BRILLIANT MINDS: Michael Grassi Previews the New Zachary Quinto-Led Medical Drama

On Monday, September 23, NBC debuts its new medical drama BRILLIANT MINDS in the plum post-THE VOICE slot.

The series follows Dr. Wolf (Zachary Quinto), a brilliant neurologist who is struggling with his own complex physical and familial issues, and his team of interns as they collectively try to help patients. (The cast includes Tamberla Perry, Ashleigh LaThrop, Alex MacNicoll, Aury Krebs, Spence Moore II, Teddy Sears, and Donna Murphy.)

Here, showrunner Michael Grassi previews the new series to Give Me My Remote…

The show is inspired by Dr. Oliver Sacks, who was both a physician and an author. How has the writers’ room been incorporating his life or books into the show so far?
I feel so lucky to be making a show that is sort of so steeped and inspired by incredible material and this incredible man. He really is our North Star every step of the way. So whenever we’re in the room and we’re sort of debating something, or what case should we do, we always look to our source material. We always look to Oliver Sacks. Or even how would Dr. Wolf approach this case? It’s [then a question of] how would Oliver Sacks approach this case? So it really is a love letter to him, and the incredible work that he’s done.

How has the character of Dr. Wolf evolved once you knew you had Zachary Quinto playing him and you were able to watch him in this role?
Collaborating with Zach on this show and the character, Dr. Wolf, has been one of the most incredible experiences in my career…What’s nice is that [the show is] inspired by Oliver Sacks, this is not a biographical story. It’s inspired by—we are taking elements of his life and we are setting them in present day. So there’s been this really interesting fusion sort of what Zach brings to the character of Dr. Wolf and the real Oliver Sacks. It’s been one of the most special parts of the process—seeing Zach become Dr. Wolf with this sort of contemporary reimagining of this character. We’ve seen him play so much genre, and even play so many villains; it’s really cool to see him do this. It’s completely different. I can’t wait for audiences to see it.

The series has a very specific visual aesthetic, due in part to how the patients are showcased. How did you land on that?
When we were developing the show one of the things that Lee Toland Krieger and I talked about—he directed the pilot and episode 2—is we were so taken by the idea that Oliver Sacks always stepped into his patients’ shoes and stepped into the world. And he wanted to see the world the way they saw the world so he could really understand them and help them. So in developing the pilot, and the look for the pilot, we wanted to find a way to get the audiences into the hearts, minds, and souls of the patients. Two of the touchstones that we talked about a lot were DIVING BELL AND THE BUTTERFLY, a beautiful movie, and one of my favorites ETERNAL SUNSHINE OF THE SPOTLESS MIND. And those were visual references that we talked about a lot.

And I do think that it’s Wolf’s superpower to sort of see what the patient is feeling. It’s not accurate one-to-one, it’s more about showing the audience what the patient is experiencing.

Wolf is brilliant, but he’s not doing it alone. What can you tease about the team surrounding him?
One of my favorite parts about the show is Dr. Wolf’s relationship with Dr. Carol Pierce [played by Perry]. I love their scenes together. I love their friendship so much; it’s rooted in such history and runs so deep. We’ll be peeling back layers on their friendship throughout the season, as well. And that friendship really is the beating heart of the show. 

Another really important thing, and this is really fun, is that Teddy Sears on the show [as Dr. Josh Nichols]—he sort of rivals Wolf in the hospital. And what’s really fun about Teddy is that [he and Quinto] played husbands on AMERICAN HORROR STORY. So I love them starting out as husbands, and now they’ve come full circle on BRILLIANT MINDS as rivals. So that’ll be a really delicious, fun relationship for audiences to dig into.

Then our interns, who I love so much—we have started talking about mental health in a way that we haven’t before in our culture. We still have a long way to go, but we’re having conversations about it that are really healthy, and we’re bringing it out of the open. And when I think about the interns, I think about them as having these really deep, complex, different points of view on mental health, and I love hearing them spar in scenes and have different opinions and have really urgent conversations. And they’ll also have drama, and we’ll see what it’s like to work as a neuro in an underfunded hospital in the Bronx. It really is a workplace drama.

The show being a high-octane workplace drama is really important for me. There’s something really aspirational about watching this team come together: They’re working day and night and night and day to help patients and their mental health, while at the same time, they’re neglecting their own mental health in little or small ways. 

I think we’re all dealing with our mental health in big and small ways, or we know someone who is struggling. And it’s really important to come to the show and find themselves either in the ensemble, as you mentioned, or in our patients, and know that they’re not alone.

One of the things the show establishes early on is that Dr. Wolf is queer. How much will we be seeing of his romantic life in season 1?
I’m so excited to have a gay lead at the center of a show like this, who’s also a hero and a doctor. We’ve had gay leads on shows before, but not on a big medical drama on NBC, and that’s really exciting. I grew up watching WILL & GRACE, also on NBC, and they have such an incredible legacy of LGBT characters. And if I’m being perfectly honest, I don’t know where I’d be today if I didn’t have WILL & GRACE when I was a kid. This kind of representation is of utmost importance.

In terms of love life for Oliver, I think when we meet him this season, he has a lot of walls up. And he has a lot of emotional baggage. He’s a loner. He is so dedicated to helping his patients, that he’s dedicated to helping his patients live their best life, that he has neglected living his own life in some ways. And I think part of his storyline this season is seeing those walls chip away a little bit and seeing him let people in—potentially some romance as well. But stay tuned.

BRILLIANT MINDS, Series Premiere, Monday, September 23, 10/9c, NBC

RELATED:

• BRILLIANT MINDS Season 1 Cast Photos
• BRILLIANT MINDS: Steve Howey, André De Shields, and Mandy Patinkin to Guest Star
• BRILLIANT MINDS on NBC – First Look
• NBC Sets Fall 2024 Schedule
• NBC Orders DR. WOLF to Series

Follow @GiveMeMyRemote and @marisaroffman on Twitter for the latest TV news. Connect with other TV fans on GIVE ME MY REMOTE’s official Facebook page or our Instagram.

And be the first to see our exclusive videos by subscribing to our YouTube channel.

As an Amazon Associate we earn from qualifying purchases made through links/ads placed on the site.