Anthony Bourdain never said he was the world’s greatest chef, but almost overnight, he became one of the most famous chefs in the world. The documentary by Oscar-winning director Morgan Neville, Roadrunner: A Film About Anthony Bourdain, draws from interviews and a wealth of home video and outtakes from “Parts Unknown” and various shows for the Food Network and the Travel Channel. Bourdain ate his way around the world three times over, discovering the planet as “a traveler, not a tourist,” and perhaps discovering something disheartening about himself.
In 2018 Bourdain shocked his fans when he took his life but one gets the impression that he wouldn’t have been surprised if he had seen his future in the tea leaves or the bottom of a demitasse cup.
Bourdain’s persona was never far from the truth of the man, and that was part of his appeal. He was handsome, funny, curious about everything, a romantic cynic (not a cynical romantic). In audio snippets heard on Roadrunner (or were they generated by AI?), he explained, “I got very lucky.” Washing dishes led to restaurant cooking, which led to becoming a chef at Manhattan’s Les Halles. A lively, descriptive email to a friend while visiting Tokyo led to a book deal. Kitchen Confidential (2000) became a bestseller, which led to David Letterman and Oprah. And then he was offered a series and then, other series, and went around the globe to eat the local food—some of it unusual by American standards (yes, he gulped down cobra meat as if it was an oyster).
But Bourdain wasn’t interested in eating snakes as much as understanding the people who ate them. He wasn’t an off-road backpacker unpacking his preconceptions wherever he went but a great traveling storyteller whose empathy may have burned him out. He was in Beirut under Israeli air attack (2006) and in Haiti after the earthquake (2010). Unlike most travel or food show hosts, Bourdain was also a hipster. When he traveled to Armenia (2018), he shared his meals with System of a Down’s Serj Tankian.
Celebrity for Bourdain was a blessing as well as a curse as he kept figuring out how to remain authentic while being followed by cameras. His first marriage (to his high school sweetheart) expired while he was on the road and his second, shorter marriage flared like a supernova before going dark. As a young man, Bourdain was addicted to heroin. “Something was missing in me,” he admitted. One of the friends interviewed for Roadrunner added that his addiction jumped from one thing to another.
It was as if Bourdain needed an obsession—and tired of each one in turn. “Nothing was forever in his world,” the friend explained. It won’t last forever but he left behind a series of smart observations about the world around us.
