Anthony Bourdain’s Wild Summers Still Echo in Provincetown
The New York Times • • entertainment
Key Points:
- In the mid-1970s, a teenage Anthony Bourdain worked as a dishwasher in Provincetown, Massachusetts, where an unusual encounter involving his boss and a newlywed customer sparked his desire to become a chef.
- This formative experience occurred during a summer when Bourdain arrived with little ambition, but by season's end, he found a newfound aspiration in the culinary world.
- The film "Tony," directed by Matt Johnson and opening on August 7, dramatizes Bourdain's early years in Provincetown, focusing on his kitchen experiences rather than the broader influences on his later career.
- While the movie takes creative liberties typical of biopics, it highlights the kitchen environment that shaped Bourdain's sensibility, which he later detailed in his 2000 memoir "Kitchen Confidential."
