Having to visit the emergency room is no laughing matter — it frequently means a life-or-death situation. But sometimes it’s just fate reminding you to be less clumsy.
Because the cast of The Good Doctor spends their work days recreating life in the emergency room, we asked them if they had any stories that fell into the goofy category.
What is the dumbest reason you’ve ever gone to the hospital?
Chuku Modu: Where I’m from, everyone’s pretty hard. You know, we’re English. We’re hard as nails. You don’t go unless you’re dying. Dumbest reason? I was boxing with my stepdad. Sparring, which is like you’re fighting, but you’re taking it easy on each other. He headbutted me by accident, and he cut my eyebrow open. There’s the scar right there. I had to get stitched up, so that’s probably the most — you know, fighting your stepdad…I think it’s just years of angst against us, and he took it out on me.
Tamlyn Tomita: You know what, I’ve never had to go to the hospital except to get my tonsils out. I’m really super lucky. That was when I was seven, was to get my tonsils out. So I’ve never had to go to the hospital. I’ve always had to go to the hospital with other folks, and I’m always the designated driver.
Debbie Day for Rotten Tomatoes: OK, so — what’s the dumbest reason you’ve had to go to the hospital?
Tomita: Probably alcohol poisoning. I think we all go through that when one of our friends [overindulges] … Yeah, they just basically make you throw up. You know, fluids, fluids, fluids.
Nicholas Gonzalez: I think it was when I was a lot younger. I was a kid and one of my friends had stuck a bean up his nose. I think my dad [who is a surgeon] was the one who was there when they did it. But we got to go to the hospital there on base. We were in Fort Huachuca in Arizona at the time.
Hill Harper: The dumbest reason I guess is when I broke my hand. I was playing a pick-up football game. It’s not a very good story, I mean I just broke my hand.
RT: Did it end your football career?
Harper: No, I still play. I still played
Freddie Highmore: There was a little plastic — it’s sort of hard to describe — like a plastic weight with a hole in it, and that became stuck around my finger. It was sort of like — it’s going to be very hard to describe in print without some sort of image — but it was sort of a rectangle, and there were these plastic 10-gram weights, sort of, and you’d like hang them on — they’d sort of go on balance scales at school. And then I just stuck my finger through one of them, and it became stuck and wouldn’t come off. So I think we may have gone to hospital as a way of chopping it off of me. Or maybe we did it at home — I can’t remember.
RT: That’s the best dumb hospital story — you win.
Bonus question: Was there ever a time you should have gone to the hospital, but you didn’t?
Modu: There was a time I dislocated my little finger, moved it directly to one side. I caught a ball and it just went “chrrrrk.” And I guess I didn’t go because instantly I ran my other hand over it and straightened it out, and I was like, “Oh, it’s back to normal again,” as you do when you’re 15 years old — you just go about your day. So, probably should have went then, but I didn’t go.
Tomita: No. I’m really blessed. I’m really, really healthy … No, so yeah, No, no. So my father was a man of good health. My mother is a picture of good health. We are just blessed with good, healthy genes, so I’m kind of scared of the hospital, because it doesn’t mean good things, usually.
Gonzalez: I had a herniated disc for the longest time and didn’t really realize-slash-wanna really deal with it until I had to. You know it was pretty stupid to not go for a long time. I also had a gaping head wound. My brains were seeping out. I didn’t go to the hospital.
[He’s joking — we think.]
Harper: I’ve only been to the hospital twice. No, three times. I went to the hospital when I broke my hand, when I had thyroid cancer. I had surgery on my thyroid. And then, I was there when my son was born. So it’s only three times. Even though my parents were doctors, I don’t like hospitals. I don’t like the way they smell. They’re scary to me. That’s what makes the show so fun. There are ghosts in here.
RT: Ghosts?
Harper: Ghosts.
RT: What kind of ghosts?
Harper: Well you know people die in hospitals.
RT: There are no ghosts here.
Harper: San Jose State Bonaventure has a bunch of ghosts. Season 2 will be all about ghost stories.
RT: The supernatural side of The Good Doctor —
Harper: Kidding.
