This blog post mentions suicide. National Suicide Prevention Lifeline 800-273-8255 available 24 hours in English and Spanish.
Well, of course, I loved him.
I loved him along with all others who followed his travels around the world and virtually placed themselves in the seat across from him, watching and listening as he flicked on the light of his curiosity.
Anthony Bourdain shared his worldview as a storyteller. He loved the strength of well-honed phrases His rat-a-tat-tat verbal delivery sated the moment. He could have been writing songs he was so lyrical.
This oral finesse along with his bass timbre, lanky gate, commanding height created a navigation system that seemed unbeatable.
But, as we all know, that is the lie. No one is unbeatable. We all need serious scaffolding to hold us up.
The film left me feeling surprisingly untethered; a reminder that the bruises of suicide don't necessarily heal for the living - even those of us watching from the very, very cheap seats.
Bourdain first popped up on my radar during his No Reservations show on the Travel Channel followed by CNN's Parts Unknown. His appeal was as the cool kid who could lure the viewer into his shenanigans. We were invited to be his co-conspirators and we could almost hear him utter, "Psssst....come see this!"
A favorite Parts Unknown episode for me aired three months following Bourdain's death. W. Kamau Bell (I am a big fan of his United Shades of America show) and Bourdain traveled to Kenya - a country neither man had ever visited. Bell's middle name - Kamau - is Kenyan meaning 'quiet warrior.'
Bourdain savored Bell's discomfort watching goat's head soup being prepared for him. Bell knew the time and space shared was precious and noted this arc while the two sat perched before the golden vista in the Lewa Wildlife Conservancy. It cemented a connection to each other, to Kenya, to Nature, to Life, to feeling small in the raw, wide world.
I saw it as another perfect example of how Bourdain drew in his guests, his guides, and his viewers determined that they experience the marrow of the moment.
As someone who loves to cook and bake, who delights in reading about food, who pours over recipes, and follows chefs, cooks etc. on social media, I was naturally intrigued by Bourdain's iterations of travel/food television shows. I watched and listened intently always appreciating his ability to straddle being relaxed and edgy as he sought to unspool the essence of location - always appreciating it with a touch of humility.
My choice of an audiobook had a singular motivation: I hungered to hear him spin tales.
It was excruciatingly clear while watching Roadrunner how Bourdain's many friends and co-workers who appeared in the film did so because of their shared craving to reminisce, to wonder, to search for answers. Not one of them had yet to find someplace to rest their grief.
The film's power for me came from this repeated universal need to experience their compadre; to talk of him in shared pain and joy; to utter their loss and struggle as they felt impotent in knowing he slipped through the bonds of their friendship.
Bourdain insisted he was not a good friend ("I'm not going to remember your birthday") and yet many lined up to be his. He was the guy they all wanted to be around. And now they couldn't.
In the 2017 Tony award winner for Best Musical The Band's Visit, the final song's lyrics titled Answer Me bubbled up as I watched Roadrunner.
All alone,
In the quiet,
Ah, my ears are thirsty
For your voice,
For your voice,
Can you answer me?
Criticism of the film's intent noted it as "a snippy tell-all" pointing to heavy focus on Bourdain's TV shows and too little focus on his hefty career in restaurant kitchens and heroin addiction as a young man. I did not see it this way but I understand how the author arrived here. All loss leaves a mark. https://www.wbur.org/news/2021/07/15/roadrunner-anthony-bourdain-documentary-review
The article's critic included a spot-on bit from comedian Dave Chappelle's 2019 show Sticks and Stones that referenced a sort of celebrity sleight-of-hand when we think we know how good life must be for famous, rich folk. Chappelle reminded us that Bourdain's death telegraphs one truth: "No matter what it might look like from the outside, you don't know what the f--- is going on inside."
In 1980, I visited my brother Vincent in Maui for three weeks. His newly claimed home blew open my worldview. We saw the island from the sea, air, and land and the boxes of slides that resulted in my unquenchable thirst to capture it all numbered in the "way too many" range. I wanted to share all of it upon returning home and did so to a very patient group of co-workers held hostage by my "you gotta see this" slide show. I easily fell into the 'vacation slides sharing' trap. (I again apologize to those lovely co-workers.)
I offer this only to say it's easy to overshare. Bourdain did the opposite of this. He managed to lure us in as travel companions even in this world where any internet search will provide easy context for all things exotic. We wanted him and his point of view to guide us.
He managed to deftly describe important moments, making them important to those of us who loved his work.
Morgan Neville, Roadrunner Director created a 100-song playlist of favorite titles randomly mentioned by Bourdain with some added by the chef's friends.
Listening to it while I meandered through this post I was unsurprised by the
beat-thumping, electric guitar-laden push of Patti Smith's High on Rebellion, Elvis Costello's Lipstick Vogue, or New Order's Blue Monday.
These seemed to represent Bourdain's velocity.
Also notable were unexpected softer choices such as the Beach Boys' God Only Knows, The Velvet Underground's Sweet Jane, Earth, Wind, and Fire's That's The Way of the World, and Kevin Morby's Beautiful Stranger.
I think these, like much of his offerings, pulsed from his soul.
Roadrunner isn't perfect and neither was Bourdain. We are all just fragile humans.
Two more links to Roadrunner reviews:
Article on the use of artificial intelligence technology to replicate Bourdain's voice in the film:
