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Anthony Bourdain: Junk, Romance, and a Lust for Life · DISGRACELAND

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Speaker 1: This episode contains content that may be disturbing to some listeners.
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Speaker 1: Please check the show notes for more information. Disgraceland as
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Speaker 1: a production of Double Elvis. The stories about Anthony Bourdain
0:29
Speaker 1: are insane. As a struggling cook and writer, he chased
0:34
Speaker 1: the romance of a heroin addiction through the restaurant kitchens
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Speaker 1: and grimy rock clubs of nineteen eighties Manhattan. He published
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Speaker 1: his first book of nonfiction at the age of forty
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Speaker 1: three and became an overnight success. He parlayed success as
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Speaker 1: a writer into success as a TV host, traveling all
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Speaker 1: over the world, dining with rock stars, presidents, and everyone
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Speaker 1: in between. He dodged bullets, the real and figurative kind,
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Speaker 1: the figurative kind from the tabloids having the most impact,
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Speaker 1: and through it all, Anthony Bourdain made great art. Nothing
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Speaker 1: like that cheesy loop I played for you at the
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Speaker 1: top of the show. That was not great art. That
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Speaker 1: was a preset loop for my Melotron called high Steak
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Speaker 1: Steakout MK two. I played you that loop because I
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Speaker 1: can't afford the rights to Maria Maria by Santana featuring
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Speaker 1: the product GMB And why would I play you that
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Speaker 1: specific slice of nylon stringed Spanish Harlem Cheese. Could I
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Speaker 1: afford it? Because that was the number one song in
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Speaker 1: America On May twenty second, two thousand and that was
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Speaker 1: the day Anthony Bourdain published Kitchen Confidential, forever changing his
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Speaker 1: life and enriching hours. On this episode, Chase Heroin through
2:01
Speaker 1: Lower Manhattan, an overnight's success beers with the President, an
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Speaker 1: insatiable lust for life in Anthony Bourdain, I'm Jake Brennan,
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Speaker 1: and this this Disgraceland, Chapter one, the Not So Blushing Bride, Provincetown, Massachusetts.
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Speaker 1: The edge of the world, some might say, the beginning
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Speaker 1: of my world. At least that's what they'll say when
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Speaker 1: I'm dead, when all the dust is settled, when the
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Speaker 1: tabs have lost interest, and when the truly curious are
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Speaker 1: still hanging around to pick through the remains of what
3:00
Speaker 1: once was, if not a perfect life, a damn interesting
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Speaker 1: one in Peetown, as they call it. The point isn't
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Speaker 1: to lose oneself on the edge of nowhere, but to
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Speaker 1: find yourself, or perhaps to find who you might one
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Speaker 1: day become. Wait a minute, hold up, hold up, this
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Speaker 1: is not this. This is something else. This is this.
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Speaker 1: Bobby was giving it to the bride from behind like
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Speaker 1: a drunken pirate. She panted in delight. She was bent
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Speaker 1: over a fifty five gallon drummer cooking grease, and Bobby's
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Speaker 1: apron was pulled up over his belly. His pants were
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Speaker 1: down around his ankles. Her white wedding gown somehow still
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Speaker 1: looked pure under the provincetown moonlight. Myself and the other
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Speaker 1: dishwasher and the cooks howled up the moon from the
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Speaker 1: back door of the kitchen, egging on Bobby, our head
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Speaker 1: chef here at the dreadnought inside the dining room at
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Speaker 1: the bride's wedding reception, neither her, her assembled family nor
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Speaker 1: her newly wet husband had any idea what was happening
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Speaker 1: out back with the kitchen staff. That was Anthony Bourdain's
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Speaker 1: secret weapon. Most of the world had no idea what
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Speaker 1: was happening out back with the kitchen staff. He used
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Speaker 1: that secret knowledge to carve out a writing career unlike
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Speaker 1: any other, beginning with his debut work of nonfiction Kitchen Confidential,
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Speaker 1: published in two thousand, which became an instant smash hit
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Speaker 1: and transformed Anthony's life overnight. From Capable Chef in a
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Speaker 1: good not great Manhattan restaurant to a New York Times
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Speaker 1: bestseller and in demand media Darling anecdotes like the aforementioned
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Speaker 1: not So Blushing Bride, of course, an anecdote that Anthony
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Speaker 1: Bourdain claims made him want to be a chef, had
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Speaker 1: a lot to do with the book's success. Anthony, or
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Speaker 1: Tony as his friends called him, approached his subject food
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Speaker 1: and the culture of chefs and the people who made
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Speaker 1: kitchens run like his hero Iggy pop godfather of punk,
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Speaker 1: approached his own subject, rock and roll, with a potent
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Speaker 1: mix of danger, truth and charisma. At times, it seemed
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Speaker 1: like danger was the point. Danger was where the action was.
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Speaker 1: Give me danger, a little stranger, food or making. It
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Speaker 1: wasn't merely a job or a profession. It was just
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Speaker 1: like rock and roll, a lifestyle. And for guys like
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Speaker 1: Tony boardin The Journeyman, the back of house pirates, the
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Speaker 1: guys who steered ships of twenty or more staff, many
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Speaker 1: of them alcoholics, drug addicts, ex cons, immigrants, both legal
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Speaker 1: and illegal, it was a romantic lifestyle. Ask any writer
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Speaker 1: and they'll tell you that romance can be a great
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Speaker 1: tool for storytelling. That goes for works of nonfiction and
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Speaker 1: for three coord punk. Was Tony's story about the pe
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Speaker 1: Town bride who was defiled on our wedding night? True?
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Speaker 1: Or was it just a way of romanticizing his backstory?
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Speaker 1: Who cares? There's a great story? Was I Want to
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Speaker 1: be Your Dog? True? Who cares? It's a great song? Truth?
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Speaker 1: Isn't the point? Storytelling is the point. Creating is the point,
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Speaker 1: and to create is to love, to bring love into
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Speaker 1: the world, which Anthony Bourdin most certainly did with his writing.
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Speaker 1: The love he inspired brought him unimaginable success, success that
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Speaker 1: eventually led him to standing on a beach with his hero,
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Speaker 1: Iggy Pop. In twenty fifteen, more than a decade after
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Speaker 1: that story about the bride was published, Tony asks Iggy
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Speaker 1: Pop what his definition of a perfect day is, and
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Speaker 1: Iggy goes on to describe his perfect day. It involves
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Speaker 1: a beach, the big Florida sun sparkling on the ocean.
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Speaker 1: In the positivity one can derive from such an experience,
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Speaker 1: particularly when it's spent with a loved one, that's a
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Speaker 1: far cry from what one would expect from a man
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Speaker 1: who once proclaimed to the world that he was a
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Speaker 1: street walking cheetah with a heart full of napalon and
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Speaker 1: Anthony Bourdain looks bewildered by his hero's answer, because Iggy
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Speaker 1: Pop gave Anthony Bourdin the truth, and the truth is
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Speaker 1: hard for a romantic to come to terms with. Throughout
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Speaker 1: twentieth century American culture, the concept of the junkie has
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Speaker 1: been thoroughly romanticized, from Miles Davis to William S Burrows
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Speaker 1: to Iggy Pop and Kurt Cobaine for a certain type
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Speaker 1: of subversive leaning, literary minded, rock and roll bent, transgressive
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Speaker 1: dudes who may be paid a little too much attention
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Speaker 1: to Lou Reed's lyrics. Dudes who were always first in
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Speaker 1: line to do whatever new drugs showed up to the
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Speaker 1: party last, who were always taking more, doing less, aspiring
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Speaker 1: to little. To these dudes, Heroin wasn't something to be avoided.
