Wendi McLendon-Covey Says Filming St. Denis Medical After The Goldbergs Felt Like 'Cheating on My Family' (Exclusive)

Wendi McLendon-Covey couldn’t help but think of her TV family as she began filming the upcoming NBC sitcom, St. Denis Medical.

The 55-year-old actress tells PEOPLE that working on the new workplace mockumentary felt like “cheating on my family” after starring as matriarch Beverly Goldberg on The Goldbergs for 10 seasons.

“It was so hard because while I was in negotiations for this and filming this pilot, I was also on a goodbye tour of shutting down The Goldbergs, and that was heartbreaking for me,” she says of the series, which came to an end in May 2023. “I loved that show. I loved all those people, and it did feel really, really strange.” 

“I'm grateful that I have this opportunity, but the way it overlapped, it was a little bit weird for me,” she adds.

However, the Bridesmaids star embraced her role as Joyce, the executive director of the hospital, on St. Denis Medical, which follows “the employees of an underfunded and understaffed hospital in Oregon. Like real-life medical professionals, the characters come to work every day trying to balance their innate desire to do their very best to help people with their innate desire to not lose their own sanity,” according to an official synopsis.

McLendon-Covey admits that she “never played a person like Joyce" before landing the part on the sitcom.

“I just came off of 10 years on The Goldbergs and I knew I probably don't want to play another mom right away,” she shares. “So I love Joyce. She's a bit of a mess. She is not a nurturer at all, so that's fun because my other character was so much like that, but I love that she does not want to be touched. Don't hug her.”

The Reno 911! alum describes the character as “a former oncologist," who is now "a hospital administrator, which means she works her butt off more than 40 hours a week trying to drum up funds.” 

“She's in constant fundraising mode, and she's just bubbling under the surface,” she adds. “She's going to explode at some point, and so I love playing people like that who are trying to hide their real emotions.”

The show also gave McLendon-Covey the opportunity to team up with David Alan Grier, who plays ER doctor Ron.

“I was just so thrilled that I get to work with David Alan Grier,” she says. “I've been a fan for years and years, so while we were shooting the pilot, I would get so nervous just sitting next to him and being like, 'Oh my God, I hope he finds me funny. I hope he doesn't think I'm an amateur.'"

As for their characters' story arcs on the show, she hopes that viewers get insight into the early days of their relationship.

“My character and his character, we have a long history and I hope that at some point we can do some flashback episodes,” she says. “So we can see what they looked like back in the 90s or whatever when they were first coming up.”

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St. Denis Medical premieres with two back-to-back episodes on Tuesday, Nov. 12 at 8 p.m. ET on NBC.