Anyone who ever read Anthony Bourdain’s books, watched one of his globe-hopping culinary travel series or even just sat down to a mouth-watering plate of steak frites at Manhattan’s Brasserie Les Halles during his tenure there as executive chef probably has an idea of the man behind the self-made success. His bluntly unfiltered storytelling and conversational style, his passion and curiosity as a cultural explorer, his eloquence in the language of food and even his amusing bad-boy arrogance were all part of a larger-than-life, unapologetically authentic personality. Almost a decade after his shocking suicide by hanging, Bourdain remains an iconic figure as both celebrity chef and accidental anthropologist.
Matt Johnson’s Tony is a prologue to all that, tightly focused on the pivotal summer the rudderless 19-year-old Bourdain spent in Provincetown in 1975, washing dishes in a seafood joint, where he stumbled onto his vocation, right before enrolling in the Culinary Institute of America. It’s a lovely grace note that Bourdain’s friend and colleague for more than 20 years, Eric Ripert, is on the admissions panel in a brief scene.
Tony
The Bottom Line
More of a light bite than a full meal, but flavorful.
