Abbott Elementary’s Tyler James Williams on Janine and Gregory’s Big Moment: ‘There’s No Going Back’
Warning: The following contains spoilers for Abbott Elementary’s Season 3 finale. Proceed at your own risk!
Never has a repaired light been so sexy.
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On Wednesday’s Abbott Elementary season finale, Janine threw quite the rager for her friends and colleagues, even unintentionally knocking out the power. In her dimly-lit bedroom, Janine and Gregory shared a sweet moment that appeared to be leading to a kiss when the lights came back on. Later, Gregory left the party under the mistaken assumption that Janine and Manny were dating. But thanks to surprisingly good pep talk from Mr. Johnson, Janine decided to go after Gregory, who got some encouraging words of his own from Jacob. Just as Janine went to the door, Gregory was there.
“I fixed your light,” he announced, referring to her broken door light. Then he gave the camera a pointed look before kissing Janine deeply and pulling down the window shade so the camera crew could no longer see inside the apartment.
Unlike before, when Janine and Gregory have gotten close to getting together and backed away, “there’s no going back from this moment,” Tyler James Williams, who plays Gregory, tells TVLine. “They have to live in the reality of this choice.”
“I’m not sure the audience has really thought about all the ways it could go right and wrong,” the actor continues. “I think we’ve just kind of been in this place of hoping that it happens. But there’s going to be unknowns that they’re going to have to explore. This is the first time we’ve seen them actually in a place where they’re accepting their feelings at the same time. We’ll be taking Season 4 to really explore what comes with that.”
Below, Williams reveals which moment in the big scene was unscripted and why the smooch wouldn’t have happened without Jacob.
TVLINE | You’ve said in the past that you wanted to explore Janine and Gregory’s friendship more so than them in a romantic relationship. So how do you feel about where they’re at following this finale?
Oh, I was lying. I knew what the finale was, and I was misleading. [Laughs] I kept getting asked about what was happening with Janine and Gregory, and I’m like, “Uhhh, they should be friends.” No, I’ve been waiting to get to this moment just as much as everybody else has. It’s just very difficult, in a world full of spoilers, not to allude to that. I’m one of those people who have a hard time hiding what’s on my face, and I feel like every time I’ve been asked about them romantically, I’ve been trying to hide knowing where this goes. I’m actually really excited to explore where they’re headed, because for so long, it’s been kind of stop-start-y. Now, I can actually lean fully into the intention that has been simmering with Gregory for some time.
TVLINE | To be fair, you made some valid points in that interview about how we don’t see platonic, loving friendships very often on TV.
Here’s the thing: That’s what Season 1 through 3 has been. I think when I had done the interview, we were already gearing up to shoot the finale. But I do think that that is important. It’s something that we have been trying to show and display for three years, which is you can have feelings for somebody, but that doesn’t need to happen right now. How do you support this person regardless? Your love and support for them should not come exclusively with romantic entanglement. It doesn’t have to go that way. That’s the story we’ve been telling up until this point, which I found very fulfilling and needed to be portrayed. That’s probably not the story we’re going to be telling going forward, though.
TVLINE | In last week’s episode, it seemed like Gregory and Janine were scared off by Ava’s warning. We saw in the finale Janine’s conversation with Mr. Johnson and how that might have impacted her decision. But what changed for Gregory?
We talked about this a lot, specifically that scene — I think it was the last scene that we had shot at the end of the season — about what is it exactly that [changes for] him. I think it’s a combination of two things. One, he’s running out of excuses. I think we forget sometimes that Gregory and Janine, I think, at this point, are like 26, 27. He’s still, in a lot of ways, learning to step into his adulthood and not just go after what he wants, but like secure what he wants. I think this is one of those concrete moments for him. But also, I think a main motivator is Jacob. I don’t think if Jacob wasn’t as integral to this story and the romance [between] Jeanine and Gregory, that Gregory would have a lot of different outlets to talk about it and also someone to nudge him in the right direction, which is one of the more beautiful stories that I love that we’re telling here, that the thing that gets us to Gregory and Jeanine is actually Gregory and Jacob.
