On 'The Bear,' Ramy Youssef Found Stillness in Copenhagen
We had these scenes in an apartment, and then we’re kind of walking in Copenhagen and realizing, Oh wait, these are really cool places to be and to live. And again, it creates that privacy, that intimacy, that sometimes that can look like loneliness but actually isn’t.
This episode is a real fine line between loneliness and quiet. And I think that the houseboat felt so quiet in this really cool way. There’s even the element of floating—being untethered can either be scary or it can be freeing.
Boyce on the houseboat. “He gets to go back home with this new piece of himself,” says Youssef of Marcus' journey.
What did you learn at the restaurant Poulette, because Lionel also mentioned Poulette when I interviewed him?
[Culinary producer] Courtney Storer—who I think is just a crucial part of why the show is so good—just threw me on a text with a few chefs. And Martin [Ho], who owns Poulette, and I just really got along. He has this amazing bike with a side carriage thing—I’ve never seen these things outside of Europe, but it’s like, I basically was sitting close to the floor and he biked me all around Copenhagen for days. He’d just take me to all these different places. And truthfully, his fried chicken sandwich was just my favorite thing that I had there, and so I kept going back.
It’s a sandwich I think about all the time. So we shot it romantically, like you can see the steam coming out of it. I was looking at [cinematographer] Adam [Newport-Berra] and I was like, This is fucking awesome.
Preparing Poulette's famous sandwich.
How did you work with Lionel Boyce, who was in a different situation—having to carry the whole episode rather than being a part of the ensemble?
He’s such a natural, and he brings so much of himself into the character. He has this innate sweetness; he has this contemplativeness. I think the thing we probably played with the most was his phone call with Sydney and kind of trying to find those pockets of vulnerability.
And similarly, I think he has really fun stuff to play in his scene with Will Poulter, Luca. He’s so happy to be there, but it’s that thing where you’re trying to play it cool, but then you’re also trying to get some information. That scene with him and Will was some of the most fun I’ve had shooting because it was so subtle, but there was actually a lot to do. Luca has got the doors shut, he’s closed off, and then Lionel just has the softest knock. He keeps opening the door and opening the door and opening the door.
Lionel Boyce captures by Youssef's lens.
Is there anything you learned from this experience that was new for you compared to the other directing work you’ve done?
I think because I had more time to focus on one thing, one episode, it was like a peak for me of a more expansive directing experience. Sometimes showrunning feels like running a small business. When you’re fully showrunning and in something, the way that we are on Ramy, there’s so many pieces. But for me, I just got this really expansive look at what it could feel like to, hopefully, do a film.
Do you have an eye on a feature you want to direct?
I have a couple of things that feel exciting that I’m kind of chasing. I’m working on this show right now with Will Ferrell, which has been amazing, and then around that corner, especially off this Bear experience—I think, hopefully, I’m ready to jump into figuring that out too.
“I had maybe seven, eight rolls of just Copenhagen stuff and whittled it down, sent it to this location manager who was a wizard because he knew where everything was," says Youssef. “I had no addresses, I had nothing. I was just like, ‘Hey, I saw this row of trees.’ And he was like, ‘I know where that is.’”
Peering into the houseboat. "I'd asked [The Bear creator] Chris Storer, "Hey, can I watch some of second season and where it's at?" And he was just like, "No, just make it whatever it is, however you guys want to do it."
The houseboat where Marcus stays in Copenhagen.
“The writer's room had not been to Copenhagen but Lionel and I had, and so I think we got this really fun opportunity to be like, 'Hey, let's make this a love letter to this city,'” says Youssef.
“I met a location manager in Copenhagen and we scouted stuff for like two days, but then I hung out for like two weeks and I got to shoot a bunch of film photography and find a bunch of locations,” says Youssef of his time exploring the city.
“I really felt like the more I got to talk to the restaurant people there, you realize it is like everyone in food is a transplant from somewhere else,” says Youssef.
Boyce in a kitchen in Copenhagen. “I think the episode is constantly playing with this tension of like, ‘wait, is this lonely and about to get scary or is this quiet and about to be freeing?’” says Youssef. “And it only is quiet and freeing for him.”
Youssef calls Courtney Storer (pictured here with Poulette's Martin Ho) “a genius on set. She is so good with how the food is being presented and made.”
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