By Jamie Ruby

This Wednesday, Royal Pains, USA Network's #1 hit series, will return for season four. This season Dr. Hank Lawson, played by Mark Feuerstein, will be stepping out on his own with his medical practice, as his brother Evan (Paulo Costanzo), starts his own business venture. With all the fighting, it looks like Divya(Reshma Shetty) doesn't want to take sides. However, HankMed must team up for a Hamptons' emergency once more.

Feuerstein recently sat down with the media to talk about the upcoming season and what we can expect.

USA Network Conference Call
Royal Pains
Mark Feuerstein

May 29, 2012
2:00 pm CT

MARK FEUERSTEIN: Hello. Hello, hello, hello, everyone.

SCIFI VISION: Hi, Mark. Thanks for doing the call today.

MARK FEUERSTEIN: It's my pleasure. And let me just say that if I missed my opportunity to say to everyone who is listening how much I appreciate all of you taking the time to listen to me babble about Royal Pains and how our lives on set and my life - I'm very appreciative of this show and this job and this career. And it always fascinates me and makes me feel grateful to know that there are people out there who actually care about the minutia of our little show and my little life. So thank you.

SCIFI VISION: Sure, it's a great show so we're happy to do it.

This season Evan is going to be kind of off on his own. Can you talk about how that's going to change the dynamic of the show and everything?

MARK FEUERSTEIN: Yes, let me just go back in time for a second. When the part of Evan was actually called Evan R. Wacksman and it was meant to be Hank's best friend. And just remind and tell for the first time to those who don't know that it was only when Paulo Costanzo came in to read that it became clear to the executive brass and the director and the creators of the show that they could never be best friends.

They looked too much like brothers between the nose and the hair and the wacky sense of humors, they had to be brothers. So for three to four years now we have mined so much great substantive story and theme from the fact that they are family. Including bringing Henry Winkler to the show to play our father, the history of our mother who has passed away.

And so now we come to Season 4, having had a major schism between the brothers over the business, which I think is a very real thing. My father was a corporate lawyer who dealt specifically in corporate divorce with two partners who were in business and had very different ideas about how to grow the business and how to grow together in business. So that's the problem we come to at the end of Season 3.

And now Evan is off in HankMed 2.0, as he calls it, while I'm left in a lurch trying to piece together the remaining bits of our company so I can continue to do what I do, which is taking care of patients when they need me, where they need me. And it looks like Evan is very good at being an entrepreneur and growing the business on his own and finding other doctors to replace his poor, lonely, sad brother, who is now on his own.

But as I like to believe, it should always be true with family, though it's not always true in reality, the brothers will come back together, will find a way that they can get over this schism. And will be that much more mature and productive because of the fight that they had.

SCIFI VISION: you tell us kind of some of the medical cases that are going to be coming up, anything about that?

MARK FEUERSTEIN: Well, we had an amazing guest star who was, for me, a major reunion in my career, Ashley Williams, plays the manager, a gatekeeper of basically the (Madge) Stone Club which really exists in the (unintelligible), but we call it the Blackstone Club. It's sort of the most elite, exclusive country club in the history of perhaps the world, but for sure Long Island.

And Ashley plays the manager there. And she has to know everyone who works at the (Madge) Stone Club because it's her job to take care of each of them. And things go very awry for her character named Sidney when she starts to lose the ability to recognize people's faces. Which is a real condition called prosopagnosia.

And it's more normal for people who speak English to total face blindness. And she has that. And it takes awhile for good old Hank Lawson to diagnose it, but eventually he figures it out. I hope we don't spoil too many people's experience of that particular episode, but it's a fascinating case that we covered this year in addition to many others. And it was so wonderful for me to be reunited with Ashley who I had done a year and a half of a sitcom with.

But instead of showing that pressure on tape night to make everybody laugh for three hours straight, we got to relax in the schedule of a one hour drama and hang out on set and reconnect. And so it was as great story and a great event in my own life.

QUESTION: How do you view who Hank is as a character if he's not running HankMed?

MARK FEUERSTEIN: A great question. Hank very much identifies himself with his work. So as you'll see, when he is somewhat out of work, he is slightly lost. There's a moment with a patient who asks Hank for his pamphlet, explaining what they do and how it works, and he doesn't have it because that was always Evan's job.

He doesn't have the documents that he's supposed to be giving the client because he doesn't do that sort of thing. So, you know, it's always a great opportunity in life when a person who has been our right hand is sick for the day and you realize just how little you can get through the day without them. And so Hank is a little at sea.

