rant · moment 3 of 13
Pitching a Food Show and Trashing Anthony Bourdain
from Day Drinking At Borders · #5
Audio-only archive episode — no video to seek.
4 minTim describes meetings with food TV development people who want him fat and unfunny, then goes on an extended rant about Anthony Bourdain being over-anointed by liberal tastemakers and mixing hummus talk with political tragedy.
- 4:21Tim went to a development meeting about pitching a food show, since he talks about food constantly on the podcast and in his act.
- 4:39Food Network shows are homogenous—they're all travelogue formats like Diners, Drive-ins, and Dives or Burgers, Brews, and Qs.
- 5:19His pitch: a food show where you eat quickly, talk about the CIA, and leave the restaurant.
- 5:41Food Network claims to want funny but doesn't—by funny they mean someone in a colorful shirt making bad pizza dough jokes about themselves.
- 6:04Anthony Bourdain episodes juxtapose serious human suffering with food talk, like a Turkish family worried about their missing daughter suddenly pivoting to hummus and grape leaves.
- 6:55Liberals anoint certain people as "the guy"—Bourdain has been anointed by the New York, LA, Portland intelligentsia as the definitive food personality.
- 7:36People claim they learn more from Bourdain's show than from actual news, which seems absurd given what news they're actually consuming.
- 7:50Tim sees Bourdain's show as a serious food-and-travel program with heavy political overtones rather than entertainment, which feels severe for what should just be about food.
- 8:09A certain type of person will only watch Bourdain and dismiss Diners, Drive-ins, and Dives as beneath them, treating it as an intellectual status marker.
- 8:36Bourdain is the only food show worth watching, according to the people who watch food shows at all.
Anthony BourdainFood NetworkDiners, Drive-Ins and DivesThe ChewBrews, Burgers, and Barbecue