BODACIOUS BOURDAIN
Surprising star on CNN
Anthony Bourdain: Parts Unknown Season 8 premieres Sunday, CNN
“This is going to be the worst day of Anderson’s life,” Anthony Bourdain says, settling behind a table at Takashi, a Japanese-Korean fusion restaurant in New York.
Before Bourdain’s CNN docu-series Anthony Bourdain: Parts Unknown premieres each season, he and Anderson Cooper sit down for a meal and film a preview. Cooper hates trying new food and Bourdain — the TV host and chef who eats everything — takes great joy in watching the news anchor squirm.
Cooper walks in a few minutes later in jeans and a maroon T-shirt; Bourdain is wearing the standard jeans and a black T-shirt.
“We mirror,” Cooper says, gesturing back and forth.
“I look to you for my styling,” Bourdain replies.
The banter continues as the cameras roll and they discuss the eighth season of Parts Unknown, the food and travel series that kicks off Sunday with a guest appearance by U.S. President Barack Obama in Hanoi.
The White House reached out to Bourdain’s team about getting the president on the show; when Cooper asks whether it’s because Obama is a fan, Bourdain deflects. Instead, he talks about how he drank beer with Obama at a small, family-run restaurant. To the joy of the locals, they ate a uniquely Hanoi dish called bun cha that includes cold rice noodles and grilled pork.
The Secret Service wasn’t thrilled about the “hard to control” environment, but Bourdain and Obama dined for about 90 minutes. The meal cost $6 and Bourdain picked up the tab — quite the unconventional presidential meeting.
“But for whatever reason,” Bourdain says, “they seemed willing to play.”
There are a few reasons Obama might stop by. Namely, Parts Unknown has developed a loyal audience in the 31/2 years since its debut and Bourdain’s fans follow his every move as he explores international cultures and cuisines. The show recently won its fourth consecutive Emmy for outstanding informational series or special.
The show is a great stop for a world leader who wants to talk about his trip to improve relations between the U.S. and Vietnam.
But in 2013, when CNN first announced plans for the series, some people scoffed.
“There were people who were naysayers. … ‘Why are you putting someone who’s not a journalist on CNN?’ ” says Amy Entelis, executive vice-president for content development. “People thought that change in strategy was threatening to CNN.”
At the time, the network wanted to launch a few hours of original programming weekly to combat its ‘peaks-and-valleys’ ratings: Viewers flipped to CNN in droves for big news events, but when the story died down, the audience left. During a development meeting in 2012, Bourdain’s name came up.
Bourdain was a cultural phenomenon with the long-running hit No Reservations on Travel Channel, which started in 2005. He also was known for writing books, such as the bestselling Kitchen Confidential.
Although CNN was wary of airing something resembling a reality show, executives saw an engrossing documentary-style series.
“He made you want to go on a journey with him around the world, which is really what CNN wants to do every day as well,” Entelis says.
“We were really looking for a different kind of storytelling on CNN.”
Bourdain headed to CNN after his Travel Channel contract ended; Parts Unknown started airing Sunday nights in April 2013. He relished CNN’s resources and the freedom to go beyond topics that were more impactful than, as he puts it, “Is it salty or sweet?”
Bourdain, 60, insists he doesn’t take himself too seriously on Parts Unknown, even though he’s gone in-depth on issues including drug problems in Mexico City, kangaroo courts in Myanmar and the changing atmosphere of Cuba. Dispatches on food are mixed into every episode.
Season 8 goes all over the map: Bourdain details the hot chicken that almost “destroyed” him in Nashville and his spicy adventures in Sichuan. He was eating roasted bone marrow in London during the time of Brexit and found the city in “a collective mental breakdown.”
CNN president Jeff Zucker says that over the past four years, CNN has proved it can “walk and chew gum at the same time” in terms of content. When there’s breaking news, Bourdain’s show is pulled: The Season 7 finale featuring Buenos Aires was pre-empted for coverage of the Orlando nightclub shooting in June.
“The beauty of CNN today is that we have evolved to a place where we can juggle both original series and films and documentaries with our coverage of news and politics and breaking news,” Zucker says. “There are people who criticize us for doing too much coverage of certain stories, and there are people who want to talk about our original series. So the bottom line is everyone’s talking about CNN, and that’s a good place to be.”
Ratings-wise, Parts Unknown has stayed steady, averaging 880,000 viewers Sunday nights in the first season and 828,000 in the seventh. News of the Obama appearance got plenty of attention when it was leaked; Zucker says he wasn’t surprised that the show gets such high-profile guest stars.
“We get requests left and right from people who want to be in it. Almost none of those are honoured or done,” Zucker says. “But the president was in Vietnam and wanted to be part of the show. … I thought it was just another sign of just how deeply the program has become a part of American popular culture.”