St. Denis Medical airs Tuesdays on NBC and follows "an eclectic team of underfunded yet dedicated doctors, nurses and hospital staff, who want nothing more than to turn the hospital into an international medical destination." However, among the enthusiastic bunch are also characters like David Alan Grier's Dr. Ron, a seasoned surgeon who's seen it all and is over it all. In addition to Grier, the main cast includes Allison Tolman, Kaliko Kauahi, Josh Lawson, Mekki Leeper, Kahyun Kim, and Wendi McLendon-Covey.

Eric Ledgin and Justin Spitzer co-created the sitcom after working together on series such as Superstore and America Auto. St. Denis Medical serves as Ledgin's showrunning debut, and he was inspired to draw from some of his own experiences. The co-creator chose the hospital setting due to the wide range of scenarios it allows for, sharing that, while emergency rooms are scary places, they are also home to some of the most tension-breaking moments.

ScreenRant interviews Ledgin about playing with the hospital's hierarchy in St. Denis Medical, Alex and Joyce's work dynamic, creating Josh Lawson's character, and what he learned from Amy and Jonah's romance in Superstore.

St. Denis Medical Showcases The Juxtaposition Between Hospital Staff And Patients

"There seemed to be a lot of tension there that I thought would be interesting to see in a show."

You've worked on shows like Superstore and American Auto, so what inspired St. Denis Medical's hospital setting?

Eric Ledgin: This is the first show that I am running. It's the first show I've gotten on the air from an original idea that I had. I really was forced to dig in and think about what kind of show I would want to watch, and what I would really feel I had a lot to write about. My personal experience of hospitals has been very unexpected. They're scary places, but they are also places where you have some of the most tension-breaking funniest moments.

If you're at a dinner party, and you tell a story about the time you went to the ER, everybody's kind of got one. Some of them are darker and some of them are crazier and some of them are funnier, but everybody has these core memories that take place in this pretty small space within a hospital, specifically the emergency room. So I just started thinking about the workplace element of that. In a way, all workplaces are the same.

There are people stuck with a bunch of people they wouldn't have chosen to be with necessarily, but you're stuck together with a common goal and every job becomes a job. You're punching the clock eventually. So the juxtaposition between those people who are just trying to get through the workday and do their jobs well, and people who are having one of the most important days of their life, the patients—there seemed to be a lot of tension there that I thought would be interesting to see in a show.

That actually touches on another question that I had for you. In a series that focuses on nurses and doctors, how did you want to play into the comedic aspects of dealing with patients while still showing they care about the people they’re looking after?

Eric Ledgin: Yeah, totally. For me, I had one experience, this was many years ago, I was dating someone who had breast cancer, and we had to go to the hospital a lot for different kinds of treatments and procedures. My girlfriend at the time was needle-phobic. She had a really hard time getting through it, and she was coping with that in different ways. And sometimes she'd get a nurse who would just look at her and go, "All right, I got a handful here," and it would just make us both laugh.

Having someone who just knew how to lighten the room and the mood made such a huge difference in the experience of being there. I think there are a lot of nurses that, when you talk to them, they're funny. They have this sort of inappropriate sometimes sense of humor. They're very good at calibrating when to let it loose and when to not let it loose. It not only makes the experience of working in this kind of place bearable for them, but I think it also makes it more fun for the patients.

So one aspect of the comedy that I really wanted to explore was just these nurses and doctors being funny, not just funny at their expense, but them actually being funny. But beyond that, there are so many workplace dynamics to play with in of just hierarchy, and what are the resentments between doctors and nurses? What are the things that make them really get to each other? What are the bonds that form and what are the clicks that form? And what are all the typical workplace dynamics that are funny set against the backdrop of this very high-stakes place?

Joyce And Alex Demonstrate Their Care For St. Denis Medical In Different Ways

"There's something interesting about two people who, ultimately, both want the same thing from a big-picture standpoint."

Jumping into those dynamics, I already love Joyce and Alex. How did you want those two characters to play off of each other? What kind of relationship are you building?

Eric Ledgin: That's a really good question. I really love and am lucky and grateful for the chemistry between those two actors. Justin Spitzer, who co-created the show, and I talk about this a lot. One of the challenges of a hospital is that you can't and don't want to show anyone that just flat-out sucks at this or they have a bad attitude. That's not what you want to see because that's not what you want to believe people are in a hospital, and I think for the most part, that's not what they're like.

But for our characters that we want people to fall in love with, there's something interesting about two people who, ultimately, both want the same thing from a big-picture standpoint. They want to give good care to their patients, they want the hospital to succeed, but what they're focused on is so different. Alex is a nurse who's very focused on just the moment-to-moment experience of the patients and also the other nurses that she's kind of like the nurse mom to in a way and has to look out for.

Whereas Joyce is sort of taking this 10,000 foot view of everything and wants a new tower and all kinds of new machinery, and someone does have to have that vision. I don't see Joyce as a villain at all, but I think that that's sort of the push and pull is like, "Well, where do we want to be in 10 years?" is what one person's asking, but the other person's asking, "Where are we going to be in 10 minutes if we don't get a handle on this?"

The moment Matt walked in and became a fish out of water character on his first day, I had to wonder if he was Jonah Simms inspired.

Eric Ledgin: That's really funny. He's such a different character in of his background. I loved writing for Jonah, because there was a part of me that felt very Jonah-like, in of trying to curate the perfect sandwich or whatever, but Matt, and specifically Mekki Leeper, brought something that is just so wide-eyed, and so "I just want to be a part of this!"

