In the story of Dr. Death, a key figure is the man who did what he could to try to stop the evil and/or incompetent Dr. Christopher Duntsch (Joshua Jackson) from continuing to hurt his patients. While Josh Baker (Hubert Point du Jour), a nurse working in Duntsch's operating room, didn't have the authority he needed to step up and stop the man at the time, he was able to assist the team which eventually put Duntsch behind bars.
Hubert Point-Du Jour, whose other credits include The Public Theatre's critically acclaimed production of Much Ado About Nothing and The Good Lord Bird, explained to Collider in a one-on-one interview how he approached his role in the Peacock limited series, based on the true-crime podcast produced by Wondery, including the research he did and what went into calibrating his performance.
Collider: When you took on the project, what was your initial reaction to it?
HUBERT POINT-DU JOUR: Goodness, I was shocked. I was shocked and so, so curious as to how it ended. And so I couldn't stop listening to the podcast and referring to the podcast after I got the role. That was the first thing that I did as research, and I couldn't stop listening to it. So I would say I was most definitely shocked that such a thing actually happened. Yeah.
As your character is based on a real person, did you get a chance to do the kind of research where you talked to him?
POINT-DU JOUR: It was helpful to hear him in the podcast, but I didn't get to do that kind of research. So I didn't have that, but Patrick [Macmanus] just did a good job writing the character. He answered a lot of questions for me in the script, and then I was off to do lots of other work related to Josh Baker, as far as what an OR nurse does, and that work was really fun.
What I find so fascinating about your character is that it's so clear what issues he's dealing with, in terms of, "There's something clearly wrong with this doctor, and I have no power in this situation to really do anything about it." In doing your research, what was key for you in terms of unlocking how to play that?
POINT-DU JOUR: I had to get in touch with that part of myself that is really, really disturbed when I hear of horrible things happening to people, like when I read the news. Really, every day I read something, and there's something that really bothers me, but I can't do anything about it. For Josh Baker, he's in the middle of this. He's actually observing these surgeries. He's seeing Christopher Duntsch's behavior before surgeries, after surgeries, and he says something. And so I just found that so compelling. I admire that about him as a character. So that was part of the fun for me in playing him.
As you were playing those scenes, did you feel that same weight of trying to challenge authority knowing that you may not be able to do anything?
POINT-DU JOUR: Yeah. I mean, I did. And actually, there were certain scenes, the surgery scenes... This particular episode that I'm thinking of, the director, Maggie Kylie, worked on it with me — I'll say that my initial instincts for the interactions I had with Duntsch as he's operating and I'm trying to speak up, my initial instincts were a little more, I don't want to say aggressive, but there was a part of me that wanted to be like, "Stop. Stop it." So I was a little more firm with him, and that actually wasn't right for the dynamic. Because Maggie is such a great director, she was able to help me temper that and help the dynamic of that scene play much better. So I actually had to underplay it a little bit because I had to always remember that status, and my status is much lower than his, and so I couldn't be bigger than him in the scene. Maggie really, really helped me hone in on the approach in some of the scenes.
To wrap things up, how did making the show change your relationship to going to the doctor?
POINT-DU JOUR: It's made me ask more questions, and I think that's probably the biggest thing. It just makes me ask a lot more questions and really do a little more research into who this person is. I haven't had to have any surgeries, but it's made me look into the doctor a little more. Yeah.
Dr. Death is streaming now on Peacock.