A Brief History Of Andy Daly Playing A Doctor On Your Favorite Comedies

ABC/HBO

It’s not always easy to find a good show to watch. Yes, of course, there are many options. So many options. Too many, even. It actually makes the whole process more difficult sometimes because you just have so much to sort through. It’s especially true of comedies because — unlike a drama, which can latch onto a premise and start out interesting — they often take half of a season to really hit a groove. It would be better if there was some kind of guide or, like, a shorthand you can use to find a winner. And guess what: there kind of is. Just look for any show that features Andy Daly as a doctor.

You know Andy Daly. If you don’t, you should. He’s the best. His Comedy Central series, Review, was incredible and dark and side-splitting. His podcast, The Andy Daly Podcast Pilot Project, is consistently bizarre and hilarious, and his guest spots on Comedy Bang Bang are must-listens. He’s played a principal in everything from Modern Family to Eastbound and Down. But mostly, he pops up as a doctor in shows you probably like.

It’s one of those things, you know The things where you notice it once and then it happens again and again and the next thing you know you’re like “Hmm, this seems like the kind of show that would have Andy Daly as a doctor” and then, boom, there he is. This is hyperbole, but barely. He’s appeared as a doctor on five different television shows now, four of which I’ve listed below and one of which — Adult Swim’s Mr. Pickles — I have omitted both because I am not familiar with it and because I could not grab a screencap that didn’t feature his animated character’s hand way up an elderly man’s rectum. I stand by this decision completely.

Daly, for his part, is aware of all this. The New York Post did a short article on this phenomenon a few years ago — back when he only had three doctor roles under his belt — and Daly said “It was told to me that I was going to be a doctor, but it was not until I put the lab coat on that I went, ‘Oh, this is turning into a thing now.’” Yup, it is a thing. And I have the proof. Presented below, please find his roles listed in order of number of appearances (as of publication), which I am doing mostly in the hopes that someone in Hollywood come to their senses and give him a starring role as a doctor someday soon. No one is more qualified. Here, look.

Silicon Valley

Character: “Doctor”

Number of appearances: 8

His role on Silicon Valley is probably his best-known, in part because he’s made more appearances on this show than the others combined and in part because he steals all of the short scenes he’s in, which makes it even funnier that this is the only character on this list that does not have an actual name. He’s just listed as “Doctor” on IMDb. This will not do. The character needs a name. I vote for…hmm, let’s go with Dr. Ned Bermuda.

Anyway, there are other clips of this character out there and I recommend watching them all. He’s an awful doctor. It’s not the quality of his advice, either. This is not a Leo Spaceman situation. He just has zero bedside manner. This will become a theme.

Black-ish

Character: Dr. Evan Windsor

Number of appearances: 4

Hey, look. It’s Andy Daly as a doctor on network television. That’s notable because all of the other shows on this list are on cable or streaming. This feels… weird. Still good, or at least fine, but network television doesn’t give him quite the freedom to go dark with it all that the other outlets do. There’s something just utterly delightful about hearing awful, messed up things coming out of that sweet face. But still, this character’s first appearance involved a mini-rant about his malpractice lawyer, given in front of a patient. We will take it.

Lady Dynamite

Character: Dr. Achter

Number of appearances: 1

Lady Dynamite was funny and I’m sad it got canceled. I’m also sad it got canceled because we only got to meet Daly’s Dr. Achter once. Yes, in that one meeting he did try to diagnose Maria Bamford’s character with a mental illness and, yes, he did describe the neck of a character played by Dean Cain as “broken like a motherfucker,” which is pretty efficient for a one-off, but it only makes me sad that it’s all we have.

Big Mouth

Character: Dr. Wendy Engle

Number of appearances: 1

In season two of Big Mouth, Nick Kroll’s character heads to the pediatrician because he’s worried about his slowly developing body. When the shot cut to show the doctor’s face (I swear this is true), I thought to myself “Man, this guy looks like a character Andy Daly would voice.” And, as soon as the character started talking and promptly launched into a deranged rant about his wife that was inappropriate to deliver to a child or anyone, I realized I was right. Congrats to me and congrats to Big Mouth and congrats to Andy Daly.

We all did it, man.