‘9-1-1’: Ryan Guzman Talks ‘Risky Business’ Dance, New Version of Eddie Going Forward

[Warning: The below contains MAJOR spoilers for 9-1-1 Season 8 Episode 6 “Confessions.”]

So long, mustache. Hello, new Eddie (Ryan Guzman)!

The latest 9-1-1 starts with Eddie in a confessional, but it turns out what he really needs is to talk to the priest (the returning Gavin Stenhouse) outside of the church. It’s after the two cross paths and the priest talks to him about needing to stop punishing himself and finding some joy that Eddie takes those words to heart, shaves off his mustache (it was something like a disguise, and he couldn’t have a beard as a firefighter), and pays homage to Risky Business with a dance around his living room.

TV Insider spoke with Guzman about that dance, Eddie moving forward, and much more. Plus, read what showrunner Tim Minear had to say about this episode’s big moments, including Eddie, Buck (Oliver Stark) and Tommy’s (Lou Ferrigno Jr.) breakup, and Maddie (Jennifer Love Hewitt) and Chimney’s (Kenneth Choi) happy news here.

We have to start with that Risky Business dance because it was great to see you dancing again. Talk about filming that.

Ryan Guzman: It was just so much fun. I honestly don’t know if I’ve danced like that on screen in almost a decade. So it was fun to step back into that little version of myself. It was Eddie meets Ryan kind of a little bit, but I wanted to show the difference. It wasn’t going to be Step Up, it wasn’t going to be a perfect choreographed dance. I wanted to show Eddie just in his utmost childlike behavior and just really falling into himself and having a great time with it. So it was fun, really fun.

It was great to see him smile because my heart has been breaking for him all season. It seems like the priest said what he needed to hear, but why do you think it was a priest who he needed to hear that from rather than Bobby, Buck, or anyone else in his life?

I think sometimes when you’re too close to the person, the message doesn’t really hold. So it does take a third party to come in and give you some outside influence. What better than a—I mean, we’ve all known that Eddie has Catholic— [Laughs] He likes to be a Catholic, but then he doesn’t, and he kind of goes back and forth. So who better than a priest to come over and save the day?

And it feels like he needed to be out of the church, though, for that.

Yes, yes, yes. It’s unconventional for a Catholic to obviously get any kind of that outside of the church, which I think we all know Eddie’s unconventional. So it did take the priest coming out and meeting him on his own ground and really just making it a grounded message. It wasn’t like a priest talking to one of his subordinates; it was just a man talking to another man and giving him great advice.

When I spoke with Tim yesterday, he said that Eddie has to figure himself out. What do you think Eddie has to figure out now that he is moving forward?

I think anything that you do in the beginning, you do it really, really bad. So I think finding love for yourself, if you haven’t done it, you’re probably going to be really bad at it. So although I love the scene of him dancing and giving him opportunity to be like, “Here’s the great first step.” After that first step, it’s going to be a little difficult for him. “Now, where do I go? I did the Risky Business. I did my dream, but how do I implement that in my day-to-day life?” So it will be very interesting to see how Eddie is trying to attain this new version of himself.

Yeah, I was going to say, even though there was some joy in that, it doesn’t mean that everything is fixed. Now he knows he can move forward. Are we going to see something in between the heartbreak and the joy going forward?

I think it’ll be more awkwardness, more like him trying to reach out of his comfort zone and not being great at it, so relying on his teammates, his 118 family, and just kind of bouncing ideas and bouncing personalities, I guess. Trying to figure out himself out. Yeah, it’ll be awkward, funny. It’ll be a bunch of different things. I had fun playing with Eddie.

When you say outside his comfort zone, what do you mean specifically?

Nothing too extreme. More just maybe him being a little happier when he used to be a little sadder or more somber or more quiet and reserved, him being a little bit more outspoken. I can’t really say too much, but I would say that it’s not some extreme change for him. It’s a slow and steady change for him, but he is a semi-control freak, so I would think that any small change feels like a big change to him.