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Speaker 1: Heroin or junk was something to aspire to. Nineteen eighty,
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Speaker 1: young Tony Vordain didn't know who exactly he was looking for,
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Speaker 1: but he knew what he wanted. He and a friend
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Speaker 1: slowly cruised Second Avenue and a beat up Volkswagen Rabbit.
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Speaker 1: The Manhattan street was dark, near dead at this hour,
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Speaker 1: and the two white boys were hunting for dope, or
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Speaker 1: more specifically, hunting for a dope dealer, actually a dope dealership.
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Speaker 1: In those days, dealers didn't text you on a Friday
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Speaker 1: to see if you were set for the weekend and
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Speaker 1: then run the small baggie of brown up to your
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Speaker 1: apartment via bike messenger. No, and in those days, in
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Speaker 1: the batt old days, you had to swipe your sh sharpest,
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Speaker 1: stealthiest knife from the kitchen, concealed it in an item
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Speaker 1: of clothing that wouldn't result in you stabbing yourself, and
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Speaker 1: head into the part of town that took no prisoners
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Speaker 1: and produced only casualties, New York's Lower East Side, looking
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Speaker 1: for a fix, just like Iggy Pop, just like Lou Reed,
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Speaker 1: and just like Johnny Thunders. And you weren't on the
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Speaker 1: lookout for some pimp and a big straw hat standing
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Speaker 1: on the corner either. You were looking for a hole
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Speaker 1: in the wall the size of a Dodge Challenger, A
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Speaker 1: hole in the wall that looked about as inviting as
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Speaker 1: a den of hungry wolves. A hole in the wall
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Speaker 1: that served up one thing heroin. Even cops didn't fuck
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Speaker 1: with places like these, but you did because you were different.
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Speaker 1: You weren't like those other guys, those pajama boys back
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Speaker 1: at Vassa, or the snobs back at CIA, the Culinary
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Speaker 1: Institute of America upstate, where you learned a lot, but
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Speaker 1: nothing as important as how to keep your knife sharp
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Speaker 1: and your witch sharper. The snobs and the pajama boys
10:03
Speaker 1: had a lot in common. For one, there were fucking philistines,
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Speaker 1: and they couldn't tell you the difference between George Orwell
10:09
Speaker 1: or Orville Redenbacher. And they had no fucking heart either.
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Speaker 1: You had heart. The Vassar boys, your classmates at CIA,
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Speaker 1: they'd never know the thrill of scoring in a seedy
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Speaker 1: Lower east Side drug den like you did. And they'd
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Speaker 1: never know the complication of having to score a heroine
10:27
Speaker 1: between staff meal and the first rush, either unnecessary challenge
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Speaker 1: your junkie ass now to solve every night to keep
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Speaker 1: from puking all over the entrees as they flew off
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Speaker 1: the line. Yet you figured it out because it was
10:41
Speaker 1: the early eighties, and yeah, other than a new heroin
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Speaker 1: habit and a shitty job, you took an outsized amount
10:47
Speaker 1: of pride in you had little, but you were Anthony
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Speaker 1: fucking Bourdaine. And the one thing you did have was
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Speaker 1: a lust for life. Chapter two, Nancy with the laughing face.
11:28
Speaker 1: The heart of Manhattan beats from the working class bus
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Speaker 1: drivers and bus boys, working stiffs and waitresses, bartenders pouring
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Speaker 1: punch out cold ones to stiff up her lips, Taxi
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Speaker 1: drivers and doormen with more information than you need daily
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Speaker 1: rag scribes and night watchmen, cops, construction workers, dealers too.
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Speaker 1: And if you're not careful, you'll get caught up in
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Speaker 1: the grind and miss the beauty of the sweat and
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Speaker 1: the hustle, lose it all to the bustling sound of
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Speaker 1: the lone in some streets, wake up in a midtown
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Speaker 1: high rise with a mortgage and a wife and a
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Speaker 1: kid in a separate apartment. But if you keep your
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Speaker 1: ears open each night, you'll hear the sound of the
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Speaker 1: mission bell, that universal sign that it's time to blow
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Speaker 1: off steam, quitting time that when you're too tired to
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Speaker 1: think and too wired to go home, this is the
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Speaker 1: time when you're reminded of your station in life, reminded
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Speaker 1: of where you're supposed to be, Bellied up to the
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Speaker 1: bar with the rest of your kind, cursing your boss's
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Speaker 1: greed and your customer's stupidity toasting your coworkers on a
12:36
Speaker 1: job well done, fairly ready for a four hour crash
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Speaker 1: and inevitable hangover, and unspoken gratitude for the fact that
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Speaker 1: you get to get up too early, too sore, and
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Speaker 1: too smart to know any better, so that you, my friend,
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Speaker 1: can go back to work and do it all over again.
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Speaker 1: To an outsider, the kitchen during the nightly rush looked
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Speaker 1: and sounded like chaos, But you've got it all under control. Sure,
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Speaker 1: the slips are firing in mouie rapido signor, and the
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Speaker 1: floor staff looks haggard and scared, and the dishwasher's gone
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Speaker 1: on one of his midshift sabbaticals in the back alley,
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Speaker 1: and the sioux chef may have just quit, or he
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Speaker 1: may just be in the can with explosive diarrhea, and
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Speaker 1: no one will acknowledge that the phone has been ringing
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Speaker 1: unanswered for what you swear to God, has been all
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Speaker 1: frigging night long, and the owner just decided that right
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Speaker 1: fucking now, of all times is the time to pop
13:27
Speaker 1: in to bust your balls in front of his investors. Yes,
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Speaker 1: that all may be happening at the moment, and it
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Speaker 1: might spell chaos for the uninitiated civilian looking in on
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Speaker 1: your kitchen. But you're no civilian. You're a professional chef,
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Speaker 1: or at least a very capable cook, And this is
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Speaker 1: your kitchen, even if you don't want a piece, even
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Speaker 1: if you're fighting a daily heroin jones, even if you're
13:46
Speaker 1: a functioning alcoholic, even if you haven't seen your new
13:49
Speaker 1: wife in the daylight in six weeks, and even if
13:51
Speaker 1: you can't speak Spanish yet that's all that most of
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Speaker 1: your employees speak. Even if your fish guy went on
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Speaker 1: the lamb and your meat guy is at returning your calls.
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Speaker 1: None of this, Matt, because you thrive in this chaos.
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Speaker 1: In fact, this isn't chaos at all. This to you,
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Speaker 1: for some unexplained reason, makes sense. It's organized, at least
14:12
Speaker 1: to you, it is. You know your way around these challenges.
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Speaker 1: You and you alone know how to solve these problems.
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Speaker 1: But these are the only problems you know how to solve.
