‘Er’ Doctor’s Personality Undergoing Changes

Dr. Peter Benton has often served as the designated self-righteous stick-in-the-mud on “ER.”

That affords Eriq La Salle lots of dramatic opportunities to play the thin-skinned medical egotist. Folks with faults are more interesting characters.

But La Salle also sensed a need to expand Benton’s sometimes narrow emotional horizons. And that has been happening as the “ER” season rolls toward its climax tonight.

Now Dr. Benton has got a brand new bag of fatherhood to worry about. His girlfriend, Carla (Lisa Nicole Carson), just had his baby, although complications affected the birth.

“Now we get to see a little tiny life and how it changes this man who’s so used to standing on the (medical) mountain and taking on any challenge,” La Salle said. “I think this little baby is going to take him for a trip.”

It’s not just the parenting thing that has brought about changes in Benton’s uptight, aloof personality. Both La Salle and Noah Wyle pushed for a change in the rancorous relationship between the bossy Benton and Wyle’s young Dr. Carter.

“I just like not taking the obvious road,” said La Salle, referring to his character’s development and the perpetual Benton-Carter blowups that were staples in the earlier seasons of “ER.”

“I think this was a very good year for my character,” said La Salle, mentioning both the fatherhood story line and the softening of the Benton-Carter battles. Minus the usual bitter friction, the two doctors assisted on a kidney transplant in a recent episode.

In the past, their interaction “was consistently antagonistic,” La Salle said.

A Shakespearean-trained actor and theater arts graduate of New York University, La Salle brings some of those same attributes to the TV screen in his performance as Dr. Benton. Classy, educated and strong. And as his character gains a new perspective on life through parenthood, becoming less self-absorbed, Dr. Benton’s dignity can only grow.