Zach Braff Says There’s More ‘Pressure’ on the “Scrubs” Revival: ‘We’re the Bosses Now’ (Exclusive)
Zach Braff Says There’s More ‘Pressure’ on the “Scrubs” Revival: ‘We’re the Bosses Now’ (Exclusive)
Meredith WilshereSat, October 3, 2026 at 1:29 PM UTC
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Donald Faison and Zach Braff in ScrubsCredit: ABC -
Donald Faison says the cast wants season 2 to surpass the revival’s first season for longtime fans
Sarah Chalke says reuniting with friends of 25 years makes the comedy feel creatively freeing
The revival’s second season airs on ABC and streams the following day on Hulu
Zach Braff understands there’s a lot of pressure on him and his costars to make a great season 2 of Scrubs. When talking to PEOPLE about season 2, he says the biggest difference between making the show now versus 25 years ago when it first aired is that “it’s on our shoulders now.”
“It used to be we had this sugar daddy named Bill Lawrence, and we just showed up, and this brilliant showrunner told us what to say. We did our best to make it funny, and then he did everything else,” Braff, 51, says.
Braff would go on to direct a few episodes himself, but he admits that “we didn’t have the weight of making this work on our shoulders like we do now.”
“Every single scene we do, we all know has to be great. We have to do the team bonding and the cast bonding and make sure that everyone’s behaving themselves and making sure that we turn up prepared. We’re the bosses now with some great help from people like Aseem Batra, who’s our showrunner, but the pressure is way more on us now than it used to be,” Braff admits.
Braff’s co-star and best friend on and off screen, Donald Faison, shares that he feels “the pressure now, whereas before I was just there to do my job, but now I feel the pressure.”
“Season 1 was great. Season 2 has to be better,” Faison, 52, shares. “We want it to be better for the fans mostly, but for us also. I use sci-fi analogies, but Star Wars came out, and it was a good movie, but then Empire Strikes Back took it to another level, and we want to do that type of thing. Aliens was a good movie. Alien was a good movie, but Aliens was a great one. We want to do that as we continue forward.”
Scrubs ran for nine seasons, from 2001 to 2010. The show returned for season 1 of the revival in 2025. The show features the return of several original cast members and characters, including Braff as Dr. John “J.D.” Dorian, Faison as Dr. Christopher Turk, Sarah Chalke as Dr. Elliot Reid, John C. McGinley as Dr. Perry Cox, Judy Reyes as head nurse Carla Espinosa, Phill Lewis as Hooch and Robert Maschio as Dr. Todd ‘The Todd’ Quinlan.
The show also added new cast members Ava Bunn, Amanda Morrow, Layla Mohammadi, Jacob Dudman, David Gridley and Vanessa Bayer.
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Chalke, 50, reflects on reuniting the cast and asks, “When do you get to work with people that you’ve known for 25 years?”
“We had such a good experience in the first round; it was eight years, and to get to do it again with your friends is so lucky,” she says.
Scrubs castCredit: Darko Sikman/Disney
She says that what’s changed between the shows is “we’ve just had so much more life” and “these guys make me laugh harder than anyone.”
“In good times, in hard times, they just have always been there for me,” Chalke reflects.
She tells PEOPLE, “It’s super lucky just as friends, but also to do a show, a comedy where you’re doing with your friends, it ends up being really great because you feel like you can do anything.”
“If you screw up, if you try something that’s ridiculous, nobody will care. So I feel like it frees you up to actually try anything. I think that’s where the cool stuff happens in comedy, so it feels super lucky,” Chalke shares.
Season 2 of Scrubs is airing now on ABC and streams the next day on Hulu.
on People
Source: “AOL Entertainment”
