It’s a different perspective to be successful now, without ever identifying as that kind of person growing up.

I’ve thought about imposter syndrome a lot. It’s kind of calmed down now. It’s funny, because my dad [Brad Dourif] is an actor, but we never were [very wealthy]. He was always very scared that he wasn’t going to have enough money. You figure out as an adult whether that is actually just this internal fear that you always have because there’s very little job security.

My father—who has had a really long, wonderful career—is this strange creature of an actor. He did one day on The Pitt and he just thought he was terrible. I watched him go through it and I was like, Oh my God, my sense of this is genetic.

It’s almost useful when you realize something like that.

Our personalities are all just genetics and conditioning, right? Again, it was cool to have The Pitt happen in my 40s. As a woman, you get 39 and you’re like, Well, is this, like, kind of over? I never played the pretty girl, which kind of ages out quicker. … It’s pretty lucky to have Dr. McKay on TV.

You’ve played McKay for two seasons now. Do you feel like you’re growing with her at all?

I learned that probably the number-one element to make a scene good is relaxation. If I’m just not trying to manifest something before I perform—and I’m not worried about it—it’s good. You can see it when you’re watching Noah [Wyle] work too. He’s so loose. He’s like a noodle.

I’ve heard that about him. You feel what’s going on in his head, like an iceberg.

Right. You see the tip of it. He told me something like, “You don’t have to do anything. All you have to do is be thinking the thoughts—and it’s enough.” It’s like leaving yourself alone, you know? I’ll just speak for myself: [The Pitt‘s casting team] did find a person who is—not totally similar—I come from similar conditioning as McKay. And so if I were to just trust that that’s there and play what’s in front of me, it’s always better. I can’t always do that. I get scared. And so acting ends up being this, like, emotional trick and game you’re playing with yourself. That can be incredibly satisfying and incredibly scary.

In episode 14, it really comes through that season 2 was always meant to be a mental-health reckoning for these characters, where everyone has to confront how this work affects them and the lives they want to live outside of it.

I figured the only way to go was to have this season be about the aftermath of the mass casualty. It was too big of an event to ignore. The writers told me that they’re really careful to try to reflect the actual problems in the health-care industry and the mental-health crisis around people who work in EMS.

For McKay, the space she occupies is somebody who has a little bit of wisdom from having very bad things happen earlier in life. She can relate to patients in a way that maybe other people who didn’t go from college to med school to residency to being a doctor could. That was not her story. It’s a cool space to occupy. What she is good at is like self-care around a mass casualty. So I can see where other people are falling apart and there’s an extent to where it feels like familiar ground [for McKay].

You see this in McKay’s care of the young mother who died of cancer, who feels like her defining patient this season.

It cut a lot of ways for me. One in which she’s exactly my age and has kids and a loving husband. I remember leaving the set when we were filming it and just thinking, You are gonna die, you know, and you don’t know when it’s gonna come. It was really a journey to seeing somebody who could be me just die for very unfair reasons. And then thinking about what I want my life to look like.

I, Fiona, have always sort of felt like I was on the outside of a restaurant, looking in at everybody eating with each other. I’ve carried that quality around my entire life, and I think she has it too. Do you know what I mean?

I know how that feels.

It was seeing a loving husband, intimacy, and grace during death. McKay was very face-to-face with that. Or at least when I left the studio—I was face-to-face with that.

You’re literally looking at a simulation of that as you’re performing it.

There’s a thing about The Pitt too. It’s not filmed like a regular TV show. There’s not a long time between takes. You can feel like you’re going through it.

As a viewer, there are even patients I take with me after I finish an episode. I can’t imagine how multiplied that is for the actors.

What’s really funny about the show is that it’s devastating—but it’s so fun to make. I have so much fun. During the mass casualty in season 1, I was in the Pink Zone, where we were just intubating people all the time and belly-laughing. So it’s both things. I’ve often been cast as—I would never say a villain—but people who are deeply lost and willing to do anything. That’s sort of been my niche before McKay. It’s been really lovely to play a good person. She’s a good person who’s been through a lot, but she’s trying to do her best. There’s something uplifting about that. That’s the secret sauce to the show. People are desperate for a real portrayal of kindness.

In episode 14, there’s a callback to McKay’s date at the art gallery. Will she ever find love?

Let me tell you something: This job has mirrored my actual life to a T. Even in season 1, I was having these massive arguments with an ex-boyfriend. This season and last year, I was trying to be more brave and ask people out. So I don’t know if it happens for McKay. Maybe it will happen for Fiona. So here’s hoping. A little bit of bravery and luck.

Is there anything we’ve missed so far?

This entire job and experience has been very quietly in honor of my mother, who I lost 11 years ago. She would have absolutely loved The Pitt and been so proud of me. I was her caretaker for the last eight years of her life, and, you know, and it was a sad, wild time of difficulty. Getting this job and having the quality that got me hired is a direct consequence of my mother. Every once in a while, when I’m sitting in my car, I’m like, “Thank you, Mommy.” It’s in honor of my mother, Joni Dourif, who was brilliant and wild and singular.

Losing a parent early really does frame the rest of your life. It’s hard not to see things through the prism of that.

Yeah. I have a relationship with death and with mental health—and just how biological that is. It’s not a totally negative thing. You really understand that we’re here for a little bit. And then the stuff I kind of had to do in order to grieve, those kinds of habits can lead to a much more examined life.

Thank you for taking the time, Fiona.

I appreciate it. Next time you see me, I won’t have pink hair.