‘Abbott Elementary’ Boss Quinta Brunson Explains Janine’s Shocking Episode 19 Decision: ‘Don’t Hate Me’

“Abbott Elementary” threw a huge curveball at Janine and Gregory — and fans — after the beloved couple broke up at the end of this week’s episode. To quote Gregory himself, “I have no idea what just happened.”

Episode 19, titled “Trip,” followed as the duo disagreed on the best way to travel to the Outer Banks for a shared vacation. Gregory (Tyler James Williams) was set on driving a little less than eight hours to reach their destination and not break the bank, while Janine (Quinta Brunson) preferred to spend a little more on flights to avoid the hassle of the road. As the episode went on, neither of them would budge or agree to a compromise — until things took a turn.

“We knew in the writers room we were going to revisit Janine and Gregory on a deeper level … it felt like it was the right time to introduce a little chaos into their relationship,” series creator Brunson told TheWrap. “They’ve been together for a year and some change now, so what are some of the real things that start happening at that point.”

With an impasse on how to move forward, Gregory suggests changing their vacation to Atlantic City — a closer locale with a short drive. But Janine is set on going to their first-choice and even buys the plane tickets herself, which Gregory does not take well. This isn’t the first time the couple has disagreed about their finances, as they notably worked through finding the right home for them to move into together within both of their budgets when they secured an apartment in the same building Janine was already living in earlier in Season 5.

Back at the home they share in this week’s episode, the fight did not have as smooth a resolution. After Gregory insisted on changing their trip to Atlantic City to avoid the costs, Janine put her foot down and escalated the issue — pointing out how if they can’t agree on the logistics of a vacation, how could they possibly make it as a couple in the long run.

Gregory’s answers aren’t satisfactory and she shocks even herself when she suggests the couple should just break up, before a long silence lingers between them before she walks away. The end of the episode sees Jacob (Chris Perfetti) learn about the breakup and immediately start throwing up from seeing their favorite couple seemingly hit splitsville.

Below, Brunson breaks down crafting the episode’s big fight scenes alongside co-star Williams, director Razan Ghalayini and writer Ava Coleman, and what fans can expect from the rest of the season — without spoiling what’s next for the now-exes! This conversation has been edited for length and clarity.

TheWrap: This episode gave us a huge breakup scene between Janine and Gregory. Why did this feel like the right time to make a big move in their story?

Brunson: For the whole season, we were focusing on the school and some of our other characters. There were big moves in the school, for instance the mall arc, and then individual teacher stories. But we knew in the writers’ room we were going to revisit Janine and Gregory on a deeper level later. And after talking about it, it felt like it was the right time to introduce a little chaos into their relationship. Not just introduce it, but see what really is going on with two people who are coming out of their honeymoon phase, so to speak.

They’ve been together for a year and some change now, so what are some of the real things that start happening at that point? A lot of the writers mentioned how sometimes there are like,”Whoa, what the hell?” breakup moments that come from the smallest things you never saw coming. And we thought Gregory and Janine were a great couple to examine that with because, to the outside world, they seem so solid. But we thought there probably was more there with these two people. We know Janine’s backstory with her mom and her family, and the same with Gregory, we know who they are outside of school. So it’s like, how do these things come into play here in this relationship?

We’ve seen Janine and Gregory disagree about their finances before, but this escalated very quickly and led to a somewhat hesitant end to their relationship. How did you approach crafting this fight in the writers room?

There were a lot of talks. There was even a lot about where we placed this episode. It was at a point going to happen sooner. But we thought, no, we need more build-up of seeing Janine and Gregory in ways that will seem innocent to the audience — and they should seem innocent to the audience — of disagreements and that there are some things to work through. That’s kind of what you do in a sitcom with 22 minutes. We don’t have the time to lay all the breadcrumbs out all the time.

But once we’re there, you can look back and see, “Oh, I can see how this maybe was coming for these two. But there was a lot of talk in the room and this felt like the right time.

I love how real the moment felt, and we see that both Gregory and Janine are shocked by what has happened but can’t really take it back in the moment. How was it working with Tyler to find the right way to bring that conversation to life during filming?

Those were very collaborative days. We’re five seasons in so we know how to play our characters really well. When it’s your average episode, we’ve worked together long enough to know how to do the normal day-to-day at Abbott. But this one, from beginning to end, was interesting.

We had a more intense tone meeting than we normally have, because there is a big change in tone for this episode and for these two characters. We shot multiple times in different ways, which we don’t do often. But for example, the scene where Janine and Gregory are in his classroom and she tells him that she bought the plane tickers … we did so many different takes for that at different levels, smaller to larger reactions, heated to not heated. Our writer for the episode [Ava Coleman], she kept checking in with me to be like, “maybe the language here can feel this way.” And Tyler was very helpful — he’s directed himself before and writes as well, and also wanted to be there to make sure we were getting to a place where it’s earned that Janine feels this way, but not having her come off too harsh.

It was a real collaboration, all the way down to the edit of the episode. It felt like a big emotional puzzle to tell this story, and it felt good to all work together to make sure we all felt like we got it right.

It’s good that you played with the tone of the scenes during filming to give you options as you put it together in the edit. What was the driving force as you decided which versions of the argument to go with for the final cut of the episode?

From day one in the room when we were breaking this story, I said I want both of their sides to be valid as we can make it.

People are going to pick sides. That’s what people do, we love to do it as the human race. But I really wanted both Janine and Gregory’s arguments to be valid and for people to see where they both were coming from, so that it felt like, “Oh no, we’re breaking up. We don’t know what the right answer is here.”

And people were impacted by it on set too. I’m not even kidding. Some of the crew were arguing like, “Gregory’s wrong,” “Janine is wrong.” “I feel this way, and I feel this way.” And I was listening to my crew members discuss this amongst themselves and get into many arguments about what was the right answer. It was really, really something.

A sneak peek of the discourse to come. But that’s kind of like the fun part. Obviously, like, this is a big move for the show and for this couple. We’ll definitely have some Jacob-level reactions to this twist.

Chris [Perfetti] was so funny in it. He’s been hilarious forever and in this season, but he’s really funny in this episode.

His reaction at the end was priceless, and fans will surely be there with him — plus or minus the vomiting. What’s your message for them as they sit with this cliffhanger for the next week?

Oh, man. Just remember it’s just a show. Let’s all have a good time. Don’t hate me, let’s all have fun.

Janine and Gregory have been pretty happy in their relationship, and are a big part of the Abbott dynamic at this point. How does this big moment set up where we’re headed for the rest of Season 5?

Moving forward, we’ve got some big episodes coming up. The next episode after this one is going to be a big fun one. We’ll return to one of our most iconic locations, which is exciting to me — and we’ll see new sides of all of our main characters. I think it’s really fun and funny, so that’s exciting.

The finale is taking place in Miami, which I won’t say too much about. But it’s a unique one, and it’s partly inspired by some events that are currently happening in Philadelphia education. We always like to, if we can, bring in elements of the real world, especially in education and especially as it pertains to Philadelphia. So this episode is heavily inspired by some things that are going on right now, but it’s a super fun one. I think people are going to be pleasantly surprised by it.

I’m not even giving away anything from that episode, but it’ll be a fun one.

“Abbott Elementary” airs Wednesdays on ABC and streams the next day on Hulu.

The post ‘Abbott Elementary’ Boss Quinta Brunson Explains Janine’s Shocking Episode 19 Decision: ‘Don’t Hate Me’ appeared first on TheWrap.