When it comes to today’s television options, one does not need to look far to find one having to do with either cops/crime or medical emergencies/professionals. Most of these are a waste of everyone’s time, and, because of the overabundance of these shows, it takes quite the sales pitch to make one of them worth keeping an eye on.

So here’s the sales pitch for one such show titled The Knick: a medical drama set in New York in the year 1900 from Academy Award winning director Steven Soderbergh (Traffic, Ocean’s Eleven) and Oscar nominated actor Clive Owen (Closer, Children of Men) that will air on the far less restricted Cinemax.

Curious? Click on over to the other side to read a synopsis and check out the unsettling trailer for The Knick to get a much better idea of what to expect.

SYNOPSIS:

Set in downtown New York in 1900, ‘The Knick’ is a new Cinemax drama series from Academy Award and Emmy-winning director Steven Soderbergh. It is centered on the Knickerbocker Hospital and the groundbreaking surgeons, nurses and staff who work there, pushing the bounds of medicine in a time of astonishingly high mortality rates and zero antibiotics. Soderbergh directs all 10 episodes of the series’ first season.

Academy Award and Emmy nominee Clive Owen stars as Doctor John Thackery, a brilliant surgeon pioneering new methods in the field, despite nursing a severe addiction to cocaine. He leads a team of doctors including his protégé Dr. Everett Gallinger; the young Dr. Bertie Chickering Jr.; and Algernon Edwards, a promising surgeon who’s been recently thrust upon him. The lively cast of characters at the hospital also includes Cornelia Robertson, the daughter of its benefactor; surly ambulance driver Tom Cleary; Lucy Elkins, a fresh-faced nurse from the country; the crooked manager Herman Barrow; and Sister Harriet, a nun with who isn’t afraid to speak her mind.

The writing team of Jack Amiel and Michael Begler (“Raising Helen,” “Big Miracle”), who wrote the pilot for the series, serve as executive producers, along with Soderbergh, Owen, Michael Sugar (“Rendition”) and Gregory Jacobs (“Behind the Candelabra”). Michael Polaire (“Behind the Candelabra”) produces; Steven Katz (“Behind the Candelabra”) is a consulting producer.

Trailer