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Speaker 1: Kitchen problems. Outside the kitchen, that's chaos. You haven't paid
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Speaker 1: your rent on time. Well ever, you're perpetually three months
14:33
Speaker 1: behind and dodging your landlord. The creditors are after you,
14:36
Speaker 1: and the taxman looms you haven't been to a doctor
14:39
Speaker 1: for a preemptive checkout for what seems to be your
14:42
Speaker 1: entire adult life, and you're barreling toward middle aged with
14:44
Speaker 1: a needle hanging out of your arm during a time
14:47
Speaker 1: in history when intravenous drug use can spell instant death.
14:50
Speaker 1: It's July in your Christmas tree is still standing in
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Speaker 1: the corner of your apartment, deader than Vince Geralde and
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Speaker 1: twice as pathetic as Charlie Brown. You and your wife
15:00
Speaker 1: if Nancy, are too ashamed to even bring it down
15:02
Speaker 1: to the corner for the trash man to pick up,
15:04
Speaker 1: for fear of what your neighbors might think. You have
15:06
Speaker 1: next to no social life. You subsist on Deli sandwiches
15:10
Speaker 1: and Simpson's reruns. Life as you live it is barely
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Speaker 1: any life at all. But work is where you thrived,
15:17
Speaker 1: and after work is when you come alive. The sun ruled,
15:26
Speaker 1: the sun came on the beach, crashed out, tanning away,
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Speaker 1: the heroin power asleep in the sand in the late morning.
15:33
Speaker 1: Hours before that, it was the train out to Rockaway,
15:37
Speaker 1: nodding out, having finished the last of your smack, freaking out.
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Speaker 1: The civilians on their early morning rush hour Commute Club
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Speaker 1: fifty seven, the Mud Club CBGB, wherever junkie guitar players
15:48
Speaker 1: reigned supreme on stage. You were there, passed the line
15:52
Speaker 1: of pedestrians to the sympathetic door man who'd been bribed
15:55
Speaker 1: with steak sandwiches from your kitchen, the kitchen you'd closed
15:59
Speaker 1: hours ago. You hit the bar after closing with a
16:02
Speaker 1: couple employees. Someone thought ninety six tiers by question Mark
16:05
Speaker 1: and the Mysterious was a good idea, and they were right.
16:08
Speaker 1: It blasted from the jukebox, A fat line of coke
16:11
Speaker 1: was laid out on said bar along the length of
16:14
Speaker 1: the entire bar. The adult portion of the evening was
16:18
Speaker 1: now in full effect, commenced by you mounting the bar,
16:22
Speaker 1: getting down on all fours, and hoovering as much of
16:24
Speaker 1: that long line of blow as your aching heart would allow.
16:27
Speaker 1: You needed the bump, something to come back from the
16:29
Speaker 1: weakness brought on by the illicit rendezvous in the dry
16:32
Speaker 1: goods area with the cute waitress. Hey, it happened, so what.
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Speaker 1: You don't know how it got started. It just did
16:38
Speaker 1: sort of like this night. It just got started, sort
16:41
Speaker 1: of like all the nights you scammed. You sprinted You
16:45
Speaker 1: ran hard and fast, hard and fast, away from yourself,
16:49
Speaker 1: until finally you ended up right back where you started
16:53
Speaker 1: in the kitchen, unless, of course, it was a day off.
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Speaker 1: Then you couldn't run away. You couldn't hide from yourself
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Speaker 1: or from what you'd become a junkie. When there was
17:07
Speaker 1: nowhere left to go, and no more drugs left to do,
17:11
Speaker 1: no shifts to pick up, you found yourself where you
17:14
Speaker 1: feared you would inevitably end up alone. Not even your
17:18
Speaker 1: junkie wife could help. She was nodding off on her
17:21
Speaker 1: own trip. So it was just you, just you in
17:25
Speaker 1: the deep, dark, dirty mirror, alone at rock bottom. Fuck
17:33
Speaker 1: this cold turkey. You kicked no twelve steps, no self
17:38
Speaker 1: help goers, no meetings, hardcore like the man said, except
17:42
Speaker 1: in the other direction. You used methodone to wean off.
17:45
Speaker 1: But your biggest weapon was your lust for life. You
17:48
Speaker 1: turned that junkie appetite around and gobbled up whatever life
17:51
Speaker 1: had left to give you. You were still a young man
17:54
Speaker 1: and there was still a life to be had. You
17:57
Speaker 1: went from lime cook to chef layout like you. It
18:01
Speaker 1: wasn't great, it was good, good enough. You worked that
18:05
Speaker 1: restaurant hard and fed that yearning to be something else,
18:08
Speaker 1: something more, something better. After hours under your typewriter, you
18:13
Speaker 1: wrote two crime novels, Bone and Throat and Gone Bamboo.
18:18
Speaker 1: The critics pretty much said the same thing, that both
18:21
Speaker 1: books were like the restaurant, you ran good, not great.
18:25
Speaker 1: You kept going because what else were you going to do?
18:29
Speaker 1: Moving forward was all you'd ever done in this life.
18:32
Speaker 1: You worked even harder, kept that kitchen humming, and you
18:35
Speaker 1: continued to write. Writing replaced junk. You couldn't not write.
18:39
Speaker 1: It was the first thing you did every morning. Well
18:42
Speaker 1: it was the second thing. Actually, the first thing you
18:44
Speaker 1: did was smoke a cigarette. Then you wrote, before even
18:46
Speaker 1: brushing your teeth, before kissing your wife Nancy, before taking
18:50
Speaker 1: a shit, you wrote what you knew now. Sally the
18:53
Speaker 1: Wig and chef Tommy were fond and all, but who
18:56
Speaker 1: are you kidding? You weren't Don DeLillo. You were Raoul
18:59
Speaker 1: Duke Chef's whites. And this new writing was fresh because
19:03
Speaker 1: it was desperate. It was all you had left. It
19:07
Speaker 1: was a junkie move all in. No bullshit, Okay, a
19:11
Speaker 1: little bullshit like the bit about fish on Monday and
19:13
Speaker 1: perhaps the Provincetown Bride over the Barrel. But I digress
19:17
Speaker 1: you sent a couple thousand words into The New Yorker.
