Synopsis: A 19-year-old Anthony Bourdain travels to Provincetown and stumbles into the chaotic world of a restaurant kitchen, setting off a summer that will shape the course of his life.
Director: Matt Johnson
Stars: Dominic Sessa, Antonio Banderas, Emilia Jones
Anthony Bourdain was a well-respected man of the world. He was clearly connected to the culinary world, but reducing him to simply being a celebrity chef doesn’t capture the whole picture of the man who was a writer, traveller, storyteller and, perhaps most importantly, someone with an infectious curiosity about people and the world around him.
I begin with this because it’s true and because you won’t find much of it in the new biopic Tony.
The film from director Matt Johnson is more Anthony Bourdain-adjacent than a traditional Anthony Bourdain biopic. It focuses on a very specific period of his life, and while there is certainly entertainment to be found here, the movie barely scratches the surface of what made Bourdain such an interesting person.
We meet Bourdain (Dominic Sessa) at 19 years old in 1975. He still lives at home and dreams of becoming a writer. His father, Pierre (Rich Sommer), seems supportive, while his mother, Gladys (Dagmara Domińczyk), comes across as a gloomy cloud hanging over him. Mother and son don’t seem to have the healthiest relationship, and Tony appears to have reached the point where earning her approval feels impossible.
Things aren’t going particularly well elsewhere either.
Tony has applied for a prestigious writing fellowship and is so convinced he’ll get it that he’s already telling people he has. There’s just one problem: he doesn’t get it.
That’s devastating enough, but Tony has another obsession occupying his mind: Nancy (Emilia Jones), his high school crush. When Nancy heads to Provincetown, Massachusetts, for the summer, Tony impulsively decides to follow her.
Mild stalking notwithstanding, he arrives in Provincetown and continues pretending that he received the fellowship, claiming he has come there to write. What begins as a lie to impress a woman quickly becomes something Tony has to keep feeding.
After a series of unfortunate events leave him without enough money to get home, Tony finds himself at the doorstep of a local seafood restaurant run by a man everyone simply calls Chef (Antonio Banderas).
Tony convinces Chef to give him a chance, claiming to have restaurant experience when he has virtually none. Chef allows him to wash dishes at the restaurant in exchange for a job and eventually somewhere to stay.
And this is where Tony starts to become considerably more interesting.
The restaurant kitchen introduces Tony to a completely different world. It’s chaotic, loud, exhausting and filled with personalities who aren’t exactly concerned about being positive influences.
Chief among them is Sal (Leo Woodall).
Sal is the kind of guy who is great to have beside you in a kitchen but probably terrible to have whispering in your ear outside of it. If there is trouble to get into, Sal probably knows a shortcut. He introduces Tony to the camaraderie and recklessness of restaurant culture, but we also see the darker side of that lifestyle through Sal’s drug use and increasingly destructive behaviour.
Woodall is very good in the role because he doesn’t turn Sal into a simple bad influence. There is charisma there. You understand why Tony would be drawn to him and this lifestyle in the first place.
Meanwhile, when Tony isn’t perfecting the art of dishwashing or learning his way around a kitchen, he will do just about anything to catch another glimpse of Nancy.
This is where the movie’s biggest problem emerges.
As Tony plays out, it becomes less an origin story about Anthony Bourdain and more a reminder that some men will do and say absolutely anything to impress a woman.
That doesn’t make Tony a bad movie. In fact, taken purely as a coming-of-age story about a directionless 19-year-old trying to figure out who he is, there is plenty here that works. But if you’re going into this looking for some deep exploration of Anthony Bourdain, you will leave disappointed.
The Anthony Bourdain we eventually came to know—the brilliant writer, culinary icon, television personality and world traveller—is largely absent. Obviously, this is Bourdain before he became Bourdain, but I wanted more breadcrumbs. More moments where you could see the person he would eventually become taking shape.
Instead, much of the movie revolves around Tony’s pursuit of Nancy and the lies he tells to impress her.
Thankfully, the film has some very strong performances.
Dominic Sessa approaches this role with a maturity remarkable for an actor who has been appearing in feature films for only a few years. His breakout performance in The Holdovers definitely wasn’t a fluke.
Sessa doesn’t attempt to turn the role into an Anthony Bourdain impersonation. Instead, he captures the turmoil, insecurity and angst of a young man desperate to fit in and even more desperate to convince everyone around him that he has his life figured out.
He doesn’t.
There is an awkwardness to Sessa that works perfectly for this version of Tony. He’s confident enough to lie his way into situations but insecure enough that you understand why he’s doing it.
Speaking of breakout performances, Emilia Jones, who was fantastic in the Academy Award-winning CODA, is solid as Nancy. More importantly, the film gives her enough agency that she isn’t simply presented as the beautiful woman Tony must win over. She gradually sees through his stories and forces him to confront the fact that much of the person he has presented to her isn’t real.
Leo Woodall also continues to show why he is one of the more interesting young actors working today. His Sal is charming, unpredictable and ultimately tragic.
But Antonio Banderas might walk away with the movie.
His Chef initially appears to be the stereotypical tough restaurant boss, but Banderas slowly reveals much more beneath the surface. Chef becomes a mentor to Tony and, ironically, provides the young man with something he has been desperately searching for: direction.
Their relationship is where Tony comes closest to becoming the Anthony Bourdain movie I wanted to see.
Chef sees something in Tony before Tony really sees it in himself. He teaches him about kitchens, responsibility and earning your place. The movie is at its best when Tony stops chasing Nancy long enough to actually learn from the people around him.
Perhaps that’s the point.
Maybe Tony isn’t supposed to explain Anthony Bourdain. Maybe it’s simply showing us one summer when an immature teenager accidentally wandered into the environment that would ultimately change his life.
There is something compelling about that idea. I just wish the movie dug deeper into it.
Bourdain eventually became famous because he seemed endlessly fascinated by other people. He travelled around the world, ate with strangers, asked questions and approached different cultures with curiosity rather than judgment. He had an ability to make food feel like the beginning of a conversation rather than the entire conversation.
Tony shows us how he entered a kitchen.
I’m not convinced it shows us how he became Anthony Bourdain.
Still, thanks to Sessa, Banderas, Jones and Woodall, there is enough here to make the journey enjoyable. As a coming-of-age comedy-drama, Tony works. As a portrait of one strange, reckless and important summer in Bourdain’s life, it works even better.
As an Anthony Bourdain biopic?
It left me hungry for more.
Grade: B-
