Here Are All Two Funny Moments in ‘The Bear’s Submission for Comedy Writing at the Emmys
Dysfunctional family dinners have always been the perfect fuel for TV comedy and a major driver of demand for blood pressure medication in the real world. If and when The Bear creator Christopher Storer collects his next comedy Emmy, maybe he can pawn it and treat his fans to some complimentary ACE inhibitors.
At this September’s 75th Primetime Emmy Awards, a surefire frontrunner in the Outstanding Writing for a Comedy Series category will be the critically beloved pressure-cooker episode “Fishes” from the perennial awards-darling series The Bear. The inclusion of the FX series about a troubled but brilliant chef and his struggling restaurant in purely comedy categories at such awards ceremonies was a source of contention among critics and comedy fans alike during last year’s awards season, and this year’s lone submission for the comedy writing prize from The Bear will all-but-certainly exacerbate the arguments over what constitutes comedy in today’s drearily drama-heavy television landscape.
Compared to other fan-favorite episodes from this past season of The Bear that were left out of the series' Emmy submissions, such as the delightfully Richie-focused “Forks,” Storer and Joanna Calo’s soon-to-be-Emmy-nominated script for the flashback Christmas disaster episode “Fishes” is easily the least joke-heavy of the bunch. “Fishes” is a tense, terrifyingly believable depiction of the Berzatto family’s single most traumatic meal, and it has a significantly lower laugh-per-minute rate than last year’s winner in the category, The Bear’s first-ever episode “The System.”
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But that doesn’t mean “Fishes” is without its moments of levity. In fact, it has two of them throughout its star-studded, chest-clutching 66-minute runtime. Here are both of those laugh-out-loud gags in ascending order of hilarity…
Sugar’s endlessly upbeat, endearingly innocent husband Pete is one of the unsung heroes of The Bear simply for being the resident punching bag of a particularly hurtful cast of ball-busters. Actor Chris Witaske’s role as the lovable putz whom the whole Berzatto family loves to put down is the most underrated performance on the show, and when Pete shows up to Christmas dinner in the middle of Donna’s meltdown bearing a stinking dish of fish, it gave every increasingly anxious guest an opportunity to misplace their anger onto the party’s pain sponge with hilarious ridicule.
John Mulaney’s Entire Investment Meeting With the Faks
Out of all the A-list actors who stopped by to film “Fishes,” stand-up superstar John Mulaney easily brought the most levity, as demonstrated by his gleeful reception of the Faks’ baseball cards sales pitch. Mulaney’s character of Stevie is one of the tertiary Berzatto family friends whose presence at each and every Christmas feast is a point of speculation for both The Bear fans and the family itself, but, as opposed to Pete, Stevie brings a welcome hostess gift to the event: his dry, bold-faced burns of the most ridiculous pair of entrepreneurs in Chicago.
