An Interview with Luke Kirby, Ashley Madekwe, and Gustaf Hammarsten from ‘Dr. Death’

DR. DEATH -- Pictured: Luke Kirby as Dr. Nathan Gamelli, Ashley Madekwe as Dr. Ana Lasbrey, Pictured: Gustaf Hammarsten as Dr. Svensson -- (Photos by: Scott McDermott/Barbara Nitke/Clifton Prescod/PEACOCK)

Luke Kirby, Ashley Madekwe, and Gustaf Hammarsten are a trio of accomplished actors that have appeared in a bevy of iconic stories during their careers. Currently they star as Dr. Nathan Gamelli, Dr. Ana Lasbrey, and Dr. Anders Svensson, respectively in season two of Dr. Death on Peacock, and we here at NTG were lucky enough to sit down with them to discuss this year’s dynamic story. 
 
John Betancourt: I'm very curious what it means to each of you, as an actor to be part of such a powerful and dynamic story about ethics overall.
 
Ashley Madekwe: It’s exciting and really rewarding because I think that the story at the end kind of shows the importance of having ethics and the importance of having whistleblowers and medical oversight and the importance of advocating for yourself. So, I think it's great that it's a really dramatic story with a lot of human interest. But there is a message at the end of it. 
 
Gustaf Hammarsten: Yeah, you always want to, you know, this is what you want to do as an actor you want to play, as you said, a powerful story. Everything is involved, moral, ethics and struggle, you know, blood, rats, and murder, in a sense, you know. No, but seriously, the story with the whistleblowers, people, you know, normal people trying to stand up to the, you know, the big authorities, you know, and it's hard to tell the truth, but they fight for it. You know, that's something you should do every day.
 
Luke Kirby: Yeah, it's very compelling, to see people sort of stand up, find the courage and the guts to stand up to something that they know is going to impede the course of their future in life. You know, but at least they do that, you know, as opposed to just watching the wake, this sort of bloody wake of corruption, you know, leave a path of death and destruction behind it's, you know, you gotta speak up.
 
John Betancourt: With this being such a such a broad, amazing story. There are so many big moments to it. Without spoiling anything. What are you most excited for audiences to experience when it comes to this grand sweeping story? 
 
Luke Kirby: You know, there's a lot of sort of surgeries in the show that, you know, when I watched it, I had to kind of look away a bit. There's something that… as hard as it is for me to watch. There's something a bit enticing about that. So, you know, that's fun.
 
Ashley Madekwe: I think the audience will really enjoy kind of the human-interest angle. I think that we have the true crime medical angle, but we also have the human the human-interest angle, and the love story is really juicy. Really juicy.
 
Gustaf Hammarsten: Yeah. You have the love story. And you know, the medical stories, it’s like… a two for one special.
 
John Betancourt: One last question for all of you today. What are you most proud of when it comes to what you've done here on the show?
 
Gustaf Hammarsten: I'm so proud that I could manage to say all these difficult English medical words, like epithelium in animals. (Laughs) No, but I'm proud that I was a part of this, you know, it's like, international, you have people from all over the world. So, it's an including story, you know, it's not like, “Oh, this happened in this country, and this person.” You know, it's just people from all over the world, and we're just humans and trying to do okay, that's, that's the thing I'm proud of.
 
Ashley Madekwe: Um, I'm really proud that we were able to tell the story and do the story… justice. I think, I think that it's there on the screen. We haven't done it a disservice. We've done it justice.
 
Luke Kirby: I feel like the story, you know, doesn't shy away from the more complicated aspects of, standing up to big institutions. I think that you know, it addresses the cost and, and that there is a price to pay and in doing so, you know, I think that it shows a bit of courage to not, you know, just sweep things under the rug or tie it up in a fancy little bow and say, “Hey, isn't it just that simple?” You know, I think it's a little more complicated than that and leaves us all asking questions about our own self-interests and our own place in the world. 
 
This interview has been lightly edited and condensed for clarity. 

---