Howdy, readers. I hope Daylight Saving Time didn't set you back too much last Sunday. I feel like I'm still catching up from the hour of sleep we all lost. When I couldn't zonk out this week, I binged The Pitt—which is a new medical drama on Max starring ER vet Noah Wyle. The series is receiving heaping amounts of praise from the medical community for its realistic and accurate depiction of emergency care. That's all fine and dandy, but personally? I'm more interested in how the series films its gnarly, bloody surgeries.
So, I lucked out this week when the latest 1923 episode showed a doctor drilling a hole into another man's skull. It was the perfect opportunity to call up Brian Geraghty—the actor who plays the injured Dutton ranch foreman Zane Davis and the owner of said skull—about how the nasty, head-drilling sausage is made.
"It is wild," Geraghty told me over Zoom earlier this week. "I got a call from Taylor Sheridan just saying, 'Hey, I have this idea. I'd like to make this part better for you and for us.' And I just said, 'Wow.' I was already having a great time just riding horses at cowboy camp and shooting bad guys with Harrison Ford and Helen Mirren." Sheridan had more for Zane in mind—starting with an insane, 1920s-era head surgery.
If you need a refresher, Brian's character is attacked in the season 1 finale and left with severe head damage when season 2 begins. The local doctor suggests that Zane has a subdural hematoma, meaning that excess blood in his head is placing too much pressure on his skull. So, if he has any chance of survival, the doctor must drill a hole into his head with an old-timey Allen wrench and relieve the pressure by removing the blood. That means the 1923 team needed some convincing prosthetics.
"Jason Hamer, the special effects guy, was able to make a whole replica head," Geraghty explained. "It was so weirdly and uncannily me. They matched the exact facial hair, the color, everything."
Hamer is one of the go-to guys for special effects makeup and prosthetics in Hollywood. The two-time Emmy winner worked on freaky spider monsters for Stranger Things, believably grotesque dead bodies in Killers of the Flower Moon, and even the fan-favorite Raccacoonie animatronic from Everything Everywhere All at Once. Now, Hamer can add Geraghty's head to his portfolio. That is, if he's okay with the bloody hole in it.
"Everyone from the cast and the crew to Harrison and Helen, they said it was one of the greatest head doubles they've ever seen," Geraghty continued. He revealed that 1923 also had a body double on set with a shaved head. Thankfully, they didn't mix him up with the replica once drilling time came around. "They sent me a picture after my scene of Harrison kissing the head on the table," Geraghty shared. "It's amazing. I need to frame it."
After Zane's surgery, Sheridan gifted Geraghty's character one of the most exciting exchanges we've seen anyone have with Harrison Ford's Jacob Dutton. "Are we going after them for what they've done to us?" Zane asks. Jacob replies, "We're going after all of them."
According to Geraghty, "Zane becomes much more active throughout the rest of the series." The actor is amped for the opportunity. He initially auditioned to play John Dutton Sr. (which went to actor John Badge Dale), but Dutton Sr. died early in the first season. Geraghty isn't digging his character's grave just yet. "Zane takes some action, definitely," the actor teased. "You'll see some gunfights down the road."
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