Jewish actor Mark Feuerstein, a vocal advocate against antisemitism, is going to reprise his beloved — and Jewish! — “Royal Pains” role of Dr. Henry “Hank” Lawson in an as yet unnamed forthcoming NBC show. Feuerstein, who is the only actor currently attached to the project, will also be an executive producer; he is joined in that title by Andrew Lenchewski, the show’s co-creator, and Michael Rauch, a director, writer and EP on “Royal Pains.” Lenchewski and Rauch will be penning the script for the new show.
If you’ve never seen “Royal Pains,” which aired between 2009 and 2016 on USA network, let me catch you up. The show is about a former New York City ER surgeon who becomes a “concierge doctor” to the wealthy residents of the Hamptons. When Hank gets let go from his job after a particularly affluent patient died in his care, he ends up in the fancy vacation town and saves a man’s life. He is then asked to stay on as a private doctor, and he and his brother — an accountant named Evan, played by Paulo Costanzo — start HankMed, a fancy private medicine service.
While Costanzo isn’t Jewish, both characters Evan and Hank are, a fact revealed through an offhand comment in an episode on the show’s second season titled “Keeping the Faith” (not to be confused with the Ben Stiller cult classic film). The brothers’ (complicated, abandoning) father and grandfather are played by Henry Winkler and Ed Asner (of blessed memory), respectively.
The logline of the upcoming sequel reads: “Over a decade ago, Hank Lawson left a hospital to start a concierge practice in the Hamptons. Now, several years later and searching for a new purpose in life, Hank is about to embark on his biggest project yet.”
I am very excited to learn of the handsome Jewish TV doctor’s next adventure and am secretly hoping for many a Henry Winkler cameos on the new show. A girl can dream, right?
