Marisa Ramirez plays Detective Maria Baez in Blue Bloods. The series finale premieres tonight at 10 PM ET/PT on CBS, and streaming on Paramount+.
“End of Tour” – It’s all hands on deck for the Reagan family, as they race to stop deadly mayhem in the city when the gangs of New York unite together to demand amnesty for the release of their imprisoned members and those awaiting trial.
I spoke with the actress about her bond with Donnie Wahlberg, her final day of filming, what she took with her from set, how she’s gained strength from playing Maria, her thoughts on the show’s ending, and more. Keep reading for everything she shared with me!
I got to talk with Donnie earlier in the season and he had so much praise for you, so I wanted to ask what has it been like to bring that partnership with him to life on-screen? It’s one of my personal favorite parts of the show, and I just think Baez and Danny were so perfectly paired.
Marisa Ramirez: I’m getting teary-eyed already, it’s the first question. He’s just a beautiful human being, we were very open and genuine with each other from the day that we met, and it just blossomed into this amazing friendship. I was just so lucky to have that bond with Donnie. I mean, honestly, I don’t know what a lot of other actors on television shows have with their partners and stuff, but I feel like our relationship and our partnership was really something different and unique, we had so much fun together and we were so blessed that we were able to bring that to a lot of the stories. We could just kind of bring our relationship and the fun that we had together into the scripts, throw little things in there and we were given the freedom to do that, which was just the coolest thing. We really made it our own and made our relationship into something that we found together that might not have been on the page.
I was just so lucky. I’m so lucky to have worked with him, it’s so different now not seeing him almost every day and not FaceTiming with him almost every day. Our relationship of spending like 16 hours a day together, you really, really bond with people. You really get to know them. I know what he would want to eat for lunch and we have so many memories that I will cherish forever. I also learned so much from him. I think there are a lot of actors out there that aren’t open to that and I wanted it from him. I wanted to learn. I wanted all of his input on everything and everything that we did together, I felt like I would turn to him and be like, “Was that good? Do you think that worked?” Not that I didn’t have confidence, I did, but I really wanted to learn from him and I did.
What advice would you give to Maria as a final farewell? Like, if you had the chance to just sit down with her and give some sort of advice, what would you say to her?
Oh, gosh. I mean, take your partner, take a vacation, go to an island, just enjoy the hell out of each other, and grab Vanessa and Will or Jamko too. That is such a tough question. I have no idea. Honestly, I have no idea.
I think take a vacation is pretty good, honestly. They all need a vacation.
Yes, and you know what would be amazing is to see the characters through the vacation with the audience. The audience gets to see the characters in a different element. We never got to see that and sometimes that can be so fun just to see and experience.
One of my favorite things about this show is the incredible fan support for it. I know when it was announced that this was going to be the final season, everyone was really trying to find a way to save it because no one wanted to let it go. You filmed in New York, so you probably had fans come up to you all the time, do you have a favorite fan memory tied to the show?
People in New York would come up to me and ask me for directions. I didn’t really get recognized that much. It was more like I have a friendly, familiar face, so people would come up to me and say, “Hey, do you know where the L Train is? Do you know where I can find a Starbucks?” It was funny. It was sweet and you know what, over the years, what was pretty amazing is I knew exactly where to tell people to go and I felt very confident about that. But there wasn’t one in particular fan interaction that I have come across, there’s just been so many warm people. A man came up to me yesterday, I was with my daughter shopping in the grocery store and he just said to me, “God bless your family,” and I was like, that is just so sweet. It was just so sweet and I don’t know, it did something to me, especially with the time that our world is in right now, where we all are, and what we’re anticipating or dreading for the future. It was just really sweet and warm.
What has been your favorite part of getting to reprise the role of Maria for so many seasons?
Honestly, my favorite part of coming back season after season is seeing the crew and our Blue Bloods team and family that we don’t see for a couple of months because we’re away having our summers or our hiatus and taking care of family things or whatever we’re doing. And so, my favorite part of coming back every season was catching up with everyone and seeing what they did over the hiatus and even some of the crew, like what they worked on, who they got to work with. Honestly, I was just really happy to have a job to come back to every year. It was just such a blessing.
I know this is going to make us both cry, but that final day or that last scene before wrapping, can you tell me about that? I know you can’t say what you were filming or any spoilers like that, but do you have any specific memories from that day that are going to stick with you when you look back on it?
