Like 'The Office' and 'Superstore,' 'St. Denis Medical' mines the workplace for laughs

The workplace mockumentary is a TV genre that has helped many of us cope with full-time employment. The therapeutic value of watching old episodes of "The Office," "Superstore" or "American Auto" (all from NBC) is roughly equal to one intensive neck massage, two glasses of white wine, a 30-minute walk or 548 corporate training sessions on tolerance for that cubicle neighbor who chews too loudly.

Besides the laughter part, the key to these kinds of comedies is empathy. The formula typified by "The Office" (the U.S. version, not the more acerbic British original) acknowledges that being inside a confined space with the same people five days a week is akin to being stranded on a desert island with them. But instead of going all "Lord of the Flies" on one another, the characters who sell paper for Dunder-Mifflin (and keep the big-box retailer Cloud Nine stocked on "Superstore" and run the corporate side of a fictional Detroit car company on "American Auto") ultimately reveal their humanity. They are flawed without being awful people. In a pinch, they can access best selves and help one another, no matter how many petty grievances they've accumulated along the way.

It's an optimistic reflection of real life, given how successful that hate, greed and indifference have been throughout the history of mankind. And after a stress-inducing 2024 election, a workplace mockumentary could be just what's needed. Thanks to executive producers Eric Ledgin (a writer on "Superstore" and "American Office") and Justin Spitzer (creator of both those shows and a writer-producer for "The Office"), "St. Denis Medical," which premieres Tuesday on NBC, is a series that finds humor in the irritating things about other people and yet delivers a strong dose of hope.

Set at an Oregon "safety net" hospital that cares for all patients despite their insurance and financial status, "St. Denis Medical" is populated by archetypes that will be familiar to fans of Ledgin's and Spitzer's work.

There is s a somewhat clueless but ultimately decent, boss, here an ambitious executive director named Joyce (played by the great Wendi McLendon-Covey) who tries to convince the film crew embedded in St. Denis that "the most infectious thing in a hospital is a smile." As with Steve Carell's Michael Scott from "The Office," what Wendi lacks in self-awareness, she makes up for with the heart that lies hidden underneath all that forced enthusiasm and fake camaraderie.

Thanks to McLendon-Covey's inherent gift for never veering into obnoxiousness, Joyce can be both a nightmare of a supervisor and a caring human being. That knack is displayed to hilarious effect in the episode two scene where Joyce plays "Lean on Me" on the marimba to honor a departed friend (before she veers into her own composition, "Smitten with Kittens").

The elder statesman is Detroit's own David Alan Grier as Dr. Ron, whose decades in medicine have left him devoid of patience for bureaucracy. In the premiere episode, as Joyce leads the film crew around the hospital, she asks Dr. Ron to explain what he's doing at the moment. He replies: "Well, I just examined a patient with a heart murmur. That took about two minutes. Now I'm going to spend 40 minutes filling out electronic health records. That's a party!"

Grier expertly reveals both the character's underlying commitment and vanity. (He is truly shocked when a twentysomething female patient who he thinks is flirting with him wants to set him up with her grandmother.) Like many veterans of skilled labor, Ron has the most to offer and the best grasp on reality, even though he probably is one budget cut away from a buyout.

The moral center of the show is Alex, who is played with anxious grace by Allison Tolman (FX's "Fargo," ABC's late, lamented "Downward Dog"). An actor who is peerless at playing the sort of relatable women that Hollywood prefers to exclude from the screen, Tolman by now should be a national treasure. Here, she is a recently promoted supervising nurse, a role that brings a small pay raise and a huge increase in responsibilities. Alex is a control freak and a workaholic whose inability to step back and let someone else take over is a blessing to everyone else's lives, especially those of the patients.

Like Jenna Fischer's Pam in "The Office" and America Ferrera's "Amy" in "Superstore," Alex is a working-class hero, but she's no pushover. She knows that she is lying to herself when she insists in the first episode that she will leave her shift in time to see her daughter perform in the school musical, "Mamma Mia!" And when she sees someone collapse in the parking lot on her way to the performance, she knows that being there was a pipe dream. Without the Alexes of the world, how would the rest of us survive? The show is lucky to have Tolman revealing with every fiber of her being that the extraordinary people in our world are the ones who can't ignore someone else's pain.

Surrounding the lead roles are solid actors playing quirky but redeemable men and women. Josh Lawson (he was the arrogant pharmacist on "Superstore") is Dr. Bruce, an egotistical trauma surgeon who is always ready for camera time and declares, "If saving someone's life makes their day just a little bit brighter, it's all worth it." Kahyun Kim is Serena, the blunt nurse who has seen it all and yet still doles out kindness when necessary.

Mekki Leeper is Matt, the naïve newbie nurse who barely knows what he's doing and was raised by a hyper-religious family that is anti-medicine. And Kaliko Kauahi, so wonderful as timid and insecure Sandra in "Superstore," is Val, a no-nonsense admissions staffer. Val still needs time to develop as a character, but give Kauahi one season and she's bound to work her magic.

You'd think that being an NBC workplace mockumentary would be enough to guarantee a hit. After all, "The Office" is revered as one of the best comedies in broadcast network history. "Superstore" lasted six seasons by deftly skewering and honoring the service industry. But "St. Denis Medical" doesn't bring much to the table that is all that different from either of those shows, so it's tough to tell whether it will do well. Like the under-appreciated "American Auto," which lasted only two seasons, it faces the challenge of staying alive as broadcast networks battle for relevance and profits in the age of streaming.

It's easy to say the classic sitcom is a dying format (hang in there, CBS' "Ghosts"!) and blame it on the competition from online platforms. Or maybe there is another culprit. As Time magazine wrote in 2021, the decline of the network comedy is "emblematic of a culture that has become so politically, socially and generationally fragmented, with heightened sensitivities on all sides, that large swathes of the American public can't even agree on what's funny anymore."

So many great sitcoms of yore, from "Cheers" and "Taxi" to "Brooklyn Nine-Nine" and "The Good Place," have relied on throwing together a bunch of people with vastly different backgrounds and clashing outlooks on life and finding the unlikely bonds that can form. But for almost a decade now, empathy — the ability to understand and be sensitive to another person's feelings and experiences — has been declining in real life while lobbing crude insults has had a steady uptick. Why watch a TV series about the struggle to get along with others when you're desperate to escape from the daily version?

"St. Denis Medical" still sticks to the notion that, deep down, unity is possible. When an emergency arises in the first episode, the characters come together like a well-oiled machine to apply their knowledge of saving lives. Alex may miss the school play, but she does get a hug from a complete stranger for saving the most important thing in the world to him.

There may be nothing unique about "St. Denis Medical" to those who already are fans of "The Office," "Superstore" or "American Auto." But, wow, is it comforting. And sometimes that's all you need a sitcom to be. A slightly rundown Oregon hospital might be your new happy place. I think it's going to be mine.

Contact Detroit Free Press pop culture critic Julie Hinds at Denis Medical'

Series debut

Episodes at 8 & 8:30 p.m. Tue.