‘The Pitt’s Katherine LaNasa Celebrates Emmys Love, Teases ‘Changed’ Dana in Season 2

Without charge nurse Dana Evans, Pittsburgh Trauma Medical Center wouldn’t be able to run nearly as smoothly as it does on The Pitt. And the Television Academy recognized that, with Katherine LaNasa, for Outstanding Supporting Actress in a Drama Series, receiving one of the show’s 13 Emmy nominations on July 15.

“I’m just so proud of everybody,” LaNasa tells TV Insider. Below, Katherine LaNasa opens up about that Emmy nomination, celebrating with The Pitt cast and crew, and more.

Congratulations! Talk about finding out about the nomination because it’s so well deserved.

Katherine LaNasa: My husband was here to get a haircut from the hairdresser on the show, so he decided to come early so that he could listen to the nominations. And it just happened that we got a bathroom break right at 8:30. I don’t think the ADs meant it. I was actually standing behind them. It just happened to be that Noah asked to use the restroom then. And so then we all got a break and I ran up here. It was right at 8:30, and then they announced everybody, but they didn’t do my category, and they’re like, “And that’s it.” And then I said, “I got to go back down.” And my husband was trying to look it up online. I was like, “I have to go back to work.” So I went down to work and they were rehearsing and it was a trauma scene where I enter the scene. So I’m standing out there and my makeup artist, who was also nominated, just comes and she’s just one of my favorite people at work, she’s just one of my favorite people in the world, and so she’s the one that let me know. And so we were just quietly huddled, like hugging in the hallway, so it was really, really cool.

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And that’s amazing to be on set of the show that you’re nominated for because that doesn’t happen too often.

I know. It was really cool. I’m just also so proud of everybody. I mean, it was just Noah Wyle and basically a bunch of unknown people, and then this juggernaut came out of it. I mean, it’s an amazingly talented crew and incredibly experienced writers, but all these kids, a lot of them didn’t have very much experience and we just flung this thing together and it worked.

I saw all the celebration photos and video from the set. What was that celebration like?

I haven’t seen anything. I had a decent lunch break, but I was just returning all my personal texts. I haven’t really even got online. It was just fun. My husband was out there and my boss came up, Scott Gemmill and the head writer, and they were waiting to go in and tell everybody, and then Scott announced all the 13 nominations to the whole crew. We’re all really tight. And so I think it’s just a lot of pride. Everyone’s really pretty humble, so I think everyone’s just super happy for everybody. They’re just like, God, that makeup and the special effects makeup, so many of the departments, so deserving. I just thought that the directing, I just thought everybody was so deserving.

What about the work that you put into your outstanding performance and the character of Dana are you most proud to see recognized?

Well, I’m proud that I pulled off that Pittsburgh accent because I am from Louisiana, so a lot of tears. Got to thank Susanne Sulby, who was one of the people that worked on Mare of Easttown. I was listening to Mare of Easttown in the bathtub for the 17th time, and I had let it run the last episode, and then the extras just came on. And then I found the dialect coach from that who directed me to Susanne, who’d done most of the other actors, and so she’s the one that really helped me. So for me, that was the thing that was the biggest leap, the thing that I didn’t know if I could do. I think I didn’t know if I could do that. I think I had an innate sense of who the person was, and I don’t really know where that came from. It’s kind of like there’s a little bit of acting that’s sort of magic. Sometimes you should be right for something, you’re just okay at it, and sometimes you’re not really that person at all, like Dana, and she just came into my imagination.

Which scenes in particular especially stand out you from Season 1 now looking back?

I don’t know. I just have to go with how they feel. I really liked, it’s a very brief scene that I had with Jake [Taj Speights] after he lost his girlfriend. I just go over and give him a hug. I thought that was a really beautiful, very tiny scene. I liked doing the scene with Mel [Taylor Dearden] in the hallway when she was on the stairs, and I just tell her she doesn’t have to know all the answers, and I loved the scene in chairs when I get to break up the fight, I’m like, “This ain’t Philly!” I mean, that’s just actor fun to just get to be that big and loud. I often like those scenes in movies. I know a lot of people think that things are overacting when they’re huge, but I think sometimes watching someone explode is really satisfying. So it was fun to also get to be the person doing that scene.

What stands out is Dana is really the glue that holds this ED together, and I feel like because of your performance.

Oh, I don’t know. I didn’t know — I kind of had this sense going into it that they wanted this sort of very equitable feel on the set, and they were expecting that of all of us. So I had a feeling that the key to the character and also to Katherine playing the character was humility, that everything should just feel like being of service. And so I think that’s maybe what came through.

