Instead of giving its doctors and nurses several seasons to evolve, the second season of “The Pitt” jumped 10 months into the future. This allowed the actors the unusual opportunity to explore new facets of their characters. For Shawn Hatosy, Gerran Howell and Patrick Ball, each nominated for an Emmy for supporting actor in a drama series, that meant very different performances.

At the end of Season 1, Ball’s Dr. Frank Langdon was forced to depart the hospital after Dr. Michael “Robby” Robinavitch (Noah Wyle) discovered his drug addiction. Season 2, set on the Fourth of July, marks his first day back after rehab.

“It was a great dramatic problem for me,” Ball says, speaking with Howell and Hatosy over Zoom from Los Angeles. “He’s been out of the Pitt and going through this profound spiritual transition and hasn’t seen anyone for 10 months. He has to come back and reestablish these relationships. He realizes over the course of the season that, actually, everybody here has changed.”

Howell’s Dr. Dennis Whitaker has become more confident. In fact, he seems to be having a better day than his co-workers, particularly Robby, whose mental health is on the brink of collapse.

Gerran Howell.

(Ian Spanier / For The Times)

“Whitaker isn’t witnessing any of what’s going on with Robby,” Howell says. “He’s found his flow in this very turbulent environment. But it’s not necessarily a healthy way of dealing with it. People are leaning on him, but you never see him ask other characters for help.”

Ball adds, “Whitaker is now occupying this space that [Langdon] once occupied as the golden boy. But being the golden boy isn’t actually a healthy seat to be in.”

Howell notes that the characters don’t necessarily change over the course of a season. “A lot of it happens in between seasons,” he says. “It’s a really gradual thing that the audience gets to understand as we go along. They have to figure out what’s changed.”

“You’re not going to have a grand catharsis or a life-changing turn,” Ball says. “But profound beginnings can happen. You see that for Langdon. In Season 1 he is very ego-forward. But he has gone away and realized, ‘I am probably the worst.’ The beginning of that revelation happens for Langdon in Season 2.”

Hatosy, who plays night-shift attending Dr. Jack Abbot, remembers getting a call from [creator] R. Scott Gemmill about Episode 7 and worrying that his character might be in peril. Instead, Gemmill outlined a storyline that revealed Abbot’s work as a SWAT medic.

(Ian Spanier/For The Times)

“It’s not too different than Robby’s self-diagnosis of taking a motorcycle journey across the country without a helmet,” Hatosy says. “Abbot is seemingly doing this work, but there’s a lot of red flags there. I started the first episode [of the show] on the roof, literally about to jump, so I’m never sure when he’s going to come in and not make it.”

Being part of “The Pitt” has helped Hatosy let go of the need to know everything about his character or the story ahead of time. “There is something incredibly freeing about not knowing and being present,” he says. “I’ve given up asking because I don’t really want to know. Instead, I accept it and go with the flow.”

Although the characters were dealing with new challenges in Season 2, all of the actors felt more at ease, both with the unknown and with the structure. Ball had come from a theater background and had no television experience before “The Pitt.” The show is filmed on two handheld, constantly moving cameras with complex choreography required of the cast.

“I had absolutely no ability to process all that,” Ball says. “Now that we’re into filming Season 3, I am becoming aware that this has been quite an educational process because I can feel it now. I’m starting to see the chessboard.”

For Season 1, the actors underwent a five-day medical boot camp to learn terminology and procedures, and to ask real-world doctors any questions they might have. They had a shorter edition ahead of Season 2.

“We were thrown into the deep end,” Howell says. “It was lots of horrific videos. But those doctors instantly put it in perspective how important it was to them that this show was going to shine a light on something. You could feel in the room how important it was for us to get it right.”

“The show was pretty clear from the beginning that it was not going to be here to be a crowd-pleaser and have the romantic through lines and have all the archetypes of hooking up in closets,” Ball adds. “It was going to prioritize authenticity of medicine and authenticity of representation. The word ‘documentarian’ was thrown around a lot. We wanted there to be a conversation around mental health with Robby and a conversation around addiction.”

Ball grew up seeing firsthand the effect being a medical professional can have. His mom is an ER nurse, and his dad is a paramedic.

(Ian Spanier / For The Times)

“I was on the phone with my parents a few days ago talking about how they had lost a dear friend who is an ER doctor who took his own life,” Ball says. “That was a real reminder of why we make this show. Being on a hit TV show and having a bunch of nominations can become primary. But this is not about nominations or trophies or views. There’s a mission to what we’re doing.”

“It’s opening up this conversation about the fragility and how dysfunctional this healthcare system is and how hard it is for these doctors and healthcare workers to navigate their way through it,” Hatosy adds.

In the world of “The Pitt,” everything is a group effort. It’s the same with the show itself. Out of 25 total Emmy nominations, 13 are for acting, which Hatosy says make it feel like “less of an individual achievement.”

“We get to go through it as a true ensemble,” Ball says. “When it’s over, we’ll be Emmy nominees forever. But while we’re here, we are still just one of ‘The Pitt’ crew, which is a really rare and awesome way to go through this moment.”