If people didn’t know who Liza Colón-Zayas was before, they know now. The actress and Bronx native lit up the screen in the FX series The Bear as veteran chef Tina Marrero. Fans are especially talking about the fifth episode of the second season where Tina breaks out of her shell and sings late Tejano star Freddy Fender bilingual hit, “Before the Next Teardrop Falls.”
Up to this point in the series, Tina has had trouble connecting with the younger chefs in the Chicago restaurant where she works. When she steps up to the mic and performs the song, however, her character blossoms in an unexpected way.
“That karaoke thing – I was so afraid of it. Liza was so afraid,” Colón-Zayas told Vulture. “I have karaoke trauma, and it ended up in the script.”
So, where did Colón-Zayas come from and where might have you seen her before?
Colón-Zayas, who is Puerto Rican, broke into mainstream theater circa 2000 with her one-woman show, Sistah Supreme, a semi-autobiographical stage production about growing up as a Latina in New York City during the 1970s and 1980s.
Some of her other stage credits include the off-Broadway play Our Lady of 121st Street and Arabia, We’d All Be Kings, which was directed by late Oscar winner Philip Seymour Hoffman (Capote).
Colón-Zayas has been working in the film and TV industry since the mid-1990s. She’s appeared in films like United 93, Righteous Kill and The Purge: Election Year. Before The Bear, she was seen on series like Law & Order, Law & Order: SVU and In Treatment.
“To be an artist to me is about representing the truth whatever that may be,” Colón-Zayas said.
Colón-Zayas is married to actor David Zayas, who is best known for his role as Angel Batista on the crime drama series Dexter.
This piece was written during the 2023 WGA and SAG-AFTRA strikes. Without the labor of the writers and actors currently on strike, The Bear being covered here wouldn’t exist.