1. ER was initially intended to be a movie back in 1974, with Steven Spielberg set to direct a script penned by Michael Crichton, which would be “a documentary-style movie about what happened during 24 hours in an emergency room” based on his experience as a med student in Boston. Alas, it never ended up happening, with the project shelved for almost 20 years before NBC expressed interest in making it a TV series.
2. While Carol would go onto become one of the show’s most beloved characters, she was never intended to be in any episodes beyond the pilot, as the original script had Margulies’ character dying. But after test audiences responded well to the nurse, a dubbed line was added in to explain how she survived her suicide attempt.
3. But Margulies has since revealed it was actually Clooney who “saved” her career by convincing her to stay on ER and not join a CBS sitcom that was courting her, with The Good Wife star explaining, “He called me out of the blue, kinda put his neck out on the line for me, and said, ‘I overheard that your character tested well…If I were you, I wouldn’t take another job because I think they’re going to bring you back to life.”
