The first season of the American comedy-drama television series The Bear premiered with all episodes on June 23, 2022, on FX on Hulu. Christopher Storer and Joanna Calo serve as showrunners for the season. Jeremy Allen White stars as Carmy Berzatto, an award-winning chef who returns to his hometown of Chicago to manage the chaotic kitchen at his deceased brother's sandwich shop. The supporting cast includes Ebon Moss-Bachrach, Ayo Edebiri, Lionel Boyce, Liza Colón-Zayas, and Abby Elliott.
In March 2021, FX ordered a pilot for The Bear to be written and directed by Storer, and the series was given a full season order in October 2021. Filming for the season began in February 2022 in Chicago, and wrapped in March of that year. The season consists of eight episodes.
The season received critical acclaim. It received ten Primetime Emmy Awards, including Outstanding Comedy Series and acting wins for White, Moss-Bachrach, and Edebiri, making it the season of television with the most wins in a single year for a comedy series until the record was beaten by the series' second season. The season was the most-watched comedy series in FX's history.
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FX ordered a pilot for The Bear in March 2021, to be written and directed by series creator and co-showrunner Christopher Storer. In October 2021, FX greenlit the series for a full-season order, scheduled for a 2022 premiere date. The season was produced by FX Productions (FXP), with Hiro Murai, Nate Matteson, Joanna Calo and Josh Senior serving as executive producers. Matty Matheson, who portrays Neil Fak in a recurring role in the season, serves as a consulting producer. The sandwich shop interior is copied from the Chicago restaurant Mr. Beef on Orleans Street, in River North. Storer was a frequent patron and a friend of the owner's son.
On May 21, 2021, it was announced that Shameless star Jeremy Allen White would be starring in the pilot for The Bear in the leading role, alongside co-stars Ebon Moss-Bachrach, Ayo Edebiri, Lionel Boyce, Abby Elliott and Matheson. In October 2021, Liza Colón-Zayas was announced to be joining the main cast, with Matheson and Edwin Lee Gibson starring in a recurring capacity. The season features many guest stars, including Oliver Platt, Joel McHale and Jon Bernthal. Joanna Calo told The Hollywood Reporter after the launch of season one, "We were looking for surprising people, the most exciting people, and people with kindness at their center as a way to ground some of the sharper edges of the show. And Lionel [Boyce] and Ayo [Edebiri] were people Chris had worked with in different ways. And Ebon [Moss-Bachrach] was someone that we both really admired and kind of just found through the casting process. All the people that we cast were willing to read, which was a really interesting process to navigate. And that wasn't even about them, showing us how good they were, we knew how good they were. But it was a way for us to meet them and talk to them and see if they wanted to work with us and see if they kind of could have a shared energy."
Storer wrote four of the eight episodes, and co-showrunner Joanna Calo wrote two. The rest of the episodes were written by Sofya Levitsky-Weitz, Karen Joseph Adcock, Catherine Schetina and Rene Gube. The scripts for all the episodes in the season were submitted to the Writers Guild of America on May 6, 2022.
According to Calo, "One of the things that changed greatly ended up not being put into the final pilot. We wrote a big explosion for Jeremy [Allen White], getting at this thing that happens in kitchens, which is that the hot temperatures and the close quarters and the abusive cycles often lead chefs to yell at each other. There was this big moment for Jeremy to freak out at everyone. If you've seen the series, there are moments like that later on. When we made the pilot, we decided that we were able to draw that out for longer, but I do think that it showed FX what Jeremy could do and what the show could be. And that was something exciting to them. And also Sydney [Adamu] was supposed to appear first in episode three. And I loved her and I said, 'let's get her in.'"
Several scenes for the pilot were filmed on location at Mr. Beef, although a set was built for the kitchen scenes. The pilot was filmed in summer 2021. Principal photography for the season began in February 2022, and wrapped on March 31, 2022, in Chicago. Storer directed five of the eight episodes, with the other three being directed by Calo. The seventh episode of the season, "Review," features an 18-minute long take.