But as is always the case in the Hamptons of Royal Pains, there are always people who need to be treated and somehow they always find their way to Hank Lawson. And when they do, Hank always rises to the challenge. So it's not like he's sitting on the beach, crying for Evan for the following five episodes. There are lots of things that go down.

But I think, you know, also what's going on with Evan and Paige gives Hank a foil to consider his own life, his own romantic situation. And luckily for Hank with the advent of two different characters coming up in Episodes 6, 7 and 8, we have Judy Greer who is so brilliant, I can't even talk about it, playing a matchmaker who has a very unique medical condition. She has - and I hate ruining some of the diagnoses, but some of the medical cases are so fascinating, I can't help talking about it.

But she has two hearts and they go out of rhythm. She has an arrhythmia with her two hearts, which is supposed to beating as one. And because she's someone who is all heart, she became a matchmaker. And in her matchmaking she decides to enlist me, even though I didn't sign up, and sets me up with someone who is pretty fantastic. Played by Kat Foster. So that's one potential romance for Hank.

And then there's another one as Hank goes deeper into the dark and mysterious world of Boris Kuester von Jurgens-Ratenicz. So I think the change in the business allowed Hank to focus a little more on his own life and explore certain possibilities to find the one who he's meant to be with. But it also changed the nature and structure of HankMed itself.

And when Hank and Evan, if -- I'm going to have to say if for the spoilers out there -- they finally do come back together it's a very new HankMed and a new work relationship filled with trust and respect.

QUESTION: You're new to Twitter, what do you think it is that actually drew you to it and how it's been helpful to promotion of Royal Pains?

MARK FEUERSTEIN: First of all, thank you for calling attention to my rival at Twitter. Second of all, if any of you feel free to mention that I am @markfeuerstein which is my address for Twitter, it would really help my Twitter account, whatever you call that, follower account which apparently is that all that Twitter is about. It's about collecting people.

No, I'm sorry, let me take that back. That's what it seems to be about when actors get together and compare how many followers they have. And my number is miniscule so I think I'm feeling slightly challenged by that. But all of that said, the truth is, Twitter is a great opportunity to be in touch with the people who have been enjoying and watching and appreciating your show for three, four years now.

And it's really gratifying to reach out to them because I have had - I've been living in my little bubble, terrified of what they might be writing on the USA Web site or any other Web site that (unintelligible) a show. And now I find that there all these articulate, witty, lovely people who write in all the time on Twitter to say how much they love the show, me, Hank, Evan, Divya, and all the characters on Royal Pains. In addition to connecting with people who I haven't necessarily been in touch with for a long time.

I think Twitter will make me ask myself what is my voice, how do I want to express myself out in the public domain. For now it's pretty much limited to the excitement of shooting episodes of Royal Pains and being on a talk show and possibly connecting with other people I might know out there. And hopefully over time I find whatever that is that I would call my voice. And hopefully that voice is remotely funny.

QUESTION: You also illuminated on Twitter with a little bit to Sarah Shahi of possibly a crossover with Fairly Legal. How would you like to see that play out with Royal Pains.

MARK FEUERSTEIN: I just don't see why her character can't take a visit to the Hamptons and perhaps HankMed gets into some legal trouble, as is want in a world of litigious Hamptons hedge fund managers and lawyers. And Sarah Shahi brings her legal expertise to the Hamptons, represents me and who knows what happens from there.

So I mean, look, the truth is I think that crossover possibilities are so rife on USA because the characters seem to already exist in their own universe. And they all seem to speak a similar language and exist in similarly beautiful, well dressed, well heeled places, so it wouldn't be a stretch, but I didn't know what the network has planned.

I also am trying to enlist one of the members of the executive branch of USA to possibly be in the episode that I'm directing. So that's a secret that may or may not happen so your readers might go, oh, that was really interesting until it never really happened. But that's something else I'm trying to do which is cross over an executive from his ivory tower onto the set of Royal Pains, in front of the camera.

QUESTION: I think it's really interesting that Evan was smart enough to buy Divya's shares, so he actually has a bigger percentage. And your character always thinks he's right. But in this instance, could he actually be wrong and Evan's approach is right? Because you guys still aren't living on your own means. You're still at the courtesy of...Boris. Any thoughts on that?

...Do you think that your character sometimes gets so caught up in the medical aspect of it that he doesn't see the business side and that Evan could actually be right, that the business does need to grow?

