2 months ago
Though accumulation connected Season 2 of “The Bear” was good underway earlier Ramy Youssef traveled to Copenhagen to nonstop nan 4th episode, bid creator Chris Storer was slow to bring him afloat down nan curtain.
“He didn’t fto maine watch thing they had changeable [in nan first 3 episodes]. He was like, ‘No, no. You tin spot it erstwhile you travel back, but conscionable make this what you deliberation it should be,'” Youssef remembers.
Youssef is nan first and only personification to service arsenic a head connected “The Bear” too Storer and his co-showrunner Joanna Calo. When a tight accumulation timeline made it intolerable for Storer aliases Calo to nonstop successful Copenhagen connected apical of 9 Chicago-set episodes, Youssef was Storer’s first choice. Storer has been a head and executive shaper connected Youssef’s Hulu bid “Ramy” since its 2019 debut, and had bounced ideas for “The Bear” disconnected of him since “way backmost erstwhile it was a movie idea.”
“I understand nan position Chris is successful really well,” Youssef says. “It’s his baby. So I appreciated that trust, and besides he knew he wanted nan section to consciousness different from nan remainder of nan show.”
Titled “Honeydew,” Episode 4 follows Marcus (Lionel Boyce) connected a travel to Denmark, wherever he trains nether a pastry cook (guest prima Will Poulter) to bring caller skills and ideas backmost to Chicago arsenic Carmy (Jeremy Allen White) and Sydney (Ayo Edebiri) activity to unfastened their caller restaurant. Amidst nan changeless chaos of nan kitchen, Marcus’ diligent quality intends that he’s often nan series’ only root of calm, and “Honeydew” zeroes successful connected nan beauty that comes pinch that outsider status.
“Knowing we were getting personification other to nonstop it and that it was a Marcus-centric section conscionable framed it differently, because I haven’t taken connected nan communicative successful this way,” Boyce says. “I person an knowing of everyone connected nan show and really we each activity together, and Ramy cares astir things that are different than they do. He’s asking different questions.”
That began successful nan episode’s Chicago scenes. Though Marcus is thrilled to create his craft, leaving Chicago isn’t easy for him, arsenic depicted successful a segment of him talking to his mother (Alma Washington) astatine her infirmary beside. As she’s rendered nonverbal owed to ALS — according to Boyce’s conversations pinch Storer, though her unwellness is not specified successful nan speech — Lionel maintains a visceral consciousness of intimacy pinch her. In fact, he says nan summation of this storyline allowed him to “reverse technologist nan discovery” of why Lionel loves to bake.
“The physicality is erstwhile it clicked for me: ‘This is care,'” he says of nan scenes wherever he speaks to his mother without getting a response. “I’m picking her manus up and massaging it, and this is really he approaches his craft, but he’s been doing this overmuch longer. It’s like, ‘Oh, baking breadstuff and pastries is for illustration what I’m doing here.'”
“There’s a multitude of ways to publication that moment, but we talked a batch astir silent acts of service, and ways of communicating erstwhile you don’t moreover request words,” Youssef says. “It’s very akin to being successful a kitchen: nan narration of serving nutrient to personification you don’t know. You’re conscionable giving them thing that they need, and they’re really grateful for it.”
Once they made it abroad, Youssef originated much of that gentle gait from nan kitchens he and Boyce sewage to shape at. “There’s this power of being shoulder-to-shoulder pinch somebody, making thing together, that felt for illustration really we should shoot. And what I saw successful nan Noma room versus Hart Bagaeri was that a bakery should consciousness slower. The full section is simply a meditative hit for nan 2nd play and for Marcus’s life. And meditative hostility — it’s still tension, but nan hostility of needing to focus, which is simply a batch different from needing to get things retired nan doorway really quickly.”
Will Poulter, Lionel Boyce, Ramy Youssef Photographer: Chuck Hodes
That’s why Poulter’s Luca becomes a cleanable mentor for Marcus. In 1 of those shoulder-to-shoulder conversations, Luca explains that he started his profession pinch hubris, until being humbled by nan expertise of a chap cook (revealed later successful nan play to beryllium Carmy): “I started looking astatine it for illustration it was a bully thing. At slightest I knew who nan champion was now, and I could return that unit disconnected myself. The only logical point to do was to effort and support up pinch him.” In Luca’s room hangs a bluish motion pinch achromatic lettering that sounds “Every Second Counts,” a mantra that continues to show up passim Season 2.
“I ever effort and get Chris to breathe,” Youssef says. “I’ll touch his shoulders — and past he’ll punch maine — but to me, trying to slow down is simply a belief act. It ties to what Luca is doing now, putting speech nan title and sitting pinch it. The enactment of chasing personification nan measurement he chased Carmy, and each that did to grow him, felt like, ‘That was a bully usage of my time. I was capable to do truthful overmuch much than if I was conscionable doing it alone.’ And evidently clip looms complete nan full bid pinch nan decease of Carmy’s brother.”
In betwixt nan quiet shots of Marcus learning from Luca, we get snapshots of Marcus enjoying his picnic — putting retired h2o for a perchance nonexistent cat, jotting down thoughts connected spirit and texture arsenic he pulls isolated a pastry, calling his mom truthful she tin perceive his voice. Many of those moments were inspired by Youssef’s clip unsocial successful Copenhagen earlier starting nan shoot.
“I stayed successful Copenhagen for almost 2 weeks and took a batch of movie photography that ended up being nan locations you spot nan episode. Just stepping around,” he says. “It wholly influenced what we were grabbing, and different bits of dialogue. Not overshooting was a large thing, nan simplicity of really we could group it up.”
Another basal portion of making “Honeydew” authentic was addressing “the subtle hostility of a gangly Black man successful Copenhagen, wherever you deliberation nan footwear is gonna driblet astatine immoderate point,” Youssef says. “And past it really conscionable doesn’t.”
Toward nan extremity of nan episode, Marcus comes crossed a Danish man who’s had an evident motorcycle crash, leaving him caught underneath a collapsed ligament fence. It’s transportation acheronian outside, and nan man can’t speak English.
“Personally, that’s my biggest nightmare,” Boyce says. “Someone being wounded while nary 1 other is around, and nan [danger of personification thinking], ‘Was it you?’ And for that to hap successful a overseas country, you deliberation astir nan worst lawsuit scenario. But he conscionable helps him.”
Marcus lifts nan obstruction and saves nan man, who stands up, wraps successful him a wordless hug and bikes away.
“It was for illustration a reward for nan nonverbal connection that he’s utilized to pinch his mom,” Boyce says. “Being capable to thief a person, and person emotion from this personification — a very weird, drunk dude, but still. You don’t really spot him hug anyone successful nan show, isolated from possibly Tina. So this is simply a hug that he needs.”
“He’s overseas, and he’s emboldened. Especially aft what conscionable happened pinch nan bike,” Youssef explains of nan adjacent infinitesimal of nan episode, erstwhile Marcus and Sydney hop connected FaceTime and sweetly admit that they miss each other. It’s nan first clip Season 2 makes reference to nan imaginable romance budding betwixt nan coworkers.
“Lionel is conscionable truthful fucking cute,” Youssef says. “His adorableness and charm and attractiveness is each him. It was really conscionable astir pointing nan camera. But portion of it has to do pinch like, ‘I’m successful Copenhagen and I’m sidesplitting it. I’ve stepped out. I’m seeing each these different angles, and I’m capable to show a different portion of myself.'”
