Shawn Hatosy on ‘The Pitt,’ Calls for a Night Shift Spinoff and Projects That Got Away — Including ‘Breaking Bad’!

Shawn Hatosy is a first-rate actor who has been in the business for more than 35 years, working on screens big and small, but primarily making his name on TV drama series.

Hatosy memorably played an L.A. cop on Southland , which ran from 2009 through 2013, and for which he was nominated for a Critics Choice Award. He was a twisted ex-con on Animal Kingdom , which ran from 2016 through 2022. And, since 2025, he has been playing Dr. Jack Abbot, a former combat medic turned attending physician working the night shift at a Pittsburgh hospital, on HBO Max’s The Pitt , winning the best guest actor in a drama series Emmy for the show’s first season, and landing a currently-pending Emmy nom for best supporting actor in a drama series for its second season, during which he also directed an episode of the massively acclaimed show. Related Stories 'Awards Chatter' Podcast Lisa Kudrow on Watching 'Friends' After Matthew Perry's Death, 'Romy & Michele' Sequel and Why 'The Comeback' May Be "Highlight" of Her Career TV 'The Pitt' Showrunner Admits Season One's Notoriety Amped Up Pressure For Season Two: "We Had to Prove That It Wasn't Just a Fluke"

Over the course of a conversation at the L.A. offices of The Hollywood Reporter , the 50-year-old reflected on his entry into the business in his early teens while he was living in the Baltimore area; his relocation to New York and then L.A., where, in his 20s, he was in particularly high demand for teen-targeted projects; what sparked his lengthy collaboration with TV creator John Wells , which now spans 20 years and five projects, from ER through The Pitt ; how he feels about calls for a Pitt -spinoff about the titular hospital’s night shift; plus more.

You can listen to the full conversation via the audio player above or read excerpts of it — lightly edited for clarity and brevity — below.

“There were so many actors that I would brush up against. Tobey Maguire was one of them — Wonder Boys was a big one, and Cider House Rules . American Beauty [the part eventually played by Wes Bentley] was something that I was really wanted — everybody wanted that, and I remember being in the room on that one… I remember getting asked to audition for Breaking Bad [the part eventually played by Aaron Paul], and it was not a time where AMC was anything — Mad Men hadn’t even come out yet — so I wasn’t jumping up and down to do that.”

On the beginning of his special relationship with TV creator John Wells…

“I was going through a rough patch personally at that time, and I just was not taking great care of myself. I was drinking a lot and I had just become a father. The ER audition came and I was still in that mindset of, ‘I’m a film actor. I’m not doing that.’ And my manager said, ‘You should take a look at this role. This is a good role. And John’s directing it. And the ones that he directs, they’re really special.’ So I looked at it, and he was right. I went in and had a really great audition for a very challenging role — he’s multiple personalities, and there’s a lot of range in those three characters that I got to play, and it was juicy. I remember doing it.