Jacob Elordi Actually Loved Watching Austin Abrams’s Wild ‘Euphoria’ Dance

Euphoria Season 2 Episode 7 introduced the world to a new creative theater powerhouse: Lexi Howard (Maude Apatow). Whether you loved last night’s experimental episode of Euphoria or not, you’ve got to admit: Lexi pulled off quite the complex production on a high school budget. Jokes aside, the highlight of Lexi’s play might not have been the takedown of her peers or her tragic retelling of how her friendship with Rue (Zendaya) broke down. It was Austin Abrams‘s Ethan leading the boys in a homoerotic jock fantasy dance number set to Bonnie Tyler’s “Holding Out For a Hero.”

For weeks now, Euphoria Season 2 has been teasing Lexi’s original play. Meant to be the character’s ultimate form of self-expression, it’s a strange, campy, artsy depiction of the characters on Euphoria from Lexi’s POV. While most of the comedy and drama stems from Lexi’s all-too-honest portrayals of her friends and family’s foibles, the show seems to crescendo with the fantasy of Ethan’s number. He and a number of gold-clad dancers lip sync to “Holding Out For a Hero” while engaging in some pretty horny boy-on-boy dance moves. While the bulk of the crowd loved it, no one seemed happier about it than Austin Abrams himself, who lit up when Decider asked him about it during a Zoom interview with a bunch of actors from the show.

“It was really fun because the whole audience was actually there, watching it and reacting to it. It was such a fun dance to do and it felt to me also quite emotional,” Abrams said. “And also because it was a play it felt like it was a school play. There was no roof. I feel like you could do anything really. So it was a lot of fun. I loved it a lot.”

Abrams praised choreographer Ryan Heffington for designing the sequence and his fellow dancers for making “coming into work everyday…so much fun.”

“It was a lot of fun also to explore that side of Ethan because that kind of takes a lot to put yourself out there like that. It was so invigorating, I felt like I was actually doing a play a lot of the time just because of that audience, you felt that energy exchange,” he said.

The one person who clearly did not enjoy Ethan’s performance was none other than Nate (Jacob Elordi). Even though Nate clenches his fists and leaves the auditorium in anger, Jacob Elordi revealed that he loved watching Abrams give it his all.

“Testament to Austin, though. I don’t know, it felt like… Sitting there I watched you do that dance 100 times and every single time the ferocity and intensity just went up, and up, and up, and up it never lacked. I had to sit there and hate it on screen, but inside I was like, ‘This! Fucking! Guy! Is— ,” Elordi said.

Euphoria co-star Eric Dane interrupted Elordi to ask Abrams: “Are you a song and dance man Austin?”

“You know I’ve done all this stuff for a while but I hadn’t danced in a long time,” Abrams said.

Dane said, “Wow.”

“Being there was like…I don’t think it will ever capture…” Elordi said, making a passionate gesture with his hands.

“Yeah it was so much fun,” Abrams said. “It’s a whole different thing when you feel the energy of the audience you know? I really had a good time.”

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