‘The Patient’ Is FX’s Latest Thrilling TV Compulsion on Hulu

A psychotherapist spends a typical workday listening to people’s problems. On a very atypical workday, a therapist is forced to prevent a mass murderer from claiming another victim.

In Hulu’s 10-part psychological thriller The Patient, Steve Carell plays therapist Alan Strauss, who faces the most challenging client of his career and the most critical moment of his life.

He is held captive by Sam Fortner (Domhnall Gleeson), who confesses to being a serial killer and will kill again unless Strauss can help quell his homicidal urges.

As Alan works under intense pressure to piece Sam’s fractured mind back together, he must confront his own deeply buried troubles, including the recent death of his wife, Beth (Laura Niemi), and the estrangement from his son, Ezra (Andrew Leeds). Alan realizes that his own life depends on stopping Sam’s murderous compulsion.

“It deals with two families, and how the past and how unattended-to trauma leads to heartbreaking events,” says Linda Emond, who stars as Candace, Sam’s mother.

“There’s an enormous amount of denial that runs through the show, and the denial runs pretty much across most of the main characters,” Emond says. “The effects of that are pretty devastating.”

Linda Emond as Candace Fortner in ‘The Patient’ Frank Ockenfells/FX

In Candace’s case, her love for Sam and her willingness to protect him at all costs has blinded her to the horrific reality of Sam’s actions. “[Denial is] such a common thing that we do in large and small ways as human beings in order to get by, to be able to move forward, especially if you need to move forward and not lose things that you love,” Emond says.

If the show’s premise sounds gloomy, Emond assures us that The Patient doesn’t fit neatly into a genre. “There are aspects of it that are very dramatic, but there are aspects of it that are just downright funny,” Emond says. “Some of it is very darkly funny, but it is funny.”

Joe Weisberg and Joel Fields, who previously worked on FX’s The Americans, are EPs and writers on The Patient. They’ve managed to infuse the thriller with profound explorations of family bonds, spirituality, guilt and forgiveness. Sam and Alan discuss things like the takeout food and Sam’s devotion to country star Kenny Chesney, which injects moments of levity between scenes of suspense and horror.

“I don’t think we thought consciously about a balance of dark to light,” Fields says. “I think that’s something that you find naturally while you’re writing, while you’re filming, probably while you’re performing. And you try to just pursue what feels right and true. And bizarrely, as we all know, the darkest places are often the funniest places because it’s where you’re under the most stress.”

The Patient premieres on Hulu with the first two episodes Aug. 30, and new episodes are released weekly on Tuesdays through the finale on Oct. 25.