Just when I start to wonder if the recent new Golden Age of Television that began with “The Sopranos” is fading, a show will come along that renews my faith in TV excellence. And I can think of no better whammy that reenergized my great TV jones more than “The Bear” (streaming on Hulu), about a gifted and award-winning gourmet chef who returns to his native Chicago roots when he inherits his dysfunctional family’s Italian beef sandwich joint.
It hits all the right notes on just about every essential point that mark a contemporary streaming TV series a top-rank classic-in-the making: A unique yet still highly relatable story with superb twists and strong subplots. A gifted cast bringing their A game and melding into a troupe that interplays with the finesse of a great jazz combo or rock’n’roll band. Or maybe better put, coalesce into a near-ballet dance that’s a great restaurant kitchen and front of house operating with Michelin star excellence. Sharp, smart dialogue. Drama that plays like real life, and is nicely leavened with humor. A sense of place that brims with accurate and evocative locality. Everything in this series from how it’s shot and edited down to the song choices for well-timed needle drops is superb.
It stars Jeremy Allen White as chef Carmen “Carmy” Berzatto. White is by now an old ChiTown hand from his time on “Shameless” as Philip “Lip” Gallagher, in retrospect the linchpin of that show’s plot and cast. His inviting big puppy dog eyes and psychically wounded but still ambitious vibe that served him well on the previous show are part of his “Bear” character, and it’s a nice continuity into an otherwise somewhat same yet still distinctively different soul.
White’s tour de force thespian turn is matched in depth and excellence by his costars like Ayo Edebir as Sydney Adamu, a gifted aspiring chef plagued by confidence issues who signs on as Carmy’s sous chef, and Ebon Moss-Bachrach as Richie Jerimovich, the restaurant’s sometimes contentious manager.
“The Bear” also has a marquee list of guest/cameo stars like Molly Ringwald, Bob Odenkirk, Jamie Lee Curtis and Sarah Paulson. The series also niftily stakes out its realm in its first season and then blossoms in its second. (By now it should be obvious that I can’t find enough good things to say about this show.)
It nicely follows the big TV cultural moment of “Succession” with another exploration of family legacy intertwined with commerce in a wholly different and, the case of “The Bear,” far better than the former’s dyspeptic tale as far as spiritual uplift goes.
“The Bear” also struck a personal note with me that sent my love for this show over the moon. Late in the first season, there’s an audio snippet of legendary rock radio DJ Lin Brehmer on air at the Windy City’s WXRT, a beloved local signal that’s respected nationwide by radio and rock music buffs. Lin and I were on college radio together at Colgate University’s WRCU-FM and continued to run into one another and be in contact as we both continued our professional pursuits in music. He became an integral element within contemporary Chicago culture. At the time his voice leapt out to me on the show, Brehmer was bravely battling prostate cancer. He passed away in January.
Brehmer’s WXRT family remembered him as “Our Best Friend in the Whole World.” That’s the Lin I knew in college and afterwards: a genuinely great guy.
Including Lin on the show demonstrates just how much “The Bear” captures the mise en scene, culture, vibe and people of the Second City, which is enjoying a sumptuous moment in which the Windy City shines on current TV as the nation’s most fully American metropolitan center. Watch “Shameless” and the Dick Wolf-produced trio of “Chicago Fire,” “PD” and “Med” – whose star Oliver Platt is also in “The Bear” – followed now by “The Bear” to get a big taste of the burg as real and characteristic as deep-dish pizza, Chicago dogs and, yes, Italian beef sandwiches as well as loyally rooting for its perpetual baseball underdogs the Cubs.
It’s so close to a perfect show that it could be a syllabus for a master class in episodic visual entertainment. And offers a delicious binge to get you through the summer TV doldrums. Dig in and savor its its flavorful richness.
Film: “Bridge of Spies” – Recounts with largely historical accuracy the Cold War era swap of a Soviet spy held by America for shot-down U2 spy plane pilot Francis Gary Powers and a US student arrested as a spy in East Germany. With a fine cast headed by Tom Hanks, it’s a dramatic and thoughtful diversion streaming on Showtime and Hulu that recalls previous East/West tensions that obviously still simmer.
Documentary Film: “Wham!” – This Netflix doc on the ‘80s pop duo that launched George Micheal to superstar stature traces how two schoolmates who loved music managed to make their wildest dreams of stardom come true. With a happy ending rare in most musical act stories, it’s a nice tribute to the power of friendship.
Rob Patterson is a music and entertainment writer in Austin, Texas. Email robpatterson054@gmail.com.
From The Progressive Populist, August 15, 2023
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