Abby Elliott interview: ‘The Bear’
No one needs to tell Abby Elliott that she’s hit the jackpot in getting to portray Natalie Berzatto, better known as Sugar – the big sister of restaurant boss Carmy (Jeremy Allen White) – on the multiple Emmy-winning FX hit “The Bear.” “I mean, it’s a dream job and everyone is so fantastic,” Elliott says. “All of the actors are just incredible, and to be able to work alongside them and with them, it’s just the best…I feel so challenged creatively in this environment. This just feels like what I want to be doing. I really love being able to get to do this work.” She’s also grateful and a bit blown away by the impact the show is having on its audience, who can’t wait for the series to drop its third season June 27 on Hulu. “I get people coming up to me saying, ‘I’m the Natalie in my family. I’m so sorry.’ The audience thing, it means everything.” Watch the exclusive video interview above.
Sugar spends Season 2 of “The Bear” overseeing the chaotic renovation of her late brother Mikey’s (Jon Bernthal) beloved Italian beef restaurant into a fine-dining establishment. She also spends it pregnant, both on the show and in real life simultaneously. Elliott calls that aspect of the season “really cool.” She asserts, “I was lucky during my pregnancy. I felt great, and I felt like I had a little buddy with me, and that was very calming and reassuring. I had energy, I was excited, and everyone was treating me great, too I mean, they always treat me great, but there was a lot of bringing me M&M’s.” The only down side was that her maternal condition spurred an aversion to eggs, and Sydney (Ayo Edebiri) in Season 2 makes this beautiful omelete that’s the famous Bear Omelete for Natalie – and I had to use a spit bucket. It was completely wasted on me.”
One of the more memorable experiences for Elliott during the season was the shooting of the acclaimed “Fishes” episode that stands as a supersized flashback of a star-studded Berzatto holiday gathering of family and friends. It features guest turns from Bob Odenkirk, Sarah Paulson, John Mulaney and especially Jamie Lee Curtis as the hopelessly emotionally damaged matriarch Donna. “I’m there with my old friend John Mulaney from ‘SNL’ and all of these amazing actors who I would normally be joking around with, and it was just like, this is just sad,” Elliott recalls. “We were all really feeling it, grieving Mikey (who is at the gathering prior to his suicide) and seeing his pain.”
One scene in particular when Donna tosses a platter after Sugar asks her if she’s OK was especially emotional. There was also a moment when Curtis, as Donna, puts her hand on Sugar’s face – which Elliott says was improvised. “I had an out-of-body experience,” she recalls. “When she grabbed my face, I was there, but I wasn’t. (Creator-showrunner) Chris (Storer) afterwards was like, ‘Are you OK? That was so intense. Did you know she was going to do that?’ And I was like, ‘What?’ I literally didn’t know. And that was such a reaction that Natalie would have of just disassociating. So in that moment, I had to really think about it. Like, oh yeah, I guess she did grab my face, and that was all Jamie. I mean, she was just tremendous. When she puts the wig on, she’s Donna, and that was just wild.”
There is a certain amount of improvisation permitted on “The Bear,” Elliott confirms. And in “Fishes,” there was certainly a bit of it, though she says the scenes in the kitchen where everything seems to be moving a million miles an hour were “pretty choreographed. The lines did not have to be perfect. Chris is never, ‘This has to be there,’ but all of the people coming and going was really choreographed and the food, that was a big thing too.” She singles out the camera crew as “just unbelievable. They just are dancing and I don’t know how they do it. They just get around us in this way (that’s phenomenal). In ‘Fishes’ and in the finale, where it was one take and they’re moving through, they’re tremendous.”
The first two seasons of “The Bear” from FX are streaming on Hulu. Season 3 drops in its entirely on June 27.
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