19:20
Speaker 1: David Remnick wouldn't give you the time of day until
19:22
Speaker 1: your mom. Your mom used a connection to get him
19:25
Speaker 1: to read it. How uncool is that, having to get
19:27
Speaker 1: your mom to help you get published? But what did
19:30
Speaker 1: you care? Lou Reid moved back in with his parents
19:33
Speaker 1: after he was in the Velvet Underground and went to
19:35
Speaker 1: work for his dad's accounting firm again. After he was
19:39
Speaker 1: in the Velvet Underground. Things weren't yet that bad for you,
19:43
Speaker 1: so fire away, mom. It worked. David Remnick loved what
19:51
Speaker 1: you wrote, of course he did. The piece you wrote
19:54
Speaker 1: that Remnick published in the New Yorker don't eat before
19:57
Speaker 1: reading this was the type of magazine phenomenon that is
20:01
Speaker 1: hard to imagine in this day and age, the modern
20:03
Speaker 1: era of the Internet. There you were walking down Park
20:08
Speaker 1: Avenue on your way to work like you did every day,
20:11
Speaker 1: except perhaps today you were walking with a little bit
20:14
Speaker 1: more swagger than usual. The New Yorker article was the
20:17
Speaker 1: shit that you knew it. Nancy knew it, Everyone fucking
20:21
Speaker 1: knew it. There was only one problem. Did your boss,
20:24
Speaker 1: the owner of lay All, did he know it? Or
20:27
Speaker 1: was he pissed. Did all the behind the scenes kitchen
20:30
Speaker 1: exploits rub him the wrong way? Shit? Were you going
20:33
Speaker 1: to peacock into work today and get fired? You rounded
20:38
Speaker 1: the corner and there they were news trucks outside your
20:42
Speaker 1: restaurant waiting for you. Your article prompted a mini media
20:47
Speaker 1: sensation right there on Park Avenue, And oh, how delighted
20:50
Speaker 1: the news crews were when they jammed their microphones in
20:53
Speaker 1: your face and blasted their sun guns, only to realize
20:56
Speaker 1: that you were naturally camera ready and they weren't the
20:59
Speaker 1: only one to notice. The article led to a full
21:02
Speaker 1: on book deal Kitchen Confidential, And this, my friend, was
21:07
Speaker 1: no mini sensation. This was the real deal, a phenomenon,
21:12
Speaker 1: a New York Times bestseller, Oprah Letterman, high fives from
21:17
Speaker 1: construction workers as you walk down the street. Kind of famous.
21:20
Speaker 1: You ate it all up. You took every opportunity your
21:23
Speaker 1: newfound publishing fame brought you, and you knew all too
21:26
Speaker 1: well what it was like to not be famous, and
21:28
Speaker 1: now you had life by the throat and you weren't
21:30
Speaker 1: going to let go. So when they showed up looking
21:34
Speaker 1: to talk to you about a TV show idea, you
21:37
Speaker 1: were skeptical, but you listened. Then you got on a plane.
21:42
Speaker 1: Then you got divorced. Then you ventured out into truly
21:45
Speaker 1: uncharted waters towards something you'd never fully experienced before, happiness
21:52
Speaker 1: and self contentment. We'll be right back this were were
22:01
Speaker 1: where Chapter three a tavia. Love, as they say, is
22:15
Speaker 1: a many splendid thing. They also say love is a
22:19
Speaker 1: burning flame, and that love will tear us apart. I've
22:24
Speaker 1: found all three of these quotes to be true at
22:26
Speaker 1: various parts of my life. But perhaps the most truthful
22:30
Speaker 1: quote about love comes from my hero uncle lou lou Reid,
22:34
Speaker 1: who said, you do what you love, or you get arrested.
22:39
Speaker 1: Anthony Bourdain made it out of the kitchen. Anthony Bourdain
22:43
Speaker 1: was freed from the grind. Anthony Bourdain was a best
22:46
Speaker 1: selling author. Suddenly, to the surprise of everyone, including himself,
22:51
Speaker 1: Anthony Bourdain was now a television star, and Anthony Bourdaine
22:56
Speaker 1: was in love. Two thousand and five, five years after
23:03
Speaker 1: Kitchen Confidential was published, Anthony Bourdain's television series No Reservations
23:08
Speaker 1: debuted for the Travel Channel. It was not your normal
23:12
Speaker 1: food or travel show. It was almost entirely subjective. More
23:17
Speaker 1: Gonzo journalism presented through a different medium and for a
23:20
Speaker 1: different millennium. This wasn't early two thousands reality TV, and
23:25
Speaker 1: it wasn't some cuddly roly poly chef molded for Middle America.
23:30
Speaker 1: This was a street walking chia ready to get his
23:33
Speaker 1: eat on. The show's concept was simple. Best selling food
23:38
Speaker 1: author Anthony Bourdain would travel to different locales around the world,
23:42
Speaker 1: sampled the local fare, and comment on it. But the
23:46
Speaker 1: show was different because of well Anthony Bourdain. Tony was
23:52
Speaker 1: a totally unique character. Tall, lanky, dark, strangely handsome, and
23:58
Speaker 1: armed with a lifetime of blue collar kitchen experience, hard
24:02
Speaker 1: working experience that was relatable and that softened his cutting
24:06
Speaker 1: wit and obvious intelligence. Tony displayed an encyclopedic understanding of culture,
24:12
Speaker 1: of books, movies, music, the things that bind people together
24:16
Speaker 1: that don't come out of a kitchen. All of this
24:19
Speaker 1: constituted a totally unique point of view that Tony delivered
24:22
Speaker 1: with humor and curiosity, and the dude could write. His
24:28
Speaker 1: narrations for episodic TV remained some of the best examples
24:31
Speaker 1: of subjective journalism that I've ever heard. Hunter S. Thompson,
24:35
Speaker 1: Joan Diddion, Dominic Dunn, Anthony Bourdain. His writing was that good.
24:41
Speaker 1: Almost instantly, Tony elevated himself to the level of some
24:45
Speaker 1: of the greatest to ever do it. He was fearless
24:48
Speaker 1: when it came to his point of view, and he
24:50
Speaker 1: was nothing if not curious and empathetic. Part of the
24:53
Speaker 1: show's appeal was Tony's ability to break bread with people
24:56
Speaker 1: from all walks of life, from completely different so social
25:00
Speaker 1: and economic backgrounds Montana ranchers, Sardinian pig farmers, Muslims, Jews,
25:06
Speaker 1: ted fucking nugent, didn't matter politics, religion, whatever. If you
25:11
Speaker 1: liked to eat, if you had ears and could open
25:13
Speaker 1: them up and listen, then Tony Bourdin could find common
25:16
Speaker 1: ground around the dinner table. Hunger was at Tony's core.
25:22
Speaker 1: He went at his job and his newfound success with
25:25
Speaker 1: an insatiable energy. You could sense that he had life
25:28
Speaker 1: by the balls finally, and that he wasn't going to
25:31
Speaker 1: let go ever, But we didn't want him to. We,
25:35
Speaker 1: like him, were hungry for more. But Tony's hunger was
25:39
Speaker 1: a junkies hunger, all consuming. There are no part time
25:45
Speaker 1: heroin addicts, and though Tony kicked his addiction years before
25:49
Speaker 1: becoming successful, the addiction never kicked him. Tony just shifted
25:55
Speaker 1: his addiction from heroin to work and then to a
25:59
Speaker 1: top Anthony Bourdain's television career was responsible for the end
26:07
Speaker 1: of his first marriage, and it was also responsible for
26:10
Speaker 1: the beginning of his second. A tavia beautiful, strong, smart,
26:15
Speaker 1: take no shit, Italian, wholesome from a big, loving family
26:20
Speaker 1: on the other side of the world, the type of
26:23
Speaker 1: woman that a guy like Tony Bourdain looks at and goes, oh, yeah,
26:27
Speaker 1: this is who I've been waiting for. He went all
26:30
Speaker 1: in and so did she. They shared secrets. Tony's were
26:35
Speaker 1: darker than she expected. The Caribbean island of Saint Martin's
26:42
Speaker 1: a few years after Tony's success, just after the split
26:46
Speaker 1: from his first wife, a dark time that no amount
26:50
Speaker 1: of accolades or money or opportunity was going to fix.
