Cover Carmy (Jeremy Allen White) and Sydney (Ayo Edebiri) workshopping a dish in season two of "The Bear" (Photo: FX Networks)
Carmy (Jeremy Allen White) and Sydney (Ayo Edebiri) workshopping a dish in season two of "The Bear" (Photo: FX Networks)
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Ahead of the premiere of season 2, we ask some of Singapore’s top chefs how the award-winning TV show matches up to real life
If you were online at some point in June 2022, your social media feeds might have been inundated with a strange TV show inexplicably named The Bear, filled with TikTok videos of people yelling “Yes chef!” and “Corner!”, and thirst Tweets over a tortured Jeremy Allen White in painfully tight chef’s whites, entrapped in moments of cinematic masculine introspection, his beautiful face adorned by the rattiest and oiliest curls you ever did see.
This June 22, FX’s hit show is on track to set social media ablaze once again as it returns for its highly anticipated second season on Hulu. Blazing a trail at this year’s TV awards circuit and set to win big in this September’s Emmy Awards, fans and critics alike fell hard for The Bear’s first season, which is centred on Carmy (Jeremy Allen White), an ex-fine dining chef who takes over his late brother Michael’s beef sandwich shop. With eight tightly-realised, half-hour episodes of drama-comedy, this is not the usual purview of prestige TV, but the show’s depiction of anxiety, grief, and drug abuse have struck a deep chord with audiences. And of course, the cooking.
Above Carmy (Jeremy Allen White) and Sydney (Ayo Edebiri) workshopping a dish in season two of "The Bear" (Photo: FX Networks)
Carmy (Jeremy Allen White) and Sydney (Ayo Edebiri) workshopping a dish in season two of "The Bear" (Photo: FX Networks)
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No cooking show in recent memory has quite pinned down the high-octane pressure that comes with working in a professional kitchen like The Bear. Just as ballerinas found Black Swan (2010) a little too relatable for comfort, service workers found the intensity, stress, and sometimes abuse in The Bear too close to home. It didn’t matter if they had worked in some of the world’s finest restaurants like Noma and Eleven Madison Park, or at run-down sandwich joints that probably have seen better days. Many reported being unable to finish the series. In one flashback, an executive chef of a high-end restaurant (played by an unrecognisable Joel McHale) belittles Carmy for the shortcomings of his staff. And just as Carmy manages to find a direction for the sandwich joint, a rave review in the paper ends up sinking the entire restaurant with overwhelming orders, complete with exploding tantrums and even an accidental stabbing.
“I think The Bear shows the culinary world in an unglamorous way that feels raw and real,” chef de cuisine Jordan Keao of Butcher’s Block tells us. “How the approach to food and work ethic improves and deepens as the show goes on feels very real.” In fact, all the chefs we spoke to agree that though there are obvious exaggerations at play, the pressure depicted of working in a kitchen is spot-on. In fact, many of them identify their instincts for constant improvement represented in the show. For chef and co-owner Jérémy Gillon of Restaurant Jag, the “stress, the desire to do well and the want to please our customers” stands out for him.
“I like the fact that [Carmy] is always in doubt whether what he is doing or is going to do makes sense to him or his business,” he says. “We are confronted every day by this stress. It is part of our daily life, [but] it is a positive stress which allows us to do what we do.”
Read more: Deliciously Dark Comedy ‘The Menu’ Addresses Classism and Fine Dining Practices
Above The restaurant crew in the middle of renovation in season two of "The Bear" (Photo: FX Networks)
The restaurant crew in the middle of renovation in season two of "The Bear" (Photo: FX Networks)
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Any depiction of professional cooking cannot ignore how one navigates a smorgasbord of personalities within a tiny kitchen. The Bear shines particularly in this aspect, each character possessing their own complexities, contradictions, and goals. Sydney (Ayo Edebiri), for instance, shines as a fresh culinary school graduate, while Marcus (Lionel Boyce), the restaurant’s bread baker, develops a passion for pastries under Carmy’s mentorship. Even Tina (Liza Colón-Zayas), the jaded line cook resistant to change, eventually comes to respect Carmy’s professionalism and direction. “Every character from the series somehow reminded me of somebody I [had met] along my career,” executive chef of Altro Zafferano, Andrea de Paola says, a testament to the show’s accurate research. “The kitchen life, the rush during service, the ambitions of cooks, and sacrifices made to archive personal targets [are] well portrayed.”
As for season two, the possibilities are wide open as Carmy and his motley crew change up the run-down sandwich shop into a fine dining restaurant worthy of a destination spot—a mammoth task for an eatery that had barely passed its hygiene inspection. “I don't know what to expect from season two, but it will be amazing to see how they plan to document the opening of their restaurant with such a unique crew,” de Paola said. For Keao, the excitement lies in how Carmy and his team “evolve the food and restaurant”. “There are so many directions they could go in; it is going to be interesting to see what they choose to showcase.”
There are many things in The Bear that have resonated with people, and for chefs, one of them includes raising a mirror to the glories and tribulations of the restaurant industry and the necessary mettle to cut it in this business. As Keao puts it perfectly, “The respect that the characters have towards their work and the culinary industry is inspiring.” As for whether the team’s hard work and growth is enough to build a bold new concept from the ground up, we’ll simply have to wait until June 22 rolls around to see.
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About
Ethan is a dining writer with Tatler Singapore. Trained in literary arts and filmmaking, their work has previously been published in Esquire Singapore, Men's Folio, and with the Asian Film Archive and the Singapore International and Film Festival, across a wide range of interests from gastronomy to fashion and arts criticism.
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Ethan writes about exciting news in the F&B industry, specialising in fine dining, exclusive spirits launches, and new restaurants. They are always looking for riveting voices to bring something fresh to an already-dynamic industry.
Follow them on Instagram at @faustiangourmand.