What about when it comes to getting Christopher back? Is he maybe ready to confront his parents a little bit about, you know what? My son belongs with me.

I think in this season of change, it’s impossible for him to take on such a big task. So I think right now he’s just kind of biding his time and abiding to what the priest had told him and really just trying to sink into the fact of who he is and what he’s trying to do before he makes any kind of big moves towards Christopher.

Are there better video calls coming up than the premiere though?

Yeah. There’s a couple video calls that actually we just shot a couple days ago. There’s some funny ones and there’s some very serious ones.

Are there any significant Eddie and Bobby (Peter Krause) scenes coming up? Those are always so good.

Yeah, we need more of those. Those are some of my favorite things to shoot. I believe—because we are kind of shooting out of order—there are one or two scenes between Eddie and Bobby that you have to look forward to.

Anything you can share about what’s discussed?

I wish I could.

And what about Eddie and Buck? They have a lot to talk about, but they have that really great quiet moment at the end of this episode.

Yeah, I thought that was perfect, just for the fact that you have two characters going through polar opposite things in their life, and nothing needs to be said. I’ve done that with some of my friends. I’m like, I don’t want answers. I don’t want to talk. Let me just chill out, alright? I just need some safety, some comfort, and for Buck to feel that with Eddie and Eddie just to be like, yeah, I’m living on cloud nine, I hope you don’t bring me down, kind of thing. It’s perfect.

But are we going to see them talking on screen, say in the next episode?

Yeah. They’ll start to dissect everything that’s going on in their lives, and then you’ll start to really see where Eddie is in [comparison] to where Buck is and how they’re handling their situations.

And of course, I have to wonder: anything with Eddie and Maddie coming up?

I want it. Yeah, no, not yet. And me and Jen are going to have to start calling in Tim. No, I need that. Maddie and Eddie need to hang out a little bit more.

What do you think it’ll take for him to get past that survivor’s guilt? Because we’ve seen it throughout the entire series with him.

Yeah. I don’t know if you get past that. I believe that’s something you live with and you make amends with, and it’s something that you just kind of have to inhabit as part of your life, and it’s going to build your character. So I think it makes him more aware of the relationships that he has and the day-to-day and to be grateful. So there’s so much opportunity in that obstacle. So however saddening it might be and however deep it might be, it offers so much,

We’re not seeing him slipping back into Season 5 Eddie, which is good.

Yeah, no, it is a completely different Eddie. We lived that version of him, and I think that needs to just stay in the past.

Is a relationship or even thinking about one on his radar at this point? It feels like he has a lot to work through before he can even think about that.

Absolutely not. Yeah. There is not one relationship in his head. I believe that Eddie is just so focused on what he needs to be doing as a good man that before he does anything else with a good woman, he needs to solidify that.

Yeah, because we’ve seen what’s happened with his relationships. It’s like, oh, they could have been good, but it’s not the right time.

Self-sabotage, yeah.

What else is coming up for Eddie?

We have a lot of funny moments with Eddie. I’ve been having a good time playing around with Eddie and allowing him to try and figure—he’s not going to be good at trying to figure out how he loves himself and how to go about it, but just a lot of playful moments, almost childlike moments where Eddie is just kind of reconnecting with himself and in that sense, maybe he’s kind of reconnecting with Christopher without knowing it. So he’s building into this person that I think he could be proud of. And where that leads is something—a new chapter is yet to unfold in the next couple episodes.

No more mustaches?

RIP mustache. I miss that mustache already. Yeah. No more mustaches.

Should we worry about him getting into any really dangerous situations or rescues coming up?

I think Eddie likes to thrive in those situations, so you always should worry about Eddie because he likes to throw himself in such dangerous positions. But I’ll still be on the show.

9-1-1, Thursdays, 8/7c, ABC