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'The Pitt' Season 2: Filming Update, Cast, Premiere Date, More

At the end of Season 1, there was this question about whether or not Dana would return to work. Very glad to see that she does.

You and me both!

What can you share though about how Dana’s doing after this time jump?

Not too much, but the truth is that I don’t know where she’s going to go. I do know that I can just say that it is a somewhat changed Dana from having gone through that experience and that I think Scott said that if they didn’t give it 10 months, a decent amount of time, they didn’t really feel like they could have Dana back right away. … What’s significant about this day is that it’s Langdon’s [Patrick Ball] first day back, so he’s just out of rehab, so he’s back. So that’s the most significant thing about the day.

Can you say if Dana’s feelings about Langdon have changed from that scene we got of them in the finale?

I cannot say how Dana feels about Langdon anymore.

Speaking of Langdon, you were so good in that scene in the finale because we see how much Dana is holding in what she’s been going through and having everyone else rely on her when she’s needed someone.

It’s funny that you mentioned that. It’s really hard for me to see myself, but I would say when you’re talking about standout scenes, that was a scene that was particularly fun to do. I mean, working with John Wells — and he directed that — it’s doing a play and he just allows for a lot of freedom and he also just asks questions and pushes you to in a way that reveals even more that you than you thought was on the page. I went into that scene thinking, I’m just kind of supposed to be tough on Langdon, so he feels squeezed and he doesn’t have anywhere to go, and I thought it was Langdon’s story, Langdon’s storyline, and then you’re sitting here telling me that you felt like you saw all of this about Dana, and John brought that out by the questions he asked or what he wanted to see, and it made his problem my problem because I care about him so much, and I didn’t know I was going to get to that. I mean, I love John Wells. He’s really a master.

One of the most important and best and steady relationships on the show is Dana and Robby. When you’re talking about that relationship and you’re going into Season 2, are you talking about it as a relationship that has to keep evolving in a major way or are you looking at it as more of a relationship that is the steady calm that it was in Season 1?

I can’t say too much about what’s going on with us, but I do think that you’ve got to realize that Dana’s been there 30 years. I know exactly what Robby’s story is, but he is around my age, so I think he’s been there probably quite a long time as well. So I do see them more as a sister and brother, like a big sister, a little brother. I do think that that’s fairly stable.

Yeah, it’s so good. You and Noah together are so good.

He’s great. He’s the best.

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There was some great Dana and Collins (Tracy Ifeachor) moments in Season 1 and now, Collins isn’t returning. Can you say, are we going to see Dana leaning on anyone else and have similar scenes like that without any specifics?

I don’t know. We’re just in the middle of three. They don’t give us much in advance. There’s a few medical things I know that I’m going to need to prepare for, so I know those things, but I have no idea. There’s certain things I need to get an education about in order to do them better or seem more like a real nurse when I do them. So they focus on that, but they don’t tell me where I’m going, and I don’t ask. I kind of like to just play what they wrote as we’re going and not worry about where it’s going to go.

Speaking of the medical stuff, because I know there was the bootcamp for season one, how much of a bootcamp was there for Season 2, or was it kind of just brushing up on the things from Season 1? And can you talk about that bootcamp process in general?

There was some stuff, because there’s some new stuff that’s going to happen in Season 2, so there was some videos to watch. There was some stuff to bear. It’s not fun. It’s all just super intense, but it was only a day or two, and then I actually went back to the hospital again, went back to County again, and I’m going to do some more work at some different clinics and things to get some education on some of the new storylines.

How much of that bootcamp for Season 1 helped you really shape the character of Dana?

A lot. You know what really helped me is also a guy there that is a big medical educator in the emergency field, and he’s now on the writing staff. But just to see these guys in the emergency medicine field, they love John Wells because he brought so much attention to their work that John is able to bring in just the best of the best in this emergency medicine field to advise us and to see how outside of work, how emotional they were about their work and about what people had gone through since COVID and things like that, it just made me see the toll it takes on people, how much they care. I asked a simple question of one of our advisors and answering me, it made him cry about what was a good day and what was a bad day, and you just got to feel it. I think that was the most, was really seeing how deeply affected they are by their work and how much they bear and how much they hold, and how much they hold in probably to go home to their families.

Can you say one word to describe Dana and one word to describe the show for Season 2?

I don’t know where Season 2’s going. So far as The Pitt, I would say exciting. Dana, Cool.

The Pitt, Season 2, January 2026, HBO Max