Review: Marcia Gay Harden serves as the beating heart of medical retread ‘Code Black’

For the love of God, can’t someone give Marcia Gay Harden a leading role in a good hourlong drama? How hard can this be?

There are more new scripted shows than anyone knows what to do with appearing on platforms that didn’t exist 15 minutes ago. And yet the best anyone can offer an Oscar-winning performer who enriches any series in which she appears is the overstuffed, underdone CBS medical series “Code Black,� which premieres Wednesday.

Hollywood, please.

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Not that there’s anything wrong with a medical series; even in these days of artsy-fartsy television, few templates are so sturdy and satisfying. Certainly the timing is right; there hasn’t been a new hospital-centric hit since the one-two punch of “House� and “Grey’s Anatomy� premiered more than a decade ago, giving chase to “ER.�

Unfortunately, “Code Black� appears to have emerged from a pitch meeting in which executive producer Michael Seitzman simply repeated those names over and over, louder and faster until the CBS executives yelled: “Fine! Whatever! See if you can get Marcia Gay Harden to do it, because she’s good in everything!�

“Code Black� opens with a Greysian group of residents being shepherded through their first day by a tough but good-hearted senior ER nurse, Jesse (Luis Guzman), who refers to himself as their mama, as in “Mama sees everything.� He suggests they ask Mama their questions because they will be too afraid to ask “Daddy.�

“Who’s Daddy,� one of them asks with carefully directed timidity, just as we don’t all know that “Daddy� is Harden’s Dr. Leanne Rorish, a brilliant, broken bulldozer who snaps where others talk and saves lives in double-quick time, often using only power tools and super-cold water.

Which is a darn good thing because the hospital for which she works, Angels Memorial, takes great pride in its catastrophic overcrowding. The show’s title refers to the moment the demands of an ER outstrip its resources. This apparently happens 300 days a year at ol’ Angels Memorial, and everyone is OK with that.

Obviously, this creates a built-in breakneck pace and many opportunities for Dr. Rorish to display her throw-’em-in-the-deep-end, rule-breaking teaching technique. But it’s hard not to agree with the more cautious Dr. Hudson (Raza Jaffrey) when he suggests that it might be better if everyone just calmed the heck down.

Yes, yes, it certainly would, at least for the patients. Of three young people brought back from the brink of death by extreme measures in the pilot, two are initially endangered by the divided attentions of the staff. (A third storyline involves a resident performing a delicate procedure on a young boy while the parents watch.)

So while the inevitable “well, at least we didn’t kill anyone� denouement might work as a newbie narrative device, it seems very cavalier considering what just went down. (I am not even going to mention the horrifying birth scene in which No One appears to give two figs about the mother. OK, I am.) Given the current political smackdown over healthcare, the show’s central belief that a single remarkable surgeon can save a clearly broken system is more than a little alarming.

Potential viewers of “Code Black� might feel the same way, for the very same reasons. Harden is terrific because she is always terrific and she has a few fine professionals to hand — Guzman gives the show heart, Jaffrey can do more with the character than he’s initially been given and, as ER director, Kevin Dunn regularly lightens the mood.

If only the residents didn’t seem to have been swept up from the Shonda Rhimes cutting room. Christa (Bonnie Somerville) is damaged, determined and, apparently, a little old to be a resident, or so we are told by the Alex-obnoxious Mario (Benjamin Hollingsworth). As Angus, Harry M. Ford is the George of the piece, with Malaya (Melanie Chandra) its Cristina Yang — the back stories are different, but the nice-but-nervous versus obsessed-with-early-success vibe is not.

Overlaid with “Vice�-like shots of panic and bloody aftermath, “Code Black� wants the soap and sentiment of “Grey’s� along with the broken-but-driven main character of “House.� Unfortunately, the writing lacks the conviction of either series, and so viewers are left with Harden, dancing just as fast as she can.

It may be enough in the long run, but a woman that good should not have to work this hard.

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‘Code Black’

Where: CBS

When: 10 p.m. Wednesday

Rating: TV-14 (may be unsuitable for children under the age of 14)

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