All articles tagged with #anthony bourdain
Simone FM Spinner retraces Tony Bourdain’s culinary compass—Arcachon Bay, Bordeaux, San Sebastián, Rome, Tokyo, Hanoi, and New York—pairing celebrated eateries with his favorite dishes and the belief that great food is about people and stories, not stars, in the wake of the new Tony biopic.
A24’s Tony, a biopic of Anthony Bourdain, expanded to 1,652 theaters and grossed $5 million this weekend, landing seventh at the box office; the film has grossed about $6.6 million since its debut, with a budget pegged under $15 million. Dominic Sessa stars as Bourdain, with Emilia Jones, Dagmara Domińczyk, Leo Woodall and Antonio Banderas, in a release that opened in six theaters on Aug. 7 before expanding to 37 venues, aided by strong reviews and fan affection for the chef.
A24's Anthony Bourdain biopic Tony expands to 1,642 theaters and grossed about $5 million for the weekend, $6.6 million cumulative in week 3, with Dominic Sessa playing a young Bourdain and Antonio Banderas as his mentor; the coming-of-age drama is Certified Fresh at 95% on Rotten Tomatoes with a 92% audience score.
The NY Post piece gathers praise from Bourdain’s friends and colleagues about the new A24 biopic Tony, which focuses on his early, pre-fame years and the real person behind the celebrity. They commend the portrayal of his complex, bluntly honest persona, recall his writing breakthrough, and acknowledge the film’s place alongside other Bourdain works in shaping his enduring legacy after his 2018 death.
BBC Culture’s review of Tony finds the biopic entertaining but narrow, centering a youth-and-romance arc while sidelining the immigrant and people of color kitchen workers who were central to Bourdain’s Kitchen Confidential, thereby underplaying his real legacy—even as the film offers solid period detail and performances.
Salon critic Coleman Spilde argues that Matt Johnson’s Tony sanitizes Anthony Bourdain’s early life, leaning on a nostalgic image rather than the man’s candor, underexplores the realities of the kitchen, and ends up a safe, somewhat superficial portrayal that Bourdain himself would likely have disliked.
Matt Johnson's Tony portrays a fictionalized, myth-making early life of Anthony Bourdain, blending invented mentors and exaggerated bravado to probe what shaped the future chef; critics say the film favors emotional truth over strict facts, while acknowledging Bourdain's humanity and the era's toxic kitchen culture.
In an exclusive interview, Eric Ripert discusses Anthony Bourdain’s portrayal in the biopic Tony, noting the film centers on a 19-year-old Bourdain with artistic liberties and touches on his past heroin use; Ripert, who knew a very different, more confident man later in life, praises Dominic Sessa’s credible performance and describes his cameo as a turning-point moment that frames Bourdain’s evolution over time.
A24’s Anthony Bourdain biopic Tony led this weekend’s indie box office with about $349,000 across six theaters (New York and Los Angeles), a $58,000-per-screen average and sold-out shows. The film expands to top markets next week ahead of a nationwide rollout on Aug. 21; Dominic Sessa stars as a young Bourdain to strong notices (Rotten Tomatoes Certified Fresh 95%). The ensemble includes Emilia Jones, Stavros Halkias, Leo Woodall and Antonio Banderas as a mentor. Other specialty titles like CatVideoFest 2026 and Teenage Sex and Death at Camp Miasma also performed well in the indie weekend, with Cookie Queens debuting notably in limited venues.
A slate of specialty titles rolls out this weekend: Matt Johnson’s Tony, a teenage Anthony Bourdain origin story opening in six theaters with a wider rollout soon, leads a dynamic indie weekend alongside Jane Schoenbrun’s Teenage Sex And Death At Camp Miasma (already drawing strong buzz) and Kent Jones’s Late Fame with Willem Dafoe; the lineup also includes several documentaries and festival titles like Cookie Queens, The Big Cheese, Olmo, Last Picture Shows, and CatVideoFest, illustrating a vibrant, limited-release indie scene.
The biopic Tony revisits Anthony Bourdain’s unruly 1970s Provincetown years—his dishwasher days, drug use, and the fierce kitchen culture that shaped his writing—through friends’ memories and the early path to fame, with Dominic Sessa portraying the young chef. It also reflects on how later fame, marriage, and his death intersect with the man behind the TV persona. The film opens in US theatres now, with the UK release on Aug 14 and Australia on Aug 20.
Director Matt Johnson’s Tony reimagines Anthony Bourdain by focusing on his adolescence in Provincetown rather than the chef’s fame, with Dominic Sessa as a young Bourdain and Antonio Banderas as a mentor boss; the project, born from Johnson’s own coming‑of‑age experiences, uses food as a social catalyst and includes a cameo from Eric Ripert to anchor Bourdain’s life in reality. The film aims to demystify the icon, presenting a flawed, relatable version of the man behind the legend, and hits theaters in limited release August 7 and wide release August 21.
Dominic Sessa discusses playing a young Anthony Bourdain in Tony, a 1975 Provincetown-set drama that channels kitchen-life initiation rites and coming-of-age longing, drawing on his Jersey Shore summers and Deerfield Academy to explain his appetite for risk, with the film avoiding the Bourdain death arc and releasing in cinemas August 14.
Matt Johnson’s Tony reimagines Anthony Bourdain’s formative years as a high-energy, superhero‑like coming‑of‑age story rather than a straightforward biopic. Set in 1975‑era Cape Cod and Provincetown, the film follows Tony’s push to write and to find his culinary future under mentors Chef (Antonio Banderas) and Sal, blending vivid kitchen lore with rebellious nightlife. While Banderas delivers the film’s emotional throughline, the piece argues the movie trades strict biopic fidelity for a universal, myth‑making origin story, raising questions about truth versus myth in pre‑fame storytelling.
Eric Ripert makes a closing cameo in the A24 biopic Tony about Anthony Bourdain, interviewing a teenage Bourdain (Dominic Sessa) during a Provincetown summer and highlighting their deep friendship; the film stars Antonio Banderas and Emilia Jones and tracks Bourdain’s early path to cooking, ahead of its August 7 release.