Do you ever, when watching a book, a movie, or a TV series, think that what comes to life on the screen or the words printed on paper seem as real and alive as life itself? That’s the feeling I got when I watched some episodes of season 3 of the series The Bearpublished at the end of June.
The Bearas we will recall, takes place in the kitchen of a Chicago restaurant, a former dive where legendary meat sandwiches were served, transformed into a fine dining restaurant on the way to a Michelin star thanks to the talent and vision of Carmy. A tortured chef trained in the great kitchens, it is he who operates this transition, bringing in his wake a whole brigade of endearing and dysfunctional characters, on the verge of implosion. I summarize here very roughly the first two seasons of a series that won honors this winter at the Golden Globes, the Critics’ Choice and the Emmys.
In the most recent batch, Carmy and his gang, after having embraced the great vertigo, launch themselves into the void and open The Bear 2.0. What keeps us on the edge of our seats while listening to this series is the anxiety of the protagonist, Carmen Berzatto (Jeremy Allen White), from a conflicted and unstable family. Through her big, bewildered blue eyes, her anxiety is transmitted to us, the viewers, and stretches us like a bow. What also gets on my nerves, however, is this art of not ending that the writers practice. In this third season, most of the drawers that open will not be closed at the end — and it becomes exasperating at times. But in some episodes (two in particular out of ten in total), we touch the sublime.
In episode 6, eyes turn to Tina, played with a crazy naturalness by Liza Colón-Zayas. Who? Tina? Yes, this character with a generous smile, both confident and fragile, and who sings wonderfully well in karaoke. A quiet force, a little withdrawn, a good student, essential to the team, big heart, to her business. Like so many women, I want to add. In the episode dedicated to her, we go back to Tina’s past to discover how she ended up in the chaotic kitchen of The Bear.
A few years earlier, this woman, then in her late forties, lost her little job in a candy factory. Then began her ordeal in search of a new job. When you learn the art of writing a screenplay, one of the first rules you must master is the famous ” Show, don’t tell “If I were teaching screenwriting, I would put episode 6 of The Bear under study. As we follow Tina, day after day, in her job search, we see the wall of ageism, racism and sexism that she comes up against rise, one brick at a time — it’s heartbreaking. One particularly dark gray day, she ends up in tears in a small, semi-clean and crooked restaurant (I’ll let you guess which one) to buy herself a coffee and get back on her feet. There is something so current and confronting, so captivating about Tina’s story. It’s impossible to turn away from it.
The eighth episode is also stunning. Three-quarters of the way through a season that shines most in its digressions from the main plot, Sugar (Natalie to her mother), Carmy’s sister, organizational pillar and rare sane character in all the surrounding mess, is about to give birth. Her water breaks while she goes to buy paper towels at a restaurant supply store. In full contractions at the wheel of her car in traffic, she tries to call her colleagues, friends, and spouse for backup, but no one answers. In desperation, she then has one person left to contact: her mother.
Berzatto’s mother — Donna — seen in a notable episode of season 2 — suffers from unstable moods, probably also from alcoholism and borderline personality disorder. She is not well at all and has transmitted this malaise to her entire family. When Natalie decides to call her after having cut ties with her, we understand from the first seconds of the arrival of the matriarch (played stellarly by Jamie Lee Curtis) everything that is wrong. Another episode on the edge of a knife where, overcome with emotion, our eyes are moist from beginning to end. Great art.
It’s the women who are the stars of this third season. There’s also Syd, Carmy’s right-hand woman, struggling with an insoluble dilemma, and chef Terry (Olivia Colman), who announces the closure of her legendary restaurant. It’s with them that we tremble.
While I was listening The Bear This week I was reading in parallel The unsightly ones, by my friend Claudia Larochelle. In the second part of her three-part story, Claudia paints a portrait of the Montreal journalism world in the late 1990s and early 2000s, a pre-#MeToo world that I also knew from the inside. A sexist, pressurizing, exciting, alienating universe, especially for a young woman. I found myself imagining a The Bear who would be inspired by it.
As in The BearClaudia Larochelle’s story is deployed on narrative axes in which we can all recognize ourselves. The legitimate desire to achieve, professionally, romantically, humanly. The need to find one’s place in the world and to flourish. The pressure to perform – even more acute since the advent of social networks. The desire to shine, to see one’s dreams and talent blossom, the search for recognition and validation, but the brutal shock of reality. The discovery of the arena in which one finds oneself, cohabitation with lions-lionesses, toxic bosses and other rivals. The stress and anxiety that accompany all these desires.
With radical honesty, The Bear And The unsightly ones tell us about our human lives. By telling our impulses, desires and failures, these works hold up a mirror to us so accurately that it feels good and bad at the same time. That’s sometimes what art is for: to allow us to look ourselves in the whites of the eyes.