Morris Chestnut is no stranger to slipping into scrubs for the sake of a juicy medical drama, but this time, his character wears suits and leans into the innate problem-solving skills that most doctors possess.
As John H. Watson, the physician in CBS’s Watson, Chestnut said he’s been allowed to morph into a role unlike any of the previous doctors he’s played in shows like The Resident or Rosewood.
“John Watson is different,” he told Blavity’s Shadow and Act in a recent interview. “So just in terms of being a doctor, he’s a geneticist. He is very curious about people in the genetic condition, and that really drives him. The show is different because it’s a show that — some shows are just medical; some shows are just detective shows; our show, we solve our mysteries in the hospital, which we’re doctors, but we also go outside the hospital and gather information as detectives.”
“So we’re not just doctors or just detectives, we’re doc-tectives, and that’s how we solve the medical mystery,” he added.
Morris Chestnut is both the star and an executive producer of Watson.
The actor said that serving as an executive producer in his new medical drama has given him a lot more say in the makings of the series.
“I’m able to have a little bit more of a voice in the whole entire process of the show, which is always great,” Chestnut shared. “It’s a very unique and ambitious show, just in and of itself, because we’re a serialized procedural show to where we’re presented with a medical mystery, and we have to solve that by the end of the show.”
He continued, “In addition to that, we have a strong serialized element to the shower to where it’s a slow build.” Chesnut added, “We have rich characters and story development that different things would be unveiled about the characters and the stories. Each episode is going to ramp up to a very high crescendo for the finale.”
Are the cases in ‘Watson’ real?
Yes. Despite how off-putting some cases are for each episode, they are very real medical conditions people have experienced. A fact that even blew Chestnut away when he first read the script.
“All of our medicine is vetted by real doctors,” he stated. “I would read some stuff and say, ‘Oh OK, someone has a nipple on their foot.’ I go to Google, and it’s true. A lot of these rare medical conditions are actually real-life medical conditions. So much so that when people see it, I know they’re not going to believe it, but when they do like I did and they go to Google, they’re going to realize it’s actually true.”
Will his character ever find a balance between being a doctor and a human with a traumatic brain injury?
From the first episode, viewers learn that Watson has a traumatic brain injury, the result of a fall he took while working to solve a mystery alongside his good friend Sherlock Holmes in London.
As they continue to watch, they’ll discover that Watson’s love for a good conundrum has led to the demise of his marriage — something that Chestnut believes is one of his character’s greatest downfalls.
“He sacrificed a lot for his obsession with his work, for his obsession with Holmes, and it’s going to be revealed just the depth of what he sacrificed throughout when he went to go follow Sherlock Holmes,” Chestnut said. “When the story opens up, he’s really just trying to put his life together, and he’s trying to put his life together while he’s dealing with, first of all, saving other lives, while he’s dealing with his own medical condition.”
He added, “He’s really faced with a lot of challenges. And another thing I love about Watson is that he is not this perfect character. He’s smart. He can help people; he can save people’s lives, but he knows that he’s not perfect, and he knows that that’s something that he’s dealing with, and he’s trying to be better as a person, as a human being.”
Catch new Watson episodes on CBS on Sundays at 10 p.m. ET.