26:54
Speaker 1: This was the type of pain and hurt that was
26:56
Speaker 1: not going anywhere. You were going to have to go
26:59
Speaker 1: through it, it, over it, or collapse under it. If you're
27:04
Speaker 1: like me and raised on rock and roll and have
27:06
Speaker 1: spent the better part of your life socializing with degenerate
27:09
Speaker 1: rock and roll animals who view life through a dusty
27:12
Speaker 1: lens of romance, cynicism, and hyperbole. Then you've no doubt
27:16
Speaker 1: heard one of your friends along the way say these
27:19
Speaker 1: words that song saved my life, or that album or
27:24
Speaker 1: band saved me. Perhaps you said it yourself. If so, congratulations,
27:31
Speaker 1: you're as equally full of shit as I am. Music
27:35
Speaker 1: cannot literally save any of us. Only we have the
27:39
Speaker 1: power to save our own lives. Saving your life is
27:43
Speaker 1: a dramatic move. It requires action agency music Specifically, listening
27:49
Speaker 1: to music is a passive experience, and as such, is
27:53
Speaker 1: incapable of saving your life. It might make you feel better,
27:57
Speaker 1: it might help shape your identity, but it isn't pulling
27:59
Speaker 1: you out of a fiery car wreck before you burn
28:02
Speaker 1: up into a crispy black piece of toast. But music
28:05
Speaker 1: did save Anthony Bourdain's life, or so the story goes.
28:14
Speaker 1: The Island DJ played whatever the hell he wanted in
28:17
Speaker 1: this suited Anthony Bourdain just fine after stumbling drunken stone
28:22
Speaker 1: out of the Saint Martin whorehouse and shoving a dirty
28:24
Speaker 1: schwarma down his throat. House of the Rising Sun by
28:28
Speaker 1: the Animals or Iggy Pops lust for Life or hell,
28:31
Speaker 1: even Louis Armstrong's what a wonderful world. These songs would
28:35
Speaker 1: make the wobbly island you were about to drive blind
28:37
Speaker 1: ass drunk across seem a whole lot more tolerable. On
28:42
Speaker 1: the other hand, if the DJ was to play say
28:45
Speaker 1: Jimmy Buffett or Billy Joel or God Forbid the Grateful Dead,
28:50
Speaker 1: then it could spell the end. Bedtime for Bomzo. Lights
28:54
Speaker 1: out at the no Reservations hotel, all permanent, like you'd
28:58
Speaker 1: take your final drive, crash into the wall, or perhaps
29:03
Speaker 1: you drive off the road over one of those big
29:05
Speaker 1: island cliffs. Suicide via fifty thousand watts. That's what you
29:10
Speaker 1: told Atavia. Anyway, That's how thin the line had gotten
29:14
Speaker 1: for you. It was am radio roulette. You started the
29:19
Speaker 1: engine to you rented four by four lit what was
29:22
Speaker 1: likely your tenth joint of the day, choked down the
29:25
Speaker 1: urge to vomit up the day's countless beers and greasy food,
29:28
Speaker 1: gave the accelerator your full foot, and took off into
29:31
Speaker 1: the dark night, back to your hotel or perhaps iahoa
29:35
Speaker 1: silver rodeo to deliver yourself from nowhere. It depended on
29:39
Speaker 1: the song that DJ played. Life or death in the
29:43
Speaker 1: hands of an unknown islander were erratic, sometimes great, and
29:46
Speaker 1: sometimes highly questionable taste in music. The island roads were dark, unpaved,
29:54
Speaker 1: poorly grated, and populated with drivers who were likely as
29:57
Speaker 1: pissed drunk as you were. The air whipping pie felt good,
30:02
Speaker 1: and that was about all that felt good. The pain
30:05
Speaker 1: was thick, you could barely think straight, but still you
30:10
Speaker 1: had it all figured out. You'd done that four by
30:13
Speaker 1: four as fast as it would go. Throw all caution
30:16
Speaker 1: to the wind, and if you crashed and burned, so
30:18
Speaker 1: be it. If you made it out of town and
30:20
Speaker 1: out onto the remote road that brought you up to
30:22
Speaker 1: the cliffs, over the pass and down toward your hotel.
30:26
Speaker 1: If you made it up onto the cliff road, then
30:28
Speaker 1: you'd kick things up a notch and put your fate
30:30
Speaker 1: in the DJ's hands. You hit the cliff road and
30:34
Speaker 1: the music blared from the truck speakers. The better the song,
30:38
Speaker 1: the more aggressive you'd drive until you hit that big
30:41
Speaker 1: bend up high, right up high on the cliff. At
30:45
Speaker 1: that point you had to slow down and cut the
30:48
Speaker 1: wheel to the left to avoid careening off of the
30:50
Speaker 1: road into the air and soaring down the side of
30:53
Speaker 1: the cliff to a certain fiery death. Slowing down and
30:58
Speaker 1: making the turn was no problem unless the DJ played
31:01
Speaker 1: a shitty song. If the song sucked, then you'd let
31:05
Speaker 1: go of the wheel and fly away. But if the
31:08
Speaker 1: song was good, you'd slow your role and turn with
31:12
Speaker 1: the road and down the hill safely to your hotel.
31:16
Speaker 1: That was the deal you made with yourself, and you
31:19
Speaker 1: did this every night. The music gods were on your side.
31:23
Speaker 1: But tonight felt different. The DJ had a heater going
31:28
Speaker 1: MC five, James Gang Stone, fucking Roses. It was too
31:32
Speaker 1: good to be true. There was a turd of a
31:34
Speaker 1: tune coming sooner or later, and at the pace you
31:36
Speaker 1: were driving, it was starting to feel like Neil Young
31:39
Speaker 1: was onto something. Tonight was the night, as the Stone
31:44
Speaker 1: Roses is. I want to be a door wound down,
31:46
Speaker 1: You wound your way toward the bend up on the
31:49
Speaker 1: cliff road. This was it. Put up or shut up.
31:53
Speaker 1: Fucking Dave Matthews or the BG's or Loggins and Messina
31:56
Speaker 1: were bound to burst through those speakers at any moment
31:59
Speaker 1: and you'd get the answer. You were looking for a
32:01
Speaker 1: reason to let go, a suicide solution. I want to
32:06
Speaker 1: be adored faded to an end. Here it was the
32:11
Speaker 1: moment of truth and silence. Wind the fucking Chambers brothers.
32:22
Speaker 1: Fuck time has come today. Time you love this fucking song.
32:29
Speaker 1: He slowed down, turned the wheel, made the curve of
32:32
Speaker 1: the road successfully, and rolled down to your hotels safely.