Oh, it was so hard, all of that day, just going to work, showing up, walking in, and Donnie coming to me and I just kind of started crying because I was like, ‘This is our last day here.’ He had pulled me out of it, but it was just such a tough day. I felt like I was, in between takes, just sitting there at my desk or in a chair with the crew in sight to kind of watch everyone interact with each other because I wasn’t going to see it again and it was such a special day. My daughter had finished school the day before, so she came with her dad and they were there. And so, it probably made it less emotional because I really don’t like losing it in front of her too much, right? But the last scene that we filmed was Donnie and my last scene together in the series finale episode and it’s just such a sweet scene. It kind of sheds new light on our relationship and our future, and I felt like I would start to cry every time. Then, after we finished, I didn’t want it to be over, but Tom had come and Tom was there in the squad room, he’s never in the squad room unless he’s shooting something on the other set on the other side and he was there. It felt very special.
I gave a speech. I’m a very shy person, honestly, I have no idea how I got into this business or how I’m still in it because I’m so shy but I spoke in front of the crew and the cast that was there, but maybe because they were my family, it just felt so comfortable to share how special and how grateful I was to all of them, for all of us just being together all these years, and having such a wonderful time and getting to know everyone. We went through so many ups and downs, and births, deaths, and graduations. We went through all of that together and the 11 years that I was there were just a very special, special time in my life. I’m gonna get over this depression right now and I’m going to be able to look back on it, just smile and take a deep breath of gratitude at how special it was. Hopefully, we’ll all find a way to be together again.
Thank you for sharing all of that. I know I can’t wait to see what you do next and I’m hoping there is a universe where you all work together again. During the final season or the finale, were you able to take anything with you from set?
I looked around after we had wrapped, I looked at my desk and I was like, ‘What am I going to take? This phone, this dirty dusty phone? This chair? I don’t know.’ There was a picture of some random dog under the glass and I took that. I walked around, I found a little owl and my daughter really likes owls, I like owls, and we actually have owls in our tree out here in LA. It’s very strange because we’re not in the woods, so I took a little owl and he’s at my front door when you walk in. I wanted everything, but then I was like, ‘But what am I going to do? I just don’t have the space.’ They mailed me my chair back, so that was nice.
I looked at this dog under the glass of my desk for 11 years and I had no idea whose dog it was, the set dressers just find random pictures and they put them in places to make it look like we live there and that’s really our stuff. But now that I’m thinking about it, there’s stuff I want from my apartment set. I know it’s gone, but that would have been nice to get. They had blown up pictures of me with my grandmother and there was a Los Lobos poster that they had blown up and put in my apartment, which was pretty cool. But I wasn’t like Abigail where I had something that I was so attached to as she was attached to the door that she opened for 14 years, which is so cool for her.
What do you consider to be the biggest moment of growth for Maria and did it help you grow personally in any way? I imagine, as an actor, there’s such a special relationship when you’re playing a character for so long.
Yeah, I said this before, I went through this period in my career, it was a short period, but I was being cast as the crying girlfriend or the sad neighbor, it was like there was sadness behind my eyes or something. Then, I don’t know if, because I started teaching kickboxing, I started finding my voice and yelling at people, right? I was cast as — I played two other detectives or a cop in the detective role, and then I went to New York to do one episode and I ended up staying for 11 years. But I found that over the years with Maria, I found more of a voice and more of a strength that I was able to put into my life that I didn’t have. There was just this confidence and this strength of being this powerful strong detective that carried a gun and busted bad guys that I was able to kind of feel when I would walk into a room, walk into a serious or a dangerous situation, or whatever. I mean, I’m not saying like, ‘Oh, I feel great when I walk down a dark alley,’ but there’s just a strength and a confidence that I gained from playing Maria over the years.
Are you personally happy with the way that the series ends?
I mean, yes and no. Some of it, I am happy with. I think there’s a lot of amazing happy moments and a lot of closure, but in some ways, I kind of almost think we could have done more, just a bigger story. I don’t know, but it’s nice that I feel like some of the things were subtle, which is not so in the audience’s face. I think that’s probably more relatable, you know? Yeah, I was happy with it but I guess as happy as one can be with something that’s ending because I didn’t want it to end.
No, I completely agree, we didn’t want it to end. I will be sitting on the couch with my grandparents watching the finale since they are the ones that introduced me to the show. They’ve been watching it from the very beginning.
Me too!
Really? Oh my gosh!
In the beginning of 2013, I went over to my grandparents’ — both of them have passed, rest in peace, Grandma and Grandpa — but I went over to their house to say, “Bye, I’m going to New York for a couple of weeks,” and Grandpa says, “You know, you’d be really great on this show, they’re cops and it’s with Tom Selleck. Grandma loves Tom Selleck.” I’m like, “Grandpa, it’s Blue Bloods. That’s what I’m going to New York for,” and he’s like, “Oh my goodness, I just think you would be so perfect for that show.” It just so happened that that’s where I was for the next 11 years. They were so happy. They were so excited and there was more of a connection. Grandma loved TV, but for me to be in her home every Friday night… a special place in grandparents’ hearts, right?