolman sorry it only got one season?

“I was. I loved that cast, I loved that show, but we lost that show during the pandemic, and the whole world changed. So, it seems silly to miss something that is from sort of a former iteration of society, you know what I mean?”

Tolman has been experimenting with another aspect of the business. “I’ve been writing a little bit. I can’t say anything about what I’ve been writing yet, because nothing’s done yet,” she laughs,”but hopefully, you’ll be able to see my name as a hyphenate in the future.”

And what would Tolman most like people to know about ST. DENIS MEDICAL?

“That it’s a beautiful balance of funny and heartwarming, and they should tune in for a few episodes and see if they love it.”

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Article:  Exclusive Interview: Actress Allison Tolman on Season 2 of the NBC comedy series

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