32:37
Speaker 1: Eventually you'd make it off the island, back to Manhattan,
32:41
Speaker 1: into the arms in bed of a Tavia, the woman
32:44
Speaker 1: you thought was the love of your life. You knew
32:47
Speaker 1: she loved you too when she heard you tell this
32:49
Speaker 1: story and didn't run. She made you swear off the horrors,
32:52
Speaker 1: but otherwise accepted you as you were. You got back
32:56
Speaker 1: into your work making great television. Your crew almost ended
33:01
Speaker 1: up casualties of war in Beirut. It was the type
33:04
Speaker 1: of experience that alters your point of view, that changes
33:07
Speaker 1: you from the inside out, that makes you focus on
33:11
Speaker 1: what really matters in life, love, family, acceptance. Atavia was pregnant,
33:19
Speaker 1: life was short. You two were standing inside city hall
33:23
Speaker 1: saying I do Your child was beautiful. Her and Atavia
33:27
Speaker 1: were everything, and for a minute there you had it all.
33:35
Speaker 1: And then that junkie jones hit again, and the road
33:38
Speaker 1: pulled you back into the work, traveling two hundred and
33:41
Speaker 1: fifty days a year, and filling the days you weren't
33:44
Speaker 1: on the road, capitalizing on endless opportunities TV appearances, awards shows,
33:50
Speaker 1: writing more books, starting your own publishing company, attempting to
33:54
Speaker 1: launch your own Italy inspired multi concept restaurant emporium, and
33:58
Speaker 1: eventually a new TV show. More reach, more resources, grander
34:03
Speaker 1: creative aspirations. The big time CNN, where you and your
34:08
Speaker 1: crack production team at zero points zero Productions, pledged to
34:12
Speaker 1: push yourselves to make every episode bigger and better than
34:16
Speaker 1: the last. Sneaking into Hanoi for dinner with the sitting
34:20
Speaker 1: President of the United States kind of bigger and better.
34:24
Speaker 1: That kind of rush is tough to follow. You have
34:27
Speaker 1: to chase it constantly. Happiness is no match for addiction.
34:33
Speaker 1: Anthony Bordain's blissful family life was short lived. Tony and
34:38
Speaker 1: Aatavia split up in twenty sixteen. Strange things happen in
34:47
Speaker 1: the desert. It can bring out the outlaw in you.
34:51
Speaker 1: Having grown up and lived in and around Palm Desert
34:54
Speaker 1: in California, Josh Hami from the band Queens of the
34:58
Speaker 1: Stone Age understood this better than most, which is why
35:02
Speaker 1: Josh was playing it cool inside the dusty Joshua Tree
35:05
Speaker 1: Saloon and across the table from the drunk golf bro
35:08
Speaker 1: giving him and his good friend Anthony Bourdain shit. At
35:11
Speaker 1: the moment, the fucking guy wouldn't let up. He came
35:15
Speaker 1: on all starstruck to Tony looking for an autograph, but
35:18
Speaker 1: then got ugly with Josh. Josh Hamie isn't a small man.
35:23
Speaker 1: He stood and carefully grabbed the dude and started to
35:26
Speaker 1: escort him to the bar sponsor, and the dude flipped.
35:30
Speaker 1: Then Josh's loyal friend Tony flipped, screaming to the drunk asshole,
35:36
Speaker 1: that's my friend, that's my friend, referencing Josh, of course,
35:40
Speaker 1: who the drunk dude was unsuccessfully lashing out at. Tony
35:44
Speaker 1: was now at Josh's back trying to get the drunk
35:46
Speaker 1: dude Josh was trying to subdue. It was one of
35:50
Speaker 1: those flash in the pan shit shows that are there
35:52
Speaker 1: and then gone with an equal amount of quickness and drama.
35:56
Speaker 1: But when the dust settled and the drunk dude was
35:59
Speaker 1: taken away, Josh Hammie knew one thing for certain about
36:03
Speaker 1: Anthony Bourdain when it came to their friendship. Like most
36:07
Speaker 1: things in Tony's life, Tony was all in chapter four
36:43
Speaker 1: the Italian actress. When you go hard and fast and
36:49
Speaker 1: give yourself fully, when your crew and collaborators do the same,
36:53
Speaker 1: When every piece of television you make has to outdo
36:56
Speaker 1: the last, When the distance between the destination and the
37:00
Speaker 1: truth gets harder and harder to traverse, when the shine
37:04
Speaker 1: from the spotlight blinds instead of illuminates, Well, my friends,
37:09
Speaker 1: it might be time for the band to break up.
37:12
Speaker 1: All good bands do, even the great ones. Ted Nugent,
37:20
Speaker 1: the Motor City mad Man, the seventies rock guitarist known
37:24
Speaker 1: for his meat and Potatoes rifts and his hits like
37:26
Speaker 1: cat Scratch Fever and the most excellent Stranglehold, is about
37:30
Speaker 1: as far away politically from Anthony Boardaine as Florida is
37:35
Speaker 1: from me. Yet there Anthony Boardaine was on camera on
37:39
Speaker 1: Ted Nugent's ranch, firing away gleefully with a missault weapon
37:44
Speaker 1: and enjoying beer and barbecue with Ted and his boys
37:47
Speaker 1: like he was among long lost friends. I think the
37:52
Speaker 1: Barack Hussein Obama should be put in jail. It is
37:56
Speaker 1: clear that Barack Hussein Obama is a communist, mount say
37:59
Speaker 1: to lives, and his name is Barack Hussein Obama. This
38:04
Speaker 1: country should be ashamed. I want to throw up. That's
38:08
Speaker 1: Ted NuGen quote. Fast forward a couple of years to
38:12
Speaker 1: Anthony Bourdain interviewing the Leader of the Free World, Barack
38:15
Speaker 1: Obama and Hanoi over a cold beer in Hot Noodles,
38:18
Speaker 1: where Bordain asked Obama somewhat playfully if it was okay
38:22
Speaker 1: that he got along with Ted NuGen, who had said many,
38:26
Speaker 1: many deeply offensive and hateful things about him personally. Obama responded,
38:32
Speaker 1: of course, and that that was exactly the sort of
38:35
Speaker 1: person we should be talking to. And Ted NuGen knew
38:39
Speaker 1: who Anthony Bourdain was and that he was a classic liberal,
38:43
Speaker 1: the opposite of Ted, a libertarian bent conservative. Yet Ted,
38:47
Speaker 1: of course allowed Tony into his home for barbecue. Ted
38:50
Speaker 1: NuGen said of Tony, He's Machila and grill at blood brother,
38:54
Speaker 1: and Tony said, I'm proud of the fact that I've
38:57
Speaker 1: had as dining companions over the years, everybody from Hesbala supporters,
39:01
Speaker 1: communist functionaries, Anti Putin activists, cowboys, stoners, Christian militia leaders, feminists,
39:07
Speaker 1: Palestinians and Israeli settlers to Ted NuGen, you like food
39:12
Speaker 1: and are reasonably nice at the table. You show me hospitality,
39:16
Speaker 1: I will sit down with you and break bread. Anthony
39:21
Speaker 1: Bourdain or his television show, at least, was political in
39:25
Speaker 1: the best way, which is to say that it was
39:28
Speaker 1: subjective first and foremost, and seem to be almost completely
39:32
Speaker 1: detached from whatever popular political narrative of the day was
39:35
Speaker 1: being algorithmically force fed to both the left and the right.
