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Interview: Desmin Borges isn’t the worst on ‘You’re the Worst’

It’s the middle of the night, and Edgar Quintero can’t sleep. He’s losing his on-again, off-again battle with PTSD from his deployment to Iraq.

On a show called “You’re the Worst,” Edgar is the best. A veteran living rent-free as a human punching bag for his best friend (for lack of a better word), Jimmy, and Jimmy’s girlfriend, Gretchen, Edgar has struggled with readjustment into civilian life.

The man who brings to life the complicated layers of Edgar’s character—including an unexplained but somehow fitting Rachael Ray obsession—is Chicago native Desmin Borges. Before he was one of the “Worst,” Borges grew up in Logan Square until his family moved to Houston when he was 9.

He came back to Chicago to study theater at DePaul University before working with theater companies in Minneapolis. In 2009, he was in Victory Gardens’ production of “The Elaborate Entrance of Chad Deity,” a “hip-hop satire” about an underdog Puerto Rican wrestler from the Bronx.

“Chicago is probably the greatest playground for an actor because it is the city for ensembles,” Borges said of his early career. “Being around those people that are so ensemble-oriented … we’re able to dig really deep into stories and frame them from the ground up.”

The show became a massive hit with Borges as the lead. Its popularity inspired its move to Off Broadway in New York City. After arriving in New York, Borges found that the theater company he was working with wasn’t the best fit and decided to make the transition from the stage to the screen.

“The way they treat their people wasn’t a way that I was accustomed to being treated, especially coming from a very familial atmosphere in Chicago,” Borges said. “It made me step back and say, ‘Well, you know, let’s hold off on the theater portion.’ “

It was shortly after he made that decision that Borges received an offer from the casting director of “You’re the Worst.” When the time came to start scripting episodes, the writers got help from an actual war vet who shared his story from two tours in Iraq to going on and off his meds—all plot points that shaped Edgar’s character.

“At one point, at his darkest, he would just go out and look for people to ‘beat the hurt out of him,’ ” Borges recalled. “That’s something that really stuck with me, you know … and it’s not something that I could ever imagine me going out and doing, but that’s definitely something that I can image Edgar doing. That’s sort of his baseline.”

But not every moment Edgar has on screen is spent battling his inner demons. From cooking heart- (or, more accurately, butt-) shaped pancakes for Gretchen (Aya Cash) and Jimmy (Chris Geere) to talking about conducting a seance to contact long-dead relatives, Edgar isn’t defined by his PTSD, though it is ever-present.

“We see him really optimistic and full of life and joy,” Borges said. “But there’s still that bubbling underneath him … I always have that in mind.”

Not helping matters much are his housemates. Not an episode goes by that Edgar isn’t the subject of caustic ridicule from Jimmy or an obvious lack of empathy from Gretchen or Lindsay (Kether Donohue).

“Is this the time that he just is pleading with the people in the show to beat the hurt out of him?”, Borges said he asks himself each time Edgar is on the receiving end of his friends being, well, the worst.

There comes a moment in last night’s episode where it seems Edgar arrived at the point where he would do anything to be rid of “the hurt.” As he stares out across a highway of passing cars, it isn’t clear what Edgar is going to decide to do: walk away and keep fighting or let the hurt win.

“Without a doubt, he just wants the hurt to be gone, and whatever way that’s going to happen, he’s totally OK and ready,” Borges said. “We’ve never seen it come to that point [before].”

While Borges only has to pretend to be a PTSD-afflicted vet, he hopes that the storyline can effect change for those whose actual lives are affected by the aftermath of military service.

“Not only for our vets, who are just so much stronger and more brave than I ever could be, but for other people that are dealing with mental health issues, our society is known for just letting them go off and battle and protect our country and when they come home we just shove them to the side,” he said.

In the show, getting help hasn’t come easy to Edgar. His battles with insomnia and night terrors (and waking up holding a knife, we learned in Season 1, much to Jimmy’s dismay) are the subject of many jokes, but when it came time for Edgar to seek out help, the VA was less than accommodating, leading to his rapid decline this season.

“These people are broken people who are just really wanting to be the person that they were before they had these traumatic events happening in their life,” Borges said. “And even though they probably know that they’ll never become that person again, we as a society owe it to them to do everything we can to make sure that they feel comfortable.”

But it doesn’t seem that Edgar is in for an eternal spiral of hopelessness and bad behavior. At least, Borges hopes not.

“I think in a perfect world, he would have a much healthier group of people around him,” Borges said. “And we’re going to see him hit a pretty dark bottom, but I think what he gains from that individually he’ll be able to use to propel himself into another upward trajectory from his PTSD.”

@shelbielbostedt | sbostedt@redeyechicago.com