According to cinematographer Andrew Wehde, episodes two through eight of season one were shot over 27 days (two fewer days than had been scheduled) with "about 18 days in that primary set [at Cinespace Chicago], and then we were out at the original Mr. Beef and elsewhere around the city for the remaining eight or nine days." The pilot was "shot widescreen, 2:39." According to Wehde, "We started realizing the pilot lived in its own world. The show was going to be its own thing. We shot tests before principal [photography] of season one, and we were pulling grabs of widescreen and . It started to feel timeless at 1:85. We felt 1:85 worked great."
According to film editor Adam Epstein, "We were blessed-slash-cursed with an absolutely massive amount of B-roll...We had six hours of them doing the full beef process, or four hours of Chicago at dusk, and at night. We had shots of the kitchen when it was messy, and when it was clean. It was really purposeful and specific, and that enabled us to bring some interesting ideas and transitions into the episodes."
Executive producer Josh Senior and composer Jeffrey Qaiyum first met when Qaiyum taught a hip-hop theater class at Lehigh University. Senior then began hiring him for various production projects, leading up to The Bear. Qaiyum, in turn, brought in Johnny Iguana: "I use session musicians when scoring and I wanted to use only Chicago people for The Bear. Johnny Iguana is one of the greatest piano/organ players alive. He's a Chicago legend and has played in the Junior Wells band and was quite big regionally with a band called Oh My God. His current band is the Claudettes. I used Johnny Iguana a lot in season one and when we were discussing the vibe for season two, I got him involved in a more official capacity and we co-wrote many of the themes for S2." In season one, they served, in part, as musical adjuncts to the low-budget operation. According to Block Club Chicago, "Qaiyum and Iguana were often asked to compose music with similar tones and beats per minute to popular songs the show's producers wanted to use but couldn't afford."
According to supervising sound editor Steve "Major" Giammaria, season one is loud by design, so the key issue was how to focus through the noise for the audience: "Often there's a song playing as score, multiple people yelling, and production sound that includes pots and pans and working stoves tied to the dialogue as well as added foley and sound FX. The trick then becomes what to focus on at each moment."
The season released on FX on Hulu in the United States on June 23, 2022, with all eight episodes. Internationally, the season became available to stream in the Star hub on Disney+.
The first season of The Bear was the most watched program during the week of July 22, 2022, and the second-most-watched program across all platforms during the weeks of July 3, and July 13, and July 17, 2022. According to FX, the first season was the most-watched comedy series in the network's history.
The first season received an approval rating of 100% with an average rating of 8.7/10, based on 80 critic reviews on the review aggregator website Rotten Tomatoes. The website's critics consensus reads, "Like an expertly confected sandwich, The Bear assembles a perfect melange of ingredients and stacks them for optimal satisfactionâÂÂand thankfully keeps the crust-iness for extra flavor." Metacritic gave the season a weighted average score of 88 out of 100 based on 24 critic reviews.
The American Film Institute named the first season one of the ten best television programs of the year. The Guardian named the season number one of the best 100 TV shows of 2022, describing it as "the best workplace drama since Mad Men". The Bear appeared in the top ten on numerous publications' "Best of 2022" lists, including first for The A.V. Club, BBC, People, and TVLine, among others.
The season received critical acclaim, with multiple awards nominations and wins. The season won ten Primetime Emmy Awards for its 13 nominations, making it the season of television with the most wins in a single year for a comedy series, until the record was beaten by the series' second season. The following is a list of awards the first season of The Bear has been nominated for or won.
One scholarly analysis of the season 1 narrative concluded that "Carmy's masculinity (and thus his capability as a leader and a provider) are immediately questioned by the (nominally) most conservative members of the staff. Nonetheless, Carmy's fathering style wins over his extended family, with the Italian traditional family meal closing the season as a testimony to its success...They all convene in the Berzatto kitchen space, where Michael, first, and then Carmy (albeit in different ways) recruit them, along with their own positionalities, languages, and cultural experiences. These characters solidify a broad collective of individuals into an extended family based on a nonhierarchical mix of blood ties, emotional bonds, a collective love language, and a set of shared values and trauma."