39:39
Speaker 1: The show, Like the Man, seemed to project an empathy
39:43
Speaker 1: that was entirely real and unconcerned with virtue signaling. That is,
39:49
Speaker 1: until a Ja Argento. There are women men consume themselves with,
39:58
Speaker 1: and there are women that consume By the time Anthony
40:02
Speaker 1: Bourdain moved on from his second wife, Atavia and became
40:05
Speaker 1: romantically involved with Aja Argento in twenty sixteen, his relationship
40:10
Speaker 1: with his work life had run face first into a wall.
40:15
Speaker 1: The grind of making television had become more intense than
40:18
Speaker 1: the grind of running a kitchen. Anthony Bourdain was burnt
40:22
Speaker 1: out physically and creatively entered the Italian actress. Like Atavia,
40:30
Speaker 1: Aja was beautiful, strong, smart Italian, But unlike Atavia, Aja
40:36
Speaker 1: set herself in her own interests ahead of any relationship
40:39
Speaker 1: with Tony. The fact that she was less interested in
40:42
Speaker 1: the famous badass chef and the best selling author than
40:45
Speaker 1: she was herself. Made her unattainable, which made her more
40:50
Speaker 1: attractive to Tony, which made Tony's old familiar junkie instinct
40:54
Speaker 1: kick in, and then made Tony pour all of himself
40:57
Speaker 1: into his relationship with her. He put her above family,
41:01
Speaker 1: he put her above work, and he put her above friends,
41:04
Speaker 1: which without context doesn't sound that bad, but when you
41:09
Speaker 1: get down to the details in the end result, it was,
41:13
Speaker 1: of course disastrous. There are many juicy, bullshit, gossipy personal
41:21
Speaker 1: anecdotes about Tony and Ash's relationship that we could go
41:24
Speaker 1: into to give you this context, but it feels icky
41:28
Speaker 1: and frankly, you can get that stuff with three clicks
41:30
Speaker 1: in a search bar. Nonetheless, if we're going to continue
41:33
Speaker 1: this story, we need to mention to fully understand how
41:36
Speaker 1: Anthony Bourdain was changed by his relationship with Ajia Argento.
41:41
Speaker 1: I'll do my best to list them as quickly as possible.
41:45
Speaker 1: Fact number one. Despite his split from Atavia, the pair
41:49
Speaker 1: remained close as friends and co parents of their daughter.
41:52
Speaker 1: By all accounts, Tony remained, if sometimes absent, an attentive
41:56
Speaker 1: and proud dad. Ajia Argento could not accept this. It
42:00
Speaker 1: was threatened by Tony's relationship not only with a Tavia,
42:04
Speaker 1: but with his daughter, going as far as demanding that
42:07
Speaker 1: Tony not share photos of his family on Instagram. Fact
42:11
Speaker 1: number two Tony Bourdain was keen on helping Aji's career
42:15
Speaker 1: as a director by involving her in the production of
42:18
Speaker 1: his CNN show Parts Unknown. Now you have to understand
42:22
Speaker 1: that by the time Tony and his production team were
42:24
Speaker 1: making Parts Unknown, they were running a finely tuned production machine.
42:29
Speaker 1: You've seen these episodes. They're expertly made. They didn't happen
42:34
Speaker 1: by accident. Again, enter the Italian actress, but this time
42:39
Speaker 1: behind the camera, directing Tony in his seasoned crew. She
42:43
Speaker 1: was woefully incapable a disaster, and she relied on a
42:47
Speaker 1: relationship with Tony to win pissy little creative battles on set.
42:51
Speaker 1: It got so bad that she insisted Tony fire his
42:54
Speaker 1: longtime award winning cinematographer Zax Samboni, whom Tony had worked
42:58
Speaker 1: with and had a friendship with for a decade, and
43:02
Speaker 1: Tony fired him on the spot. Fact number three human
43:07
Speaker 1: growth hormones. I'm not even going to get into this
43:10
Speaker 1: because it's gross. You can look it up yourself. Fact
43:14
Speaker 1: number four hashtag me too. This was the big one.
43:20
Speaker 1: Blenagi Argento found herself at the center of the me
43:23
Speaker 1: too storm. She pulled Anthony Bourdain in fast and without
43:26
Speaker 1: an Umbrella, and Toni, who up to this point seemed
43:30
Speaker 1: to tow the old Groucho Marx line when it came
43:32
Speaker 1: to causes, the one that said quote, I refused to
43:35
Speaker 1: join any club that would have me as a member, unquote,
43:38
Speaker 1: and had lived his life as someone who proudly was
43:40
Speaker 1: not a joiner, but instead an independent minded liberal with
43:43
Speaker 1: a unique superpower that allowed him to both view and
43:46
Speaker 1: articulate this messy world with deaf nuance. Suddenly that dude
43:51
Speaker 1: was at the vanguard of a political movement, on the
43:54
Speaker 1: front lines with his girlfriend who had gone public about
43:57
Speaker 1: her rape at the pudgy hands of Harvey Weinstein. I
44:01
Speaker 1: get it, I do. Who's to say how any of
44:05
Speaker 1: us would act if we were in the same situation,
44:08
Speaker 1: But again, context, supporting your girlfriend and subverting your character
44:14
Speaker 1: to support your girlfriend are two different things. Suddenly Anthony
44:19
Speaker 1: Bourdain was in Twitter beast with Matt Damon and turning
44:22
Speaker 1: his back on friends. At the end of twenty seventeen,
44:28
Speaker 1: Anthony Bourdain's good friend Josh Hamie of Queens of the
44:31
Speaker 1: Stone Age, the same friend Anthony had been quick to
44:34
Speaker 1: defend a few years back in a potential barfight, was
44:37
Speaker 1: on stage when, overcome with the energy and emotion of
44:40
Speaker 1: a rock and roll performance, he inexcusably kicked a female
44:44
Speaker 1: pool photographer's camera as she held it up in front
44:47
Speaker 1: of her face, injuring the photographer, who then posted her
44:51
Speaker 1: injuries online with the hashtag me too. Given the moment,
44:55
Speaker 1: America was in controversy, ensued Josh Hami. He was quick
45:00
Speaker 1: to unequivocally apologize for his actions. In later statements, Josh
45:05
Speaker 1: provided context referencing the violent inadvertent stage actions of Johnny
45:10
Speaker 1: Cash and Iggy Pop, but at the moment, none of
45:14
Speaker 1: that was relevant. All that mattered was that a man
45:17
Speaker 1: kicked a woman. The pitchforks were out, and Josh's friend,
45:21
Speaker 1: Anthony Bourdain grabbed one and headed to Twitter, saying, waking
45:25
Speaker 1: up in Bhutan to the Josh Hamie shit and still
45:28
Speaker 1: in the WTF phase, senseless and a weak ass apology.
45:34
Speaker 1: Say what you will about Tony's comment and or Josh's
45:37
Speaker 1: actions or apology but if a good friend of mine
45:40
Speaker 1: finds himself in an international media firestorm, I'm calling him
45:44
Speaker 1: first to get his side of the story before publicly
45:47
Speaker 1: piling on. That's who I am, and I'm sure that's
45:50
Speaker 1: who you are, because that's how most people are. Most
45:54
Speaker 1: people are reasonable people. Anthony Bourdain was, up until this
45:58
Speaker 1: moment in time, an excessive reasonable person. That changed then inevitably,
46:05
Speaker 1: As is the case with most cause focus Charlatan's the
46:09
Speaker 1: rot of hypocrisy cracked through the thin veneer of virtue.
