Perhaps the most popular television genre is the medical drama. St. Elsewhere, ER, Chicago Hope, Grey’s Anatomy, Private Practice are all examples of formats that worked. When I initially heard about TNT developing a series based on a book by Dr. Sanjay Gupta by the same name, I initially thought that the television landscape might be too saturated with shows in the same vein and that audiences might be reluctant to accept it. After screening tonight’s premiere, however, I can tell you that while it may be a medical drama, it is unlike anything I have seen before.
The show really does put the ‘medical’ into ‘medical drama.’ The premise of the show might resonate with other hospital-based shows that we have seen, simply because it is about doctors treating patients, but what is resoundingly different is the way that executive producer David E. Kelley treats it. If you’re looking for sappy love stories, this isn’t the show for you. This series is about the diagnoses that the surgeons deliver. It pulls back the curtain on what happens after a patient is discharged, obviously drawing on Gupta’s medical history. The show is titled Monday Mornings because of the “Mortality and Morbidity” inter-hospital Monday meetings that take place where the doctors have to explain why they chose the course of actions that they did.
On January 31, I had the chance to catch up with Jennifer Finnigan from the show at 299 Queen St. W, and we discussed how Monday Mornings will inevitably draw comparisons to other medical shows, her character (Tina Ridgeway) and just what Ving Rhames is doing on this type of series.
Check it out!
Monday Mornings premieres tonight on Bravo at 10 p.m.
