With season nine just underway, star Oliver Stark digs into the absurdities and profundities of 9-1-1’ s very particular brand of procedural drama – while also unpacking the loss of fearless firefighter leader Bobby Nash (Peter Krause) last year
It’s among the most delightfully unpredictable dramas on TV. From killer bees to pirates on cruise ships to the show itself suddenly moving from Fox to ABC, viewers never quite know what to expect from the cops, paramedics and firefighters of 9-1-1. And certainly, nothing could have prepared us for the loss of Bobby Nash (Peter Krause) late in the show’s eighth season, when the LAFD Station 118 captain was fatally infected amidst a biolab explosion.
As one of the show’s original cast members, his death is nothing less than seismic — and still being felt in season nine. Among the characters feeling it the deepest is Bobby’s longtime mentee, Evan “Buck” Buckley (Oliver Stark) — a reckless kid whom Nash molded into a stalwart fireman. “I think it can go in one of two directions,” Stark tells TV Week of how Bobby’s death will affect Buck. “We can go in the direction of him wanting to almost step into the shoes of Bobby, take those lessons that Bobby has taught him over the years and really double down. Or, the other route is that it can completely unsettle him. Bobby has been such a source of stability and was his rock within the 118, so removing that important pillar may send him spiralling in the wrong direction as well.”
Of course, as Buck was losing Bobby, Stark was losing Krause. “We are still friends,” the London-born actor continues. “But when you are making a TV show, you see those people more than you see anybody else in your life. They do become your family. So, the truth is that we’ll see him and speak to him less than the past eight years. And that’s really sad, because Peter’s been an important figure in my life. But he’s been really great about reminding myself and the rest of the cast that, ‘Hey guys, I’m fine in real life! We can continue to be friends.’ He’s very much as Bobby is for the 118. He’s been a great leader and a great calming force in all of our lives throughout this loss.”
One of 9-1-1’s hallmarks during its run has been delivering not only those dramatic, tear-jerking moments, but utter absurdity to boot. “A real gift that 9-1-1 offers as an actor is that you are playing the same character, but you get to play all these different genres. There are really funny episodes and then there are these really dramatic episodes and then there are these really stunt-heavy action episodes. So, I’ve gotten to try my hand at all these different styles of acting,” Stark muses. “To be honest, not even just episode to episode — sometimes scene to scene. You can be laughing at the beginning of the episode and think, ‘This is ridiculous!’ and then you can be crying by the end of the episode. It really does do all that, sometimes within one 42-minute episode.”
That wondrous surreality stems, at least in part, from the emergencies-of-the-week . . . which are actually less outlandish than you might think. “This show is a constant reminder that life is stranger than fiction,” the actor marvels. “I think the strength of the show in some sense is that we do lean as far as we can into those almost-ludicrous scenarios — but often the wildest ones are the ones that are based in reality.”
Yet beyond just pounding the pulse, 9-1-1 has also offered a platform for representation, having a profound impact on fans — and, in turn, on Stark. “One of the things that sticks with me the most is, Buck went through an arc in season seven, and obviously continuing now, where he discovered his bisexuality. Having people come up to me and speak very specifically about seeing themselves represented in that story of finding their sexuality later in life — not as a teenager, not in their early 20s, but in their 30s and onwards — and feeling like they hadn’t seen too much of that specific representation [on TV] . . . that’s really meant a lot to me over the years.”
9-1-1 airs Thursday, October 16, on Global & ABC