TVLINE | Jacob has been playing matchmaker. I was actually surprised last week that he was the one who told Janine about Gregory’s feelings and that Gregory was planning to confess them to her. I was like, “Wait a minute, shouldn’t that be Gregory’s news to share?”
But I think that’s the thing about Jacob, that he can be annoying, he can be corny, but he also knows what people need. He loves his friends dearly and knows what they will and will not do. One of the things I loved about that episode was there gets to be a sense that Jacob is the only one with all the information and he kind of knows the way everyone will behave. I get this feeling that he knows that Gregory may not actually do this. So he’s going to do it a little bit just in case. Same thing in the finale: Jacob has to turn to him and go, “Go back. What are you doing?” That’s what is so beautiful about his character’s development is you get the thing that you’re pining for out of a character that you wouldn’t expect.
TVLINE | Janine and Gregory already had a very memorable first kiss in the living classroom. Was there any direction in the script for this moment to make sure that it was special and stood out? Or did you in Quinta Brunson discuss it at all before you shot it?
Actually, there was something in the script that was so ridiculous, that was like, “And they kiss it, and it shakes the Earth.” It was something like, “I don’t know how I’m supposed to portray that, but OK.” Quinta and I talked about it quite a bit because we did want it to go up a level from the flower room kiss. I don’t think people really think about the logistics that go into these kind of moments, and figuring out how is it different and what what makes it different, not just intentionally, but atmospherically. So we did talk about it a lot. I think it was like two weeks of conversation, like, “Exactly what does this mean? What happens after this moment?”
TVLINE | There’s all these little moments within that moment that I love, starting with the way he says, “I fixed your light.” That’s such a Gregory thing to do to fix that light.
Yeah, his setting the mood is being functional. [Laughs] Nothing is sexier to Gregory than function.
TVLINE | Honestly, that’s very sexy to a woman, too, a man that can do things around the house.
I think the intention behind that we were nailing down for some time, too. Like, I was very aware that this is what he’s saying, but this is not what he’s saying. He’s using that moment to really say, “And we’re together. We’re at least exploring this now. We’re doing this. Enough.” That was just brilliant on the writers’ side, to put something there that’s so Gregory, and it’s just my job to try to make it romantic.
TVLINE | The other thing that stood out was the look that he gives to the camera right before he leans in to kiss her. What was the feeling or the thought in that moment for him? And was it scripted?
I actually pitched that. When we got there to shoot it that day, [director] Randall [Einhorn] had this idea that the camera should leave and that it should be somewhere tucked away, catching something. And Jeremiah Smith, our A camera operator, is one of the best camera operators on the planet… So Jeremiah is running that camera, and I said to Randall, “What if I tell the camera to leave?” and he was like, “Oh, this is a unique thing that we can do to our show right here.” … Gregory has been very frustrated, I’d say, over the last four episodes. [Laughs] It was his way of addressing that and speaking to the audience and going, “I’ve got it. We’re good. You can leave now. Thanks.”
TVLINE | I was surprised that Ava was so concerned with rules and HR last week, when she was hitting on Gregory all the time.
Ava is actually messy, and she’s down to deal with messy consequences because she’s actually messy. She knows that about herself, she accepts that about herself. Janine and Gregory like to believe that they’re not, but they are. I think what Ava’s saying there is, “If you all are gonna do this, be ready for this to go weird if it does. I am, but I don’t think you are.” It’s kind of a real recognizes real conversation, which I thought was really brilliant on the writers’ side to have the actual chaotic character talk about the chaos of the other two.
TVLINE | You had a line in Season 2: “I take all of your recommendations seriously. I want to know why you like stuff.” Did you have any idea how much that line would take off and make people swoon?
No, I didn’t. It’s one of those things that you assume everybody does, but it’s not until it’s actually articulated that the power of it lands. It made sense when I read it and went, “Yeah, of course he does,” but actually saying hits a little different. That’s what writers are for and why they need to be paid properly, and this is why we went on strike, because it’s little things like that that they notice. That’s their gift to the world is saying the things or writing the things that we would all really like to hear.
Abbott Elementary fans, what did you think of the season ender? Grade it below, then hit the comments!
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