ONE CHICAGO Crossover: Patrick John Flueger and Steven Weber Preview ‘In The Trenches’

After countless ONE CHICAGO crossovers during the early years of the franchise, the big multi-series events dwindled in recent years. But the worlds are once again being intertwined when CHICAGO MED, CHICAGO FIRE, and CHICAGO P.D. cross over for the three-hour event, “In The Trenches,” on Wednesday, January 29.

“I’ll tell you, it was very strange because we don’t even do, like, simple crossovers that often anymore,” CHICAGO P.D.’s Patrick John Flueger, who plays Ruzek, tells Give Me My Remote. “It used to be that a couple times a year you go and do one of the other shows…it was fairly consistent, pre-pandemic. Since then, both because of COVID rules and because the shows have really just by virtue of, again, us being separated from each other intentionally for safety purposes, they’ve really deviated from each other. They all have very much their own energy now, whereas I think in the first couple seasons, even when MED came on, we were all very, tonally cohesive.”

“And I’m not saying that it doesn’t work,” he continues. “I’m just saying that P.D…I just know we’ve gone as dark as we can. That’s what we’re trying to do. The other shows, I won’t speak for them, but they just all feel very different. And so that was an interesting thing, trying to see them all married together.”

The teams come together on-screen when a gas main explosion causes fires and destruction above ground, as well as causes an avalanche that traps people underground and threatens the structures around the team.

“I got to tell you, I think we did all right,” Flueger says. “I think we succeeded. It felt good…I got to work with [CHICAGO FIRE’s] Miranda [Rae Mayo, who plays Kidd] a lot…She and I did a lot of scenes together. That was a blast, because she and I are pals outside of work, quite good pals, and we never got to act together. I got to do some scenes with Steven [Weber] over there on MED. I got to work with Reza [Tabrizi], who’s the producer-director over on FIRE, and then Anna [Dokoza], who’s the new producer-director over on MED. [She]’s just this incredible Aussie woman, and I just took a shine to about thirty seconds into meeting her. It was really fun.”

“If you’re going to work on one of these shows, chances are you’re a pretty good person because they do not suffer a–holes at the top; they just don’t,” he continues. “There’s a lot of ways to kill people in our [fictional] lines of work. If you’re not cool, if you don’t show up ready to go and ready to treat each other with respect and try to have as good of a time as you can…the point of that is to say that being around everybody was excellent. It was so much fun. That was what I got out of it, for me.”

Weber, who has his first crossover experience with “In The Trenches” (after joining the franchise as Archer in 2021), also marveled at getting to work with so many different people. 

“By virtue of the term ‘crossover,’ you know we are going to interact and the three worlds are going to kind of mesh with each other,” he says in the video below. “I will say that…all the people on CHICAGO FIRE, that is a hard job they’ve got. P.D. is hard, too, but they’re not…burdened by fifty pounds of clothes and heavy oxygen tanks and tools and masks. They’ve got to run and they have to climb. And, you know, very few of these people are young and agile. They’re not spring chickens, okay? Without giving too much away, I’m no spring chicken either. I’m just saying that that’s quite a task.”

“But I can also say that…fans are in for a ride,” he continues. “It’s a [ONE] CHICAGO theme park, and everybody is going. And it’s going to be incredibly satisfying. You will see everybody. I mean so many actors!…It’s like a giant Marvel movie, everybody’s coming; it’s [AVENGERS:] ENDGAME. Oh, it’s great, it’s great. Am I enthusiastic enough? I mean, I had so much fun that I’m out of my mind. I’m still living off it.”

Flueger also notes he’s heard enthusiasm for how the crossover turned out, too. “I hear it’s pretty good s—,” he says. “That was the quote from one of the higher ups; I talked to him on the phone the other day…[and] he was like, ‘So this was great. This is great.’ He said, ‘You know what, let me just say this: It’s pretty good s—, man. It’s pretty good s—. It’s just a pretty damn good three hours of TV.’ So that’s what you can f—ing hope for, right?”

As a bonus, here’s what FIRE’s Joe Miñoso, who plays Cruz, shared about the crossover being “probably the most impressive thing we’ve ever done.”

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• CHICAGO P.D.: ‘In The Trenches: Part III’ Photos
• CHICAGO MED: ‘In The Trenches: Part II’ Photos
• CHICAGO FIRE: ‘In The Trenches: Part I’ Photos
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• NBC Sets ONE CHICAGO Crossover Event
• CHICAGO MED Recap: Goodwin’s Stalker is Revealed
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