Amazon Orders Animated Comedy from Maya Rudolph and Natasha Lyonne: “The Hospital”

The Hospital¸ an adult animated sci-fi comedy from Maya Rudolph and Natasha Lyonne’s Animal Pictures has been given a two-season order. The series, created and written by Cirocco Dunlap (Russian Doll), will feature Rudolph and Lyonne as part of the voice cast, along with Kieran Culkin, Keke Palmer, Greta Lee, and Sam Smith. The series has been in production at Amazon Studios since 2020 and will premiere exclusively on Amazon’s Prime Video.

The series will follow alien surgeons and best friends Sleech (voiced by Lee) and Klak (voiced by Palmer) who take on the most challenging cases in the galaxy, no matter the risk.

Rudolph said of Dunlap:

Cirocco is a total original. Brilliant and wildly talented with an utterly singular voice and boundless imagination. She’s also ridiculously funny and finds the most unexpected ways to make you laugh while exploring complex existential questions! It has been a thrill to watch her nurture the seed of an idea and grow it into two seasons so beautifully.

About the series itself, Amazon Studios’s head of global television, Vernon Sanders said:

The Hospital is the perfect example of the fresh and unique programming we get so excited to deliver to our global Prime Video customers. Cirocco’s humor and clever characters will entertain in any galaxy. We are thrilled to have this special project join our growing adult animated slate.

No release date has been set for the series.

The character descriptions released by Amazon are:

• Keke Palmer (Alice, Hustlers, Nope) will voice-star as Dr. Klak, a brilliant, multi-eyed surgeon who spends her down time feeding her sentient plants, obsessively reviewing past failures, and watching hit show My Lover, My Clonewith her best friend Dr. Sleech.
• Greta Lee (Past Lives, The Morning Show) will voice-star as Dr. Sleech, a reckless, cocky surgeon whose main saving graces are her genius, her well-oiled lizard tail, and her unconditional love for her best friend Dr. Klak.
• Natasha Lyonne (Russian Doll, DC League of Super-Pets) will voice-star as Nurse Tup, a playful nihilist with chameleon flesh who thrives in the chaos of the Hospital. Nurse Tup expertly navigates every accidental apocalypse created by renegade doctors Sleech and Klak, and looks good doing it.
• Maya Rudolph (Saturday Night Live, Big Mouth) will voice-star as Dr. Vlam, a robot intern who has been alive for at least 20,000 years. She’s had every career you can think of—king, thief, stay-at-home mom of 500—and is a true testament to hard work. All you need to succeed is roughly 850 years of free time.
• Kieran Culkin (Succession) will voice-star as Dr. Plowp, a surgeon, an empath, and an adult experiencing puberty. He has a love-hate relationship with Sleech, constantly feels everyone’s feelings, and has four identical brothers with whom he shared an egg.
• Sam Smith(Singer/songwriter – Spectre, Pitch Perfect 2) will voice-star as Dr. Azel, a galactically-renowned surgeon with ambiguous morals and six well-manicured feet.

Photo: The Hospital. Courtesy of Amazon Studios.