BOURDAIN MEMORIAL
A passer-by stops at a makeshift memorial for Anthony Bourdain at the former location of Brasserie Les Halles in New York City. Mr. Bourdain once worked as executive chef at the restaurant. The writer, chef and television personality was found dead in his hotel room Friday morning in France. His employer, CNN, said the death was a suicide.
Anthony Bourdain, whose madcap memoir about the dark corners of New York’s restaurants made him into a celebrity chef and touched off a career as a globe-trotting television host, was found dead in his hotel room in France on Friday. He was 61.
Mr. Bourdain spent two decades in restaurant kitchens, at first shucking oysters and cleaning dishes in a Cape Cod seafood shack and later serving high-end meals in Manhattan, before accepting a friend’s offer to fly him to Mexico if he agreed to write a novel. It was the start of a second act as an author and then a host, redefining the staid genres of food writing and food-tourism shows with an inquisitive but rebellious image that endeared him to fellow chefs, restaurantgoers and travelers.
Christian de Rocquigny du Fayel, the prosecutor for the city of Colmar, in the Alsace region near where Mr. Bourdain was found, said the cause of death was hanging. “At this stage, we have no reason to suspect foul play,” he said.
Mr. Bourdain had traveled to Strasbourg, near France’s border with Germany, with a television production crew to record an episode of his show “Parts Unknown” on CNN, the network said. “It is with extraordinary sadness we can confirm the death of our friend and colleague,” CNN said in a statement.
Eric Ripert, a celebrity chef and restaurateur who appeared with Mr. Bourdain on several of his shows, found him unresponsive, according to CNN. Mr. Bourdain was staying at Le Chambard, a luxury hotel in the village of Kaysersberg.
“Anthony was a dear friend,” Mr. Ripert told The New York Times. “He was an exceptional human being, so inspiring and generous. One of the great storytellers of our time who connected with so many. I wish him peace. My love and prayers are with his family, friends and loved ones.”
His mother, Gladys Bourdain, said Mr. Ripert had told her that “Tony had been in a dark mood these past couple of days,” but she had no idea why he might have decided to kill himself. “He had everything,” she said. “Success beyond his wildest dreams. Money beyond his wildest dreams.”
In everything he did, Mr. Bourdain cultivated a renegade style and bad-boy persona.
For decades, he worked 13-hour days as a line cook in restaurants in New York and the Northeast before he became executive chef in the 1990s at Brasserie Les Halles in Manhattan, serving steak frites and onion soup. He had been an executive chef for eight years when he sent an unsolicited article to The New Yorker about the dark side of the restaurant world and its deceptions.
To his surprise, the magazine accepted it and ran it — catching the attention of book editors. It resulted in “Kitchen Confidential: Adventures in the Culinary Underbelly,” a memoir that elevated Mr. Bourdain to a celebrity chef and a new career on TV.
Before he joined CNN in 2012, he spent eight seasons as the host of “No Reservations” on the Travel Channel, highlighting obscure cuisine and unknown restaurants. “No Reservations” largely focused on food and Mr. Bourdain himself. But on “Parts Unknown,” he turned the lens around, delving into different countries around the world and the people who lived in them.
He explored politics and history with locals, often over plates of food and drinks.