‘Chicago Fire’s David Eigenberg Says Herrmann ‘Isolates Himself’ After ‘Bad’ House Fire

“Let’s go.” That’s Christopher Herrmann’s (David Eigenberg) mindset when it comes to the call at the center of the Wednesday, October 22, episode of Chicago Fire. After all, it’s his house that’s on fire!

What’s worse: His daughter might be inside. It’s a good thing Herrmann will have his 51 family by his side — especially his best friend Mouch (Christian Stolte) — but will he let them help? Will they be able to? Below, David Eigenberg previews his character’s very personal episode.

There’s a fire at Herrmann’s house and he’s worried that his daughter is inside. This is as personal as it gets for him. So, how is he doing? Is there any part of him that’s still thinking like a firefighter when he gets to that scene?

David Eigenberg: It’s obviously a mix. I think it’s a nice dichotomy of focus that the writers came up with. We have a tendency on the show to show up to an incident, dismount, get the information, stand around, then get charged to do our jobs. And this episode, it’s like, boom, the rigs pull up, out, let’s go, mask on, helmet, we’ll go straight at it. And I really, really liked that. And then the cameraman got excited, we switched it up. It’s like a family first type thing.

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How bad is the fire and what can you say about what caused it? Is that a mystery for the episode?

Yeah. It’s a bit of a mystery of a reveal. It gets tied into Herrmann a bit and what happened and was he responsible for it, which would be another awful feeling. And the fire that we actually — I didn’t hear if there’s any CGI in it. That’s the one thing is we burn stuff and there was a lot of fire in this thing and a lot of actual — controlled fire. But it was a lot of it. There’s a couple of things that happen on Chicago Fire. One is you put on bunker gear and you feel like a firefighter as soon as you put it, in a certain regard — you feel something. That’s for sure. And then the second is when a place is rolling and it’s getting hot and they have to shut it down after 90 seconds because it’s getting good and hot in there, that will motivate you to do stuff and to put a face on.

How’s the rest of 51 handling the call? Because not only do they have to deal with the fire, but they also have to keep an eye on Herrmann, right?

Oh, yeah. And I like to think of Herrmann as a loose cannon to begin with. And it is a bad fire. There’s good fires and bad fires, and this is a bad fire because we are trying to locate a young person. Young persons have a major impact on real firefighters, not that every life isn’t precious, but it amps up the stakes and things go south in the fire. It’s going to get to the point of, is it a controllable or uncontrollable fire and do you back out or can you back out and will you be called to back out and go to a defensive position, which a lot of firefighters don’t want to do, but chiefs have to call it because if you don’t call it the right time, more lives can be lost. And no real firefighter situation wants that to happen.

And that’s got to be the last thing that Herrmann’s going to want to hear.

Yep.

Then there’s going to be the aftermath, whatever it is. How much is Herrmann going to let the rest of 51 be there for him?

I think in some ways, Herrmann is so banged up by it. He isolates himself a little bit. I mean, 51 is there and is always there for the family of their firehouse. Herrmann has a different road, a path to choose in the isolation that he kind of puts himself into. He makes it a little bit harder on himself, but I think he is brutalizing himself in a certain regard for this scenario that unfolded. And when things go bad, some people just start to blame outside circumstances and become a victim. And I think Herrmann is the kind of character that says, “F**k, what did I do? Or what didn’t I do?” Some people turn to themselves and beat themselves up, if you want to put it mildly and other people don’t. And that’s kind of what occurs a bit in the episode, which I think is interesting and poignant for a character to do. We don’t need any more victims right now.

Peter Gordon/NBC

Are we getting some Herrmann and Mouch stuff in this episode?

Yeah, we’re going to get some Herrmann and Mouch, but I think Herrmann’s a little prickly in this thing. I like it because it plays a little bit against the typical on the show of hugging and holding. It’s not a warm fuzzy, it’s a warm prickly. That’s what it is, this episode.

But if anyone could get through to him, it would be Mouch.

Yeah, definitely. We’re dear friends in real life and we connect in a way in real life and then I think also on the screen.

What will we see with Herrmann and his family as they’re dealing with this?

The character is a firefighter and they fight fire and they put life in front of their own. And he’s dealing, even with his own family, his own sense of failure.

Chicago Fire, Wednesdays, 9/8c, NBC