MARK FEUERSTEIN: I think Evan is absolutely right, that the business needs to grow. And as Hank goes out on his own and realizes you can't just wait for business to come to you, you have to go out in the world and find clients and find patients. It's a reality of running a business.

But I also think Hank is a purist. He - it's a question that we're always asking in our business. You and me both from reporters of Web sites and magazines to actors, to directors and writers, what is selling out. When are you watering down your initial intention, your vision, for the sake of commerce and marketing.

And those are the questions Hank is asking Evan all the time because he's saying I don't want to waste my time promoting HankMed, making t-shirts and hats and Frisbees when I could be in the field saving someone's life or even just maintaining someone's life. And so I think Hank gets a little self righteous because you don't get to do that if people don't know that you exist.

So that's why there's a great conflict there. Because Evan puts too much importance on growing the business and not enough on staying true to its initial principles. And Hank is too busy sitting on his pedestal, focusing on his Hippocratic oath to realize that if he doesn't get out there and hoc his wares he won't have anybody to take care of.

QUESTION: Have you had a fun fan encounter, like maybe even on a plane and they need a doctor and people think you should be able to respond to it? Or was there ever something that's happened that you think, "Oh, I can handle that because I know from the show."

MARK FEUERSTEIN: There was one moment when a woman at a Hamptons party, and I do spend time out there because my parents have a house somewhere in Bridge Hampton. And I was at a benefit for the Ovarian Cancer Research Fund. And a woman came up to me and said, "Doctor, or you, Hank or whatever you're called. I got stung by a wasp and I'm getting diy and my limp is growing and I'm infected, help me, help me."

And now I'm standing there saying, "Calm down. Here's a glass of water." I have no idea what I'm doing. And her husband, thankfully, comes over and says, "You can tell she's genuinely delirious because she thinks you can do something for her." Which, of course, I couldn't. But luckily she did calm down a little bit. She did take a sip of the water and she really just had to realizs that she was just - got a little bit of a bee sting and that was it.

...But I want to assure you that should someone take genuinely ill on a plane or on the street, while I may stand up and try to help, the first thing I will say is, "Is there a doctor in the house?"

QUESTION: Since you have to do a lot of medical speak and not to mention pronouncing Boris's whole name, did you ever have trouble with that? Or did your earlier work help you out with that?

MARK FEUERSTEIN: You know, I do get asked this once in awhile and I never know how it is that I was lucky enough to be able to pronounce some words relatively well. But I hope that the fact that I convincingly convey medical jargon does not in any way - although it does, because people seem to think I can do - I can handle - I can take care of them medically, it's just the challenge of wrapping your mouth around these incredibly mono - I mean, multi-polysyllabic words and doing it convincingly.

And the truth of the matter is I am not gifted with whatever they call a photographic memory. This doesn't just come naturally to me. It could be five days of going over one speech whether I have to say in an upcoming episode words like metacarpophalangeal or glossopharyngeal. Any number of these words will take time to say with fluency and as if I knew what they meant for the first time I read them, which, of course, I did not.

But after studying them and rehearsing and practicing and preparing, I can convey a certain level of authenticity which is great. I was really jealous of the character played by Ben Shenkman this season. Because in Episode 2 or 3, he delivers a speech with more medical jargon than has been in an entire season of Royal Pains. And he did it so well and it flew me away and I literally found myself sitting there like I want that speech. I wanted to say all those big fat words.

But Hank is just a little too down to earth and not as ensconced in his intellectual medicine as he is in telling people what they need to know and can understand.

QUESTION: Is Shenkman the one that's playing the new doctor that has trouble with people?

MARK FEUERSTEIN: Yes. That's exactly right. He's a brilliant actor who you know from...

QUESTION: A lot of things.

MARK FEUERSTEIN: Films like Angels in America and I believe he was in (unintelligible) and he's been in many TV shows and movies. And he plays Dr. Jeremiah Sacani, the namesake of which is our most loved and beloved line producer who was a producer on Royal Pains for the first two years, Christine Sacani. And so I love it when the writers give a shout out or pay homage to one of our favorite people in the world.

QUESTION: I was just wondering in the divorce of Hank and Evan, who gets Divya?

MARK FEUERSTEIN: This is a wonderful question. A question that I can't really answer you because it's a story point in Season 4 of Royal Pains. If I told you that I would deprive you of all the tugging and pulling and bargaining and convincing and charming and cajoling that we do of Divya Katdare. And so all I can say to you is that it's not for lack of effort that Evan and I try to figure out the answer to your question, who gets Divya Katdare. But only by watching our show will you receive your answer.

