“The Bear”: What’s a Sitcom Anyway?

Having just binge-watched the fifth and final season of The Bear, I have some strong thoughts on how TV has changed over time. From 1972 to 1983 I was devoted to M*A*S*H, a sort-of sitcom set during the Korean War. Lasting eleven years, the show—about a military surgical unit a stone’s throw from the front lines—focused on the hijinks of young surgeons, nurses, and other American military personnel far from home. So this series (with Alan Alda as “Hawkeye” Pierce, its central figure) blended outrageous comedy with a deep awareness of the tragedies of war and the challenges faced by healers in times of crisis.

 My friend Elias Davis, who co-wrote the famous final episode of M*A*S*H , implies that the show’s outcome was by no means fully planned from the start. But it’s clear that The Bear—officially labeled a comedy, though much of the family backstory is dead serious—was building throughout most of its five-year run toward a very specific conclusion. In the past, American TV didn’t work that way. In long-running comic shows there would be changes over the years as key actors came and went. See, for instance, how the M*A*S*H dynamic evolved when the obtuse Major Frank Burns, as played by Larry Linville, was replaced by the know-it-all snob Charles Emerson Winchester III (David Ogden-Stiers) as Hawkeye’s tent mate.

 Today, of  course, TV series tend to have much shorter seasons: each of the past five years has seen the arrival of only eight episodes of The Bear. (Compare M*A*S*H , which typically had more than 20.) The Bear’s  tight timetable makes it much easier for the writing team to control the show’s narrative, and to plan out in advance where it is going, with some interesting detours along the way. Curiously, although there’s a good-sized cast portraying those who work in and around the Chicago restaurant known as The Bear, not much always happens from episode to episode. Some focus almost entirely on a single character, and it’s not necessarily star Carmy (Jeremy Allen White), a talented chef who agonizes over his decision to convert his dead brother’s sandwich shop into a fine-dining establishment. Each of the central characters has a complicated backstory, and the show sometimes pulls away from the restaurant setting to explore cousin Richie working on his people skills, line cook Tina discovering her professional abilities, pastry chef Marcus coping with the loss of his mother, or Somali kitchen helper Ebraheim shyly struggling to get the restaurant on a stronger financial footing. (His mentor is played by the late Rob Reiner, and there’s a subtle, touching tribute to Reiner in Ebraheim’s last-episode final line, “As you wish.” Jamie Lee Curtis as Carmy’s addled, sometimes alcoholic, mother does not enter the restaurant until the show’s very last episode, but she’s impossible to forget.  Because we come to know these people so well, we care about what they ultimately accomplish.

 One of my favorite things about The Bear is how it rewards viewers paying close attention. Early in season 4 there’s an episode in which maître d’ Richie, aiming to heighten the celebration of  a family whose daughter has just been declared cancer-free, mesmerizes them all by creating a magical summer snowfall. In passing, some attention is paid to the solo diner at the next table who sees and delights in the family’s joy. Who is this man? We don’t find out until the very last show of season 5, when his appreciation for his dining experience bears important fruit. It’s yet another tasty surprise for a very special show. 

 

Replaceable You: Saying Goodbye to One and a Half Men

The hit CBS sitcom Two and a Half Men has been with us (God help us!) for more than a decade. Originally it was a raunchy odd-couple story about an uptight chiropractor (Jon Cryer) who got divorced and moved into the swinging Malibu beach pad of his jingle-writing brother (Charlie Sheen). The twist was that Cryer brought a young son (Angus T. Jones) to the relationship. Hence the series’ title. As the whole world knows by now, Sheen flipped out in early 2011, making nasty statements about series creator Chuck Lorre, and earning himself a million headlines, a trip to rehab, and a pink slip.

But a hit is a hit, and so Lorre and company opened season nine by orchestrating a colorful off-camera death for  Sheen’s character and providing Cryer with a new roommate, played by Ashton Kutcher. The show’s popularity continued. Still, all was not well in CBS-land. Young Angus T. Jones had debuted on the show at age 10. By age 17, he’d become the highest paid child star in television, earning $7.8 million over the course of two seasons. Then in 2012 came his loud (OK, strident) pronouncement that he’d found God. The new God-fearing Jones decried Two and a Half Men as “filth,” labeled himself a “paid hypocrite” for his role in it, and warned audiences not to watch. It’s obvious what had to happen next. Jones’ character joined the U.S. Army and vanished into the distance.   

Wait! – wasn’t that pretty much what happened to Richie Cunningham when Ron Howard decided to leave Happy Days? Except, of course, that Richie was sent to Greenland, not Japan, and returned for the occasional Very Special Episode.

In any case, Two and a Half Men now has a new member of the younger generation. She’s Amber Tamblyn, playing a previous unacknowledged daughter of the Charlie Sheen character. And she’s a lesbian. Does that make her a half man, perhaps?

Creators of hit series are well aware that the actors playing popular characters may not want to stick around forever. But it takes some ingenuity to figure out what to do. The family sitcom My Three Sons faced a stumbling block when eldest son Tim Considine left the series. Solution: #2 son Don Grady was moved up to #1, and dad Fred MacMurray adopted a younger boy to give him the requisite number of offspring.    

Then there was M*A*S*H, both an hilarious comedy and a serious meditation on the perils of warfare. The show, set in a medical unit during the Korean War, was on the air so long (1973-1983) that personnel changes were inevitable. Still, those in charge worked hard to maintain the interpersonal dynamics that made the series a hit. In the early days, the tent-mate and nemesis of Hawkeye Pierce (Alan Alda) was Larry Linville’s incompetent Captain Frank Burns. When Linville moved on, he was replaced by David Ogden Stiers’ Major Charles Winchester, which made Hawkeye’s chief antagonist no longer a nincompoop but rather a highly intelligent snob. Another important cast change came when McLean Stevenson chose to no longer play the local commander, goofy Lt. Colonel Henry Blake. His replacement, down-to-earth Henry Morgan, more than adequately filled the bill. But fans of the show will never forget Stevenson’s final episode. Through most of it was filled with pranks and warm goodbyes, the tag ending startled viewers (and cast members, I’m told) with the news that Henry Blake’s transport plane had been shot down over the Sea of Japan, and that there were no survivors. That’s one way to ensure there’ll be no return visits.