Robert Chase

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Dr. Robert Chase

First appearance	"Pilot"
Information
Occupation	Diagnostic Medicine Fellow
Family	Dr. Rowan Chase (father; deceased) Mrs. Chase (mother; deceased)
Relationships	Dr. Allison Cameron (lovers)
Portrayed by	Jesse Spencer

Robert Chase, M.D. is a fictional character on the Fox medical drama House. He is played by Jesse Spencer.

Chase has a fellowship under the supervision of Dr. Gregory House and specializes in intensive care.

Spoiler warning: Plot and/or ending details follow.

He is the longest-serving member of House's staff, despite being a young doctor – reportedly 26 years old at the start of the show (cf. "Cursed"), although he says he is 30 in the episode "Autopsy": this is hinted at in an episode where he describes details of previous work with House to Dr. Eric Foreman, citing himself as speaking to the doctor that was around before Dr. Allison Cameron.

Chase is very attached to his job, and was willing to go to immoral lengths to keep it when it became threatened by Princeton-Plainsboro Teaching Hospital Chief of Staff Edward Vogler in Season One. He leaked the details of House's rather unconventional (and sometimes illegal) style of solving cases to Vogler over the course of five episodes, leading to a major rift between him and House when discovered – although House seemed to have suspected him from the beginning.

House says in the pilot episode that he only hired Chase because his father made a call, but considering Chase and his father had a horrible relationship, and adding in House's personality, this might not be the case. In the episode "No Reason," House, while hallucinating, is startled by a quick diagnosis on Chase's part, but covers by saying that he "wouldn't have hired him if he wasn't smart." This earns the sarcastic response from Jack Moriarty, "Right. 'Cause you've got nothing but respect for him," which becomes particularly worthy of note when "Moriarty's" identity is revealed. In any case, Chase and House have a highly complicated relationship.

In the differential diagnosis that takes place in every show, Chase's suggestions almost always tie into something the patient of the week has done to themselves, usually due to drugs or risky behavior. It could be argued this is driven by his own past experiences with self-destructive behavior, a want to please House, or a combination of both. Chase is often the only one to show amusement at his boss' callous jokes.

Early on in Season Three, Michael Tritter, a driven cop attempting to convict House of drug possession, sets Chase up to look as if he betrayed House. Chase responds by stepping up his loyalty to his boss, but during this, House is going through painful drug withdrawal and takes much of his anger out on convenient targets, Chase included. When Chase physically tries to stop him from leaving the hospital (to prevent House from making a fatal mistake regarding a patient), House snaps and punches him in the face, knocking him to the floor. An irate and bruised Chase seems ready to wash his hands of House at last, vowing to Dr. James Wilson that he will not wait for his mentor's approval anymore.

Chase seems to have a soft spot for child patients; this leads to a dilemma in the episode "Autopsy" where a dying nine-year old girl asks him for a kiss before she dies. He had a bond with another nine-year old in the episode "Cursed," said a heartfelt prayer before performing an autopsy of an infant he failed to save (cf. "Forever"), pretends to pull an alien chip out of a young boy in the episode "Cane and Able," and is frequently asking parents about their young children and dealing with kids.

[edit] Biography

Chase's life has been gradually illustrated throughout the series. He appears to be from a wealthy Australian family (of probably Czech descent; in the episode "Cursed," House speculated that his father's accent is "Czech with about 30 years Aussie," which the father confirms; Jesse Spencer is Australian himself), and has also had a rough relationship with his father, Rowan, a famous doctor in his own right, as Chase talks to House about trying to mend the gap with his father many times, but finding his father simply didn't care.

Eventually, Rowan Chase is revealed to have left the family when Robert was a teenager, which gave his son no other option but to care alone for his alcoholic mother until her death, a good five years later which was approximinately ten years before Damned If You Do. In "Cursed," Rowan visits the hospital claiming he is in town for a conference, but close observation of his behavior allows House to deduce that there is no conference and in reality, Rowan is dying from terminal lung cancer. Rowan was at the hospital to visit Dr. James Wilson, a cancer specialist. Initially, Robert is intensely frustrated with his father's presence, but offers to buy his father a drink at the end of the episode. Rowan declines, and leaves without ever revealing to Robert of his condition. In the Season Two episode "The Mistake," the audience learns that Chase's father died about two months after the visit in "Cursed."

Chase has also hinted in the second season that he is now no longer well-off, since he had started working in NICU while taking his paid vacation time in House's department, receiving twice his usual salary. Upon learning that Chase has been putting in extra hours, House speculates that Chase must have been cut out of his inheritance after his father's death. Chase neither confirms nor denies this hypothesis. However, in the Season Three episode "Finding Judas," he admits that his father left him out of his will, and that he harbors ill will towards Rowan once more.

In Damned If You Do, Chase reveals to a patient that he attended a seminary, quoting 1 Peter 1:7. This aspect of his life was shown again in the episode "Forever," when he said a prayer for the soul of a baby who died under his care. In Season Two, Chase willingly had sex with his coworker, Dr. Allison Cameron, while she was high on methamphetamine; this was further complicated by the fact that he knew she might have been infected with HIV (which had led to the drug use). It has also been alluded to that he has been into BDSM in the past, although he says that his familiarity with the scene was only because he was dating a banker who liked rough sex. (cf. "Love Hurts")

[edit] Trivia

Within a popular comparison which draws parallels between Dr. Gregory House and Sir Arthur Conan Doyle's Sherlock Holmes, Chase takes on the role of one of the members of the Baker Street Irregulars, characters that might run odd tasks for Holmes in the course of his investigations to aid in uncovering truth.
He is the doctor who will usually perform tracheotomies when needed, and is the one who normally deals with patient seizures in Season One.
Chase believes in the existence of aliens (cf. "Cane and Able").