November 15, 2006
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It's always very stressful once the chefs have started their cooking -- just as much as they run around and panic as the time ticks down, so do we. If there's one cardinal rule about producing a show like this, it is that we must be ready when the food is. Therefore if the rules give the chefs one hour until they send out their first course we have one hour until we must be ready to shoot that. We must have shot Tom doing his round in the kitchen, his report afterwards, shot the guests arriving, got them seated, made sure everyone's make up is done, they all been to the bathroom, their mics are fixed and checked, the cameras are all in position with fresh tapes and batteries, and other stuff besides.
We have a producer in the kitchen with the chefs giving the rest of the crew and production team a running countdown over our walkies -- it's like the launch of Apollo only with a more casual dress code. The worst thing that could happen would be if the chefs were ready to serve their food and production held them up for any reason and thereby caused the food to spoil/go cold/congeal etc. God forbid anyone screw this up -- I'm a pretty easy going team leader but this is one thing that I am absolutely obsessed with. Ironically, the main reason this is so important is not so much that the judges can't judge the food as easily if it has sat for a few minutes -- they're all pros and can easily factor this into their thinking. No, the problem is the chefs and their perception -- if there is any possibility that they may feel that we are in any way responsible for them not doing well, regardless of whether that is in fact the case (it never has been), then we are all in a world of pain.
In any case the well-oiled show machine operated at NASA level and the day went off without a hitch.
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Comments
Stephen wrote:
Thanks for the "NASA" info. It is nice to find out more on the production concerns that have to be dealt with. Concidering the variety of locations, I imagine that it is a bit more challeging than everyone realizes. About the elevator incident, I suspect that Chef Joseph realized that he would be the prime candidate to be hit. :)
posted on November 16, 2006 at 7:01 PM
Lee wrote:
Thank you for your blogs. I like the behind the scenes production information. It gives another flavor to the show.
posted on November 16, 2006 at 8:18 PM
Bob wrote:
ah! so it's not about the food after all.........it's mayhem and elevators!!! Your column is a very interesting insight of what goes on behind the scenes of this show. It's nice to hear the thought that goes into you and your team not influencing the outcome of the challenges by holding up the chefs. I'd have thought that your team would have provided more evidence during the Otto or the Betty cheating-stealing incidents. I'm still of the opinion that it wasn't Otto's fault about the Lychees ( it looked like the girls were pushing the cart and that it wasn't Otto that had paid the bill), and I'm not sure about Betty, although i can see her rationale of "not serving any dish that doesn't work" which is a Top Chef mantra, and she still kept under the 500cal limit. Did you ( or the judges) think that she should have just served the cookies that weren't working? or not serve a dish at all? or were there other options?
Great Show!!! keep up the good work
( next year try to find better contestants!!!)
posted on November 17, 2006 at 9:07 AM
vinny T wrote:
I feel for you, this new cast is over all horrible, full of themselves and extremely unprofessional. I have worked in kitchens many times and I would have walked out on all but two of your "cooks".
posted on November 22, 2006 at 10:39 PM
jules wrote:
You're great... don't let the mean posters get to you... I love hearing the hidden people and production!!!
posted on December 4, 2006 at 3:11 PM
Edward Barnett wrote:
I assume you no longer maintain this blog after the show, but maybe I will get lucky.
Everything I have read indicates that the challenges are written before the season starts, and you just need to know who wins the week before to see who competes.
If this is true let me ask you a simple question. If someone was supposed to be eliminated last week there would have been 11 people for this episode. How would you have divided them up. How could have 11 people done this.
Something seems rotten in the State of Top chef!
posted on February 26, 2007 at 1:11 AM