QUESTION: Will we be seeing more of your father, [played by] the wonderful Henry Winkler?

MARK FEUERSTEIN: The answer to this question is far shorter and far simpler, yes.

You will be seeing Eddie R. Lawson in all of his glory. I am always so over the moon excited when Henry Winkler comes back on the show because he brings a smile and a level of warmth that our set is always so happy to welcome.

He is such a talented man, actor, person, writer and human being. I love him with all my heart. And I'm so happy that he comes back and he's back in a sort of capacity both with Ms. Newberg and with Boris. And involving Evan trying to drum up new business. So the writers are never for a lack of story with good old Eddie R. Lawson.

QUESTION: One of the story lines has kind of been in the background of the previous seasons, has revolved around Boris, his illness and then the car crash that happened, and kind of figuring out who was behind the car crash. And then we have Claudia coming in at the end of this last season. Does that story line continue this next season and kind of in what direction?

MARK FEUERSTEIN: Where that story line was much more about the fortunes of the past of the Kuester von Jurgens-Ratencz clan in Eastern Europe somewhere. I feel like there's a (Hamps-berg) empire and a German empire and a Polish and an Austrian history as well, but no one really knows. And Claudette is a cousin, comes back to ensnare him or actually to repair the damage done with the attempted assassination of Boris and then possibly his son.

She attempts to repair it and she is moderately successful at winding her way back into his life. But all of that involves more of the personal history of Boris's existence. And as we come into Season 4, we find ourselves going a little more into the world of sociopolitical and socioeconomic and political power brokers that Boris deals with. And the world of intrigue that is Boris Kuester von Jurgens-Ratencz on a global scale.

And the interesting part about this aspect of Boris is that he's bringing Hank along for the ride. Hank is now going to slowly be immersed and ensconced in the mysterious dealings of the great Boris. And that will lead to both a terrifying business proposition for Hank, a very intriguing and exciting potential romance for Hank with a woman who is connected to Boris and the great Dimitri, who is a business cohort that Boris brings into his web of his plan for world domination.

And with Dimitri comes very interesting medical story lines that get very curious very fast as often happens on Royal Pains.

QUESTION: You mentioned that you've been directing. You directed last season. It sounds like you're going to do that next season. What do you like about directing versus acting?

MARK FEUERSTEIN: If I thought acting was stressful, if I thought acting almost gave me a heart attack when the sun is setting and we have to nail a very complicated medical or emotional scene, then directing will officially give me a heart attack and force me to have to perform open heart surgery on myself out on the set. Because directing is the greatest challenge I have had in my career to date.

And I am so grateful to the USA network and to the executive producers of our show, Michael Rauch and Andrew Lenchewski who have afforded me this opportunity. Rather than just telling the story from my perspective, as limited as it can be when you're an actor playing one role, I now found myself in a position where I get to tell the entire story.

I get to think about every character and their journey and their arc and how it dovetails with the journeys and arcs of every other character. And what images I want to show to tell the story. What jokes or visual points of view I want to bring to Royal Pains. And last year I was so lucky to get to direct an episode with so much going on, I had a funeral which was really a cheek - the writers having fun and it was a pretend funeral that was induced by me shooting myself up with pain meds because my back was out and so I imagined the funeral of HankMed.

Then I had a car chase where Divya and Jill were chasing the guy who stole Divya's china. And then I also had to perform like some (stick) with my bad back. But I also got to add my favorite part which was a hip hop video in which Van Dyke and Evan are working so excellently together that they pull up in Van Dyke's bad ass Cadillac and get out. And I had all these slow motion shots of Van Dyke's feet coming out of the car, Evan popping his collar and flicking Van Dyke's hair.

And anyway, it was like a paradise for a guy who has only directed Web videos and rap videos that I've made with my buddies. And I got to include all of that stuff that is me bringing myself to the table as a director. And I hope to do it again. I'm in prep right now. You're talking to me having just picked a location for a bar scene and going on to audition actors to play a thug in that bar scene.

And just to be able to spread my wings and make creative decision that I never get to make is a great gift. But the fact that it might open the door to another career for me in this business is a gift I cannot describe my gratitude about getting.

QUESTION: The doctor who helps with Jack, will she be coming back in the story line?

MARK FEUERSTEIN: That's a funny question that you ask. And I love that you asked it. I love that actress. Her name is Joanna Garcia. She played the nephrologist for Jack O'Malley. And she is not only the most lovely individual as a person, in fact, I ran into her in L.A. with my wife who wrote a pilot (unintelligible) and Joanna just went off on my wife's pilot, which had nothing to do with her. She said it's the best pilot of the year, I wish you the best of luck with it, I would have killed to be in it. But she's doing her own show.

