Ebon Moss-Bachrach Is the Acting MVP of ‘The Bear’ Season 2

There may be no bigger pain in the ass on television than Richard “Richie” Jerimovich, Ebon Moss-Bachrach’s sandwich shop manager/hanger-on in FX on Hulu’s The Bear, whose anxieties, resentments, and insecurities manifest themselves via one profanely petulant outburst and self-sabotaging tantrum after another.

As conceived by showrunner Christopher Storer, Richie is a man-child with a non-stop mouth and an inability to back down from the many arguments and conflicts he instigates. Thus, it comes as a monumental surprise that in a stellar second season (out now) full of unexpected turns, he proves to be the series’ undisputed—and dare I say, most endearing?—standout.

When Richie was first introduced to audiences, he was the de facto adversary of his “cousin” Carmy (Jeremy Allen White), the world-renowned chef who’d returned home to Chicago to take control of The Beef following the passing of his brother—and Richie’s beloved best friend—Michael (Jon Bernthal).

Distraught over addict Michael’s suicide, and bitter over Carmy’s desire to revamp “the system” that had governed the shop since its inception (this despite its wholesale sloppiness and inefficiency), Richie was the thorn in the side of Carmy as well as young new sous chef Sydney (Ayo Edebiri). It was therefore ironically fitting that in a late Season 1 episode, it was Richie who received a stab wound courtesy of Sydney—an accident that was the byproduct of his ceaseless antagonism, as well as his preternatural gift for escalating the business’ harried atmosphere to a fever pitch.

(Warning: Spoilers ahead for Season 2 of The Bear.)

For the initial two-thirds of The Bear’s return engagement, Richie is the same old Richie, if slightly more muted than before. That’s by and large due to the fact that, with the ragtag culinary crew having discovered Michael’s hidden stash of tomato-can cash at the conclusion of last year’s finale, and then successfully acquired additional funding from Uncle Jimmy (Oliver Platt) to convert the greasy, grimy The Beef into a high-end eatery called The Bear, Richie knows that there’s no fighting the inevitable change on the horizon. Moreover, he recognizes that he needs the business as much as it needs him.

For all his screaming-tyrant bluster and (somewhat justified) belief that he’s the glue holding everything together, Richie is no chef, no customer service whiz, nor even a reliable handyman à la sweet-natured Fak (Matty Matheson). Acting like the king of the castle without any proof that he’s irreplaceable, he’s the embodiment of a gung-ho macho spirit that’s on its way out, and a man who’s slowly accepting that unless he course-corrects—as an individual, a father, and a professional—his days are numbered.

All of which brings us to Episode 7 of The Bear, “Forks.” Just as Carmy has enrolled Tina (Liza Colón-Zayas) and Ebraheim (Edwin Lee Gibson) in culinary school to up their respective kitchen games, and shipped Marcus (Lionel Boyce) to Copenhagen to hone his bakery and dessert skills under the guidance of a former mate (Will Poulter), so too does he send Richie to a place of higher learning: a top-notch Chicago restaurant that’s run with ruthlessly uncompromising efficiency.

Ordered at outset by his 30-year-old supervisor (Andrew Lopez) to clean the kitchen’s forks until they’re smudge-free, Richie finds that his nonsense doesn’t play well in this no-nonsense environment. Consequently, despite taking this assignment as exile-like punishment (“for being ancillary”), Richie swallows his pride and soldiers onward, determined to demonstrate that he can’t be defeated—or broken.

What occurs over the remainder of “Forks” may be the most stunning small-screen transformation of the year. Unable to fall back on his bullshit, Richie shuts his trap and listens, watches, and absorbs. Gradually, he comprehends not only the machine-like method behind this starred restaurant’s madness, but the way in which its exacting rigidity (and intolerance for failure and excuses) isn’t a pose or a performance but, instead, is an extension of its deep love for its craft and its customers, as evidenced by its eye-opening decision to pick up an excited dining couple’s bill.

“Every second counts” reads the sign beneath the kitchen’s clock, and as he spies his colleagues plying their trade with superhuman speed and proficiency, Richie comes to understand it as a mantra that governs the restaurant as well as life—the latter point hammered home by his late, private mushroom-peeling conversation with the establishment’s accomplished owner (Olivia Colman).

In the span of one 34-minute installment, Richie metamorphizes into a new person—or, more accurately, into the finest version of himself. Aware of the beauty of commitment, the thrill of perfection, the exhilaration of teamwork, and the unparalleled satisfaction of doing something you love well (and being acknowledged for it), Richie becomes a grown up imbued with confidence, purpose, and ambition.

Moss-Bachrach conveys his development with grace and subtlety, his eyes—whether gazing at a colleague as she calls out a complex array of orders like a human computer, or intensely observing Lopez’s ace server as he wows two women diners with an astonishing dish—conveying the spark of inspiration, and intention, igniting within. By the time he’s boisterously answering trivia questions about the business with his superiors, Moss-Bachrach hasn’t just remodeled Richie; through quiet gestures and comments, he’s lucidly and movingly evoked every small yet significant step along his path toward maturity.

Best of all, however, is that Moss-Bachrach does this while retaining the fieriness, the cockiness, and the bawdy intensity that makes Richie a transfixing force of nature; it’s no wonder that, when he gets the opportunity to impress a table with a special meal, he does so with both upper-crust flair and his trademark bombastic enthusiasm.

As it does with all its characters during season two, The Bear thrusts out-of-control Richie into a foreign setting and gives him (and, by extension, Moss-Bachrach) a daunting challenge: evolve. Courtesy of the 46-year-old actor’s tour-de-force performance, that’s precisely what takes place—the result being that Richie learns to see himself (in a designer suit, no less!) and we, in turn, come to see the real him.

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