He's a try-hard in a way that I really enjoy writing to. I think the biggest thing that they have in common is just that they're fish out of water. They're starting out fresh in an environment they don't totally fit in. But I think that's also just often a good way to give viewers a window into a new workplace. Have someone who's also there for the first time so that you're kind of seeing it through their eyes.

St. Denis Medical May Tease Out Matt's Crush On Serena

"That seemed like a fun thing to play and be able to work into a slow burn."

Was there anything you and Spitzer learned from the success and fan response of Amy and Jonah's romance in Superstore that you wanted to bring to St. Denis Medical?

Eric Ledgin: I would say that if there was anything for me, it was that I didn't really want to lead with a will they/won't they at the center of the show unless it organically seemed like that [was the way to go]. You develop the characters, and you figure out what their background is going to be, and their dynamics with each other. And if something emerges, then great, run in that direction.

Back to your question about Joyce and Alex, they have such a great dynamic because Joyce is kind of cold and unnurturing, and Alex is the mom to everyone, including her own children, who she loves and is a great mom to, so they have a fun dynamic that way. Whereas, in of a will they/won't they, there wasn't one that was naturally emerging, and I didn't want to force it.

So what we landed on was—it did seem interesting to have a will I/won't I, which is what I call Matt's crush, because currently, at least in the beginning of the season, Serena's completely unaware of it. And that seemed like a fun thing to play and be able to work into a slow burn. Especially as you meet them, it doesn't seem like these two are a great match. And so I kind of liked the setup of that. It allows us to choose to go whichever way the story wants to naturally go and have it be surprising along the way, I hope.

Bruce is especially funny to me because he has all these different sides to him. Were you building a character specifically for Josh Lawson, or did he just end up being the perfect fit?

Eric Ledgin: No, I wish I could say that we had it in mind the whole time, but no. I think, for me, a sort of cocky, unselfaware character is probably the most fun character for me to write, and I know Spitzer really enjoys that kind of character as well. It was just a joy to think about and develop and write this character. And then to see Josh do it, it was like he had completely inhabited the role already and was ready to go.

And it just was like, "This has to happen." It was such an obvious match that I just knew he was going to knock it out of the park. I am like Bruce-obsessed. I'm obsessed with Josh Lawson's Bruce. I tell him all the time that however much I love the character, he has made it his own and just taken it to the next level. He cracks me up.

Ledgin Is Looking Forward To St. Denis Medical's Holiday Episode

"I think and hope we landed it in a place that feels warm for people while still being funny."

There are new patients every episode, which sounds like the perfect opportunity to bring in all different kinds of guest stars. Did you have anyone from previous shows in mind?

Eric Ledgin: Yeah. So one thing that was really fun about this season was I got to work with one of my oldest friends, Stephen Schneider, who was on Broad City and has started in several shows since then. He plays Chaplain Steve, and he's just one of the funniest people I know, so it was fun to really see him bring his comedy chops to the show. Erinn Hayes, who's a really gifted comedic actress, did a couple of episodes.

David Paymer, who is a very old-school character actor that I grew up watching in Crazy People and City Slickers and Mr. Saturday Night, he's this fantastic actor who came and did our holiday episode, which I'm very excited about and proud of. Steve Little, who played one of my favorite sitcom characters of all time in Eastbound & Down—he's in for a couple of episodes playing a really fun role, so there's definitely a mix of a lot of fun people that we got to hang out with.

You wrapped season 1, so which episode are you most excited to air?

Eric Ledgin: I would say the Christmas episode is very near and dear to my heart because there's one story that involves something that I, unfortunately, found out in my research is quite a common reason for men to come into a hospital, which I'll leave at that. It feels right for a holiday episode in a hospital because it's both the darkness and the joy of the holidays, and I think and hope we landed it in a place that feels warm for people while still being funny.

There's also an episode called Listen to Your Ladybugs, that involves a new program that Joyce has initiated to get women to get their mammograms, and get their breast exams. This idea for this program sort of came from the writers' room, and we were like, this is actually a very good idea for a hospital to do, and I'm sure some of them do stuff like this.

It's a very funny episode, and it involves a storyline that happened to me during the season, a version of it, which is that, weirdly enough, I got this staph infection a couple of weeks after my baby was born, my third kid, and I ended up having to go to the hospital, and I was itted for three days. At the time I was just distraught. I was like, "I have this young baby at home, and my show is going, and I'm on my laptop in the bed at the hospital." But in the end, I got a story out of it that I felt really worked, and it was very cathartic to watch it.

And I almost started crying on set watching it being shot, so that one is very near and dear. I should also mention, just to be greedy and add a third, there's an episode called "50 CC's of Kindness" that has Guillermo Díaz in it, and this younger actor named James Earl, who I love, who play these two prisoners that are rushed in from a nearby prison with stab wounds. And that was directed by Christine Gernon, who directed my first episode of Superstore, which was not only a really fun reunion, but the episode just came out so funny, and I just love watching it.

More About NBC's St. Denis Medical

Created by Eric Ledgin and Justin Spitzer

Devoted nurse Alex has just been promoted to Supervising Nurse in the emergency department at St. Denis Medical Center in Oregon. She works alongside an eclectic team of underfunded yet dedicated doctors, nurses and hospital staff, including her boss, Joyce, who wants nothing more than to turn the hospital into an international medical destination, and Dr. Ron, who's done it all, seen it all and is pretty much over it all. They're all doing their best not to lose their patience in a hospital overrun with patients -- while caring for everyone who comes in the door, including each other.

Check out our other St. Denis Medical interviews here:

• Justin Spitzer & Eric Ledgin
• Allison Tolman
• Josh Lawson & Kaliko Kauahi
• Kahyun Kim & Mekki Leeper

St. Denis Medical airs Tuesdays on NBC and is available to stream next-day on Peacock.