Anyway, couldn't - I can't say enough nice things about her, not to mention that her husband is Nick Swisher, who the day after the Yankees lost the World Series came to our set. Spent like three hours sitting in the prop room signing anywhere from 50 to 100 baseballs for all of the crew. He's the nicest guy.

Anyway, I loved her character. I loved that she was so kind and considerate about Jack's health. And it was a great potential love interest for Hank. I think because Joanna Garcia has so much going on in her career going forward, TV shows and movies and her life as a charitable person who is involved in so many great causes, and I think - I guess she's based in New York.

Anyway, I think just because of the way it works in television where we never know where people are and how they're going to fit into the universe of Royal Pains, she may not be on the show any time soon. But I would be thrilled if they decided to bring back Dr. Greene for any episode in the coming years of Royal Pains.

SCIFI VISION: In the finale last season you had kind of a lot of emotional scenes with Jack and everything. Did you have a hard time getting into that mindset?

MARK FEUERSTEIN: You know, once you have children it changes your entire emotional outlook on life. And when I'm acting those scenes with Tom Cavanagh who I love and it hardly took a lot for me to pretend to care about this character. Because I care so much about Tom Cavanagh as a person. And he and I both share that we have - well, he had three children at the time, as did I. Now he has four children so he's one-upped me yet again. Which, he has so many ways just by his sheer handsomeness and talent.

But I love the guy. And so thinking about him, thinking about his children, thinking about what it would be like if he really were sick and really wasn't going to make it as a patient with lupus, which is what he played, that was all I had to think about to get me into the right mindset of those scenes. But then to think if it were me, you know, then I'm a lost cause. Because I'm thinking about my children growing up without a father and you can imagine where one goes, emotionally once you start having those thoughts.

I just find it such a tribute to our writing staff, led by Andrew Lenchewski and Michael Rauch that after three years of Hank's perfect medical record they decided to, you know, invest in the stock of credibility for this medical operation. And not just have Hank kind of miss on a tertiary character, (unintelligible), but could take the main guest star of Season 3, Jack O'Malley, and let him die, which is a reality.

Lupus affects, you know, millions across this country and the world. And have him die is a way of saying to the audience, look, this is real. This is medicine. This is authentic and this is what happens sometimes, even to a character you love.

SCIFI VISION: So you talked about you'd like to have Sarah Shahi on the show and everything. What other USA shows would you like to be on if you could be on another one?

MARK FEUERSTEIN: Well, I have to say that Gabriel Macht and I did a play together in L.A. years ago. So to be on Suits with him would be an incredible reunion. But also I love Callie Thorne who was on Royal Pains Season 1 and who I did a movie with years ago. So I would love to be on Necessary Roughness in addition to the crossover that I'm going to be doing with Sarah Shahi.

So I just feel like there's a movie waiting to be made with all of us actors together. And it's kind of like the Avengers meets the USA Network.

QUESTION: Are there any particular patients of the week from previous seasons that you'd like to see reappear?

MARK FEUERSTEIN: Yes, absolutely. I mean, honestly I feel like every week on our show we're saying, oh yeah, we could read that. You could be the person in the Hamptons we always go to for party planning, for clothing, for whatever it is. And honestly, it's like there's not an actor who's been on our show I can't think of that I wouldn't want back. But off the top of my head, I can tell you that like if it was Big Show, who is from the WWE who played a guy who had zinc poisoning.

And let me just mention that when I was in Georgia shooting the premier of Royal Pains for this season, we ran into a girl who had watched the episode where the Big Show's character gets zinc poisoning and diagnosed her father with zinc poisoning because of the episode. Her father had dentures and used that paste that had zinc in it and she brought it to the doctor and they figured out that that is exactly what her father was suffering from.

So no end to the practicality of Royal Pains. But that aside, I'd love to bring back Big Show, I'd love to bring back Callie Thorne, I'd love to bring back Judy Greer and Ashley Williams, and Constance Zimmer and (Jennifer Fearon). And there are so many actors. David Harbour. So many actors, you name it, I wish they were back on the show. And maybe someday there will be an episode - I tried to do it in my episode that I directed.

In the funeral we placed several of the actors who had been on the show before, but I dream of an episode where we get to like have a huge HankMed party and had like literally every guest star come back. But their agents may not be as supportive.

It would be fun, though.