46:16
Speaker 1: In twenty eighteen, The New York Times reported it had
46:20
Speaker 1: obtained evidence supporting the claim that in twenty thirteen, while
46:24
Speaker 1: she was thirty seven years old, Agire Argento sexually assaulted
46:28
Speaker 1: a fellow actor, a boy two days passed his seventeenth birthday,
46:33
Speaker 1: plying him with alcohol. Agia Argento denied the incident, but
46:38
Speaker 1: I encourage you to search online for photos of the two,
46:41
Speaker 1: as well as text messages between them, and come to
46:43
Speaker 1: your own conclusion. In any event, Anthony Bourdain swooped into
46:48
Speaker 1: defense mode. The mob mentality might have been good for
46:51
Speaker 1: Josh Hami, but now the shoe was on the other foot,
46:54
Speaker 1: and it just wouldn't do for his Italian actress girlfriend,
46:57
Speaker 1: to whom he had given nearly every ounce of his
46:59
Speaker 1: energy over the last few months. She was at the
47:02
Speaker 1: vanguard of the me too movement, and Tony wasn't going
47:05
Speaker 1: to let the movement eat its own. Aggie's alleged victim
47:08
Speaker 1: was threatening a three point five million dollar lawsuit rather
47:11
Speaker 1: than let the courts adjudicate the matter. Tony, as Charles
47:15
Speaker 1: Leerson in his book Down and Out in Paradise reported,
47:19
Speaker 1: Tony reportedly hired a private investigator to dig up dirt
47:22
Speaker 1: on the kid, dirt that could be used to blackmail.
47:27
Speaker 1: In the end, Tony just paid the kid off three
47:30
Speaker 1: hundred and eighty grand to shut up and not pursue
47:33
Speaker 1: further legal action. The move was like something a character
47:38
Speaker 1: from one of Tony's unsuccessful novels would have done. A
47:41
Speaker 1: junkie move, an all in move, absolute without nuance. That's
47:47
Speaker 1: what Tony was all in on agi Argento, come hell
47:52
Speaker 1: or high water, the feeling. Despite all that he did
47:57
Speaker 1: for her, despite the financial help, rear help, the public support,
48:02
Speaker 1: despite putting her above his family, his colleagues, his friends,
48:06
Speaker 1: his career. Despite all of this, aggi Argento was not
48:12
Speaker 1: all in on Anthony boardin agi Argento had it bad
48:18
Speaker 1: for someone else, and that, as they say, ladies and gentlemen,
48:23
Speaker 1: ain't good. June twenty eighteen, Anthony Bourdain and his zero
48:30
Speaker 1: point zero crew, along with Tony's friend, chef Eric Repair,
48:34
Speaker 1: were in France filming an episode of Parts Unknown. Agi
48:38
Speaker 1: Argento was in Italy with a handsome journalist and the
48:41
Speaker 1: tabloids in the internet let Tony know all about it,
48:45
Speaker 1: and it broke him. What happens to you when you
48:51
Speaker 1: give every bit of yourself to something and get nothing back. Thankfully,
48:57
Speaker 1: I've never experienced this specific type of heartbreak like all
49:02
Speaker 1: of you. I've loved and lost, but I've never lost
49:05
Speaker 1: like this. I've never bet the farm, the dog, my
49:08
Speaker 1: first born, and the horse and buggy. I rode in
49:11
Speaker 1: on and lost it all. That kind of pain is unimaginable.
49:16
Speaker 1: Add worldwide humiliation to that reality, and suicide a romantic
49:21
Speaker 1: concept Anthony Bourdain had entertained in both a literal and
49:24
Speaker 1: literary sense, going as far back as his first published works.
49:28
Speaker 1: That type of big ending, given the context anyway, starts
49:32
Speaker 1: to become objectively understandable. I say this as someone who
49:37
Speaker 1: has lost many close relatives and friends to suicide. But
49:41
Speaker 1: the truth is that no one understands why someone else
49:45
Speaker 1: kills himself, no one. It is the most personal action
49:49
Speaker 1: an individual can make. I believe, though, that Anthony Bourdain
49:55
Speaker 1: died long before that night. He hanged himself in a
49:57
Speaker 1: luxury hotel in France, broken stewing over being betrayed and
50:02
Speaker 1: publicly humiliated by the one person in the world had
50:05
Speaker 1: given himself over to entirely. Somewhere down the line, he
50:11
Speaker 1: stopped being Anthony Bourdain. Let me say that again. He
50:16
Speaker 1: stopped being Anthony Bourdaine, which is shocking because Anthony Bourdain
50:22
Speaker 1: seemed to continuously feed the character of Anthony Bourdain, and
50:26
Speaker 1: we loved him for it. We found him endlessly entertaining, compelling,
50:30
Speaker 1: even lovable. We were more than comfortable looking into corners
50:33
Speaker 1: of the world we'd never visit with his eyes, tasting
50:36
Speaker 1: things we'd never taste with his acerbic tongue. I'm not
50:41
Speaker 1: sure when the real Anthony Bourdain died, but I'm pretty
50:44
Speaker 1: sure the wheels were coming off by the time he
50:46
Speaker 1: turned up in Miami to film that episode of Parts
50:49
Speaker 1: Unknown with his hero Achey Pop. Tony asked his rock
50:53
Speaker 1: star hero, given that he'd been the template for nearly
50:57
Speaker 1: every rock and roll front man that came after him,
51:00
Speaker 1: from David Johansson to Julian Casablancis, and that Iggy had
51:03
Speaker 1: experienced millions of adventures at this point late in life,
51:09
Speaker 1: what now thrilled him? Iggy answers from the heart with
51:14
Speaker 1: being loved and appreciating the people that are giving that
51:18
Speaker 1: to me. Tony looks like a deer in headlights when
51:22
Speaker 1: Iggy says this, because, like Iggy Pop Anthony Bourdain was
51:26
Speaker 1: a romantic, but I believe by this point love for
51:30
Speaker 1: him was a fleeting proposition. Anthony Bourdain's friend, the filmmaker
51:36
Speaker 1: Amos Poe, said, it's great to be romantic, but never
51:40
Speaker 1: be romantic about romance, because it'll take you down like
51:45
Speaker 1: a junkie. A romantic goes all in, all in on love,
51:50
Speaker 1: all in on indulgence, all in on traveling to the
51:54
Speaker 1: end of the fucking world and back, and most admirably,
51:57
Speaker 1: all in on empathy. When Anthony Bourdin went all in,
52:03
Speaker 1: his lust for life rewarded him with a career, a family, fame,
52:08
Speaker 1: but when he went all in on the wrong romance,
52:11
Speaker 1: he got nothing back and it killed him. That is
52:17
Speaker 1: a disgrace. I'm Jake Brennan and this is Disgraceland. Disgraceland
52:45
Speaker 1: was created by Yours Truly.
52:46
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Speaker 2: and iHeart Podcasts. Credits for this episode can be found
52:54
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52:58
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53:01
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53:02
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53:24
Speaker 1: roll Up he Ad don Man