For much of season one of FX’s rightly hailed series The Bear, Tina (played by the terrific Liza Colon-Zayas) is a thorn in the side of Carmen (Jeremy Allen White) as he tries to save his dead brother’s struggling restaurant, The Original Beef of Chicago. Tina’s loyalty to Carmen’s departed brother Michael (played in flashbacks by Jon Bernthal) is still strong, even though Michael is gone. Tina is a creature of habit who fights Carmen and his newly hired chef Sydney (Ayo Edebiri) at every step. Whether it’s changing the cleaning standards, the menu, or pretty much anything, Tina is relentlessly defiant. She is a fixture at The Beef, and despite the obvious issues the restaurant has, she doesn’t trust these two newbies—no matter their experience or how sensible their ideas.
Over the course of The Bear’s 8-episode inaugural season, we eventually see Tina soften, if only slightly, until the final episode when a stunning discovery inside numerous tomato sauce cans brings the whole restaurant together.
As season two begins, and Carmen and Sydney try to reinvent the restaurant in their own vision, tough choices have to be made. The Beef has been closed, and the new restaurant (to be called The Bear) has to open far sooner than either Carmen or Sydney would like due to financial concerns. In the interim, with a brand new menu and method on the way, staff choices are paramount as well.
In episode two, as Tina leaves for the night, Sydney stops her on the sidewalk. She mentions her search for a new sous chef. Tina replies that she will be happy to ask around to help recruit for the position. Sydney stops Tina mid-thought and asks Tina if she’d like to be the new sous, pointing out that she knows the place inside and out, but, more importantly, that she thinks that with some training she’d be good at it.
The next few moments are truly priceless. At first Tina’s face registers shock. She needs a moment to wrap her head around what has just been offered to her. Then she breaks into a wide grin, says “yes,” and hugs Sydney so hard that she lifts her off the ground. A move that leaves the ever socially awkward (at least in terms of displays of affection) Sydney in a state of amusing discomfort. “Uh, okay,” Sydney says, and then in a fashion that made me laugh aloud, she adds “You’re very strong.” Tina replies, “Yes.” Sydney says “That’s good.”
Sydney then walks away leaving Tina in a state of pure beatitude. The smile on her face looks as if it will never leave. Show creator (and episode two director) Christopher Storer lets the camera linger on Tina’s face for a few extra beats, letting us soak in her joy of opportunity, of being seen, of being appreciated.
The Bear is right now the best active show on television. Storer, along with cast and crew, take a deceptively simple premise—the makeover of a struggling restaurant—and invest it with great depth of character, wonderful eccentricities, existential angst, and on occasion, moments of hard won beauty that elevates the series far beyond its basic concept.
For me, in season one, the best example of that beauty was in the very last scene, when we see Jon Bernthal’s impossibly handsome mug looking back over his shoulder at Carmen. It’s an almost spiritual moment, where two brothers who have lost each other find their way back, even though Michael is no longer on this earth. I remember my heart leaping at the moment. It reminded me of why I do what I do. Why I watch, and just as significantly, why I write about what I watch.
In season two, that spiritual moment arrived again in just the second episode when Tina becomes a sous. And again, I was reminded. These moments are the why. When people who are stuck, lost even, are given the hope of finding a new way forward. And seeing in that moment their recognition of the significance of the moment, and what it means to their temporary existence, is my “why.”
There is a quote attributed to Winston Churchill during World War II that may well be apocryphal, but is no less meaningful whether true or not. During the war, Churchill was supposedly asked to cut funding for the arts to sustain the British war effort. His “print the legend” reply: “Then what would we be fighting for?”
There is no real proof that Churchill actually said it, but I do know this: at a time when the argument for defunding the arts in this country is continually simmering, when I see a show like The Bear, I know that art is worth fighting for. If you don’t believe me, try looking into the eyes of Liza Colon-Zayas as she invests her character with a hope that we, the viewer, can feel in the tingle on our arm, the lump in our throat, and in our heart that skipped a beat.
Watch that scene, and then tell me that art isn’t worth fighting for.
Go ahead. I’ll wait.
