Just a few months after Anthony Bourdain’s death in June, a documentary on his life is already in the works. According to a new report from Vanity Fair, the film is in pre-production, in collaboration with the same company that produced Parts Unknown, Bourdain’s wildly popular food and travel show on CNN.
Amy Entelis, CNN’s executive vice president for talent and content, told Vanity Fair‘s Joe Pompeo, “As well as we knew Tony, because he did reveal himself in the series, there was still a hunger to know more about him, and to honor his work and celebrate him. The documentary format became one of the more obvious ways to go.”
According to Pompeo, the film could “hit screens as early as 2019—first on the festival circuit, then with a theatrical release, and eventually on CNN, a rollout that the network has employed with other documentaries.”
Parts Unknown has been one of CNN’s biggest programming successes since it first aired in 2013.
“We just want to make it perfect,” said Entelis of the documentary, which does not yet have a name. “We want to make it exquisite for Tony. We want to do him justice.”
In the fall of 2019, Ecco Books will publish Bourdain: The Oral Biography, and Laurie Woolever, Bourdain’s assistant and frequent collaborator, is reportedly on board to edit the book.
This fall, CNN is airing the twelfth and final season of Parts Unknown, which will consist of five episodes. (The first episode of the season, which takes place in Kenya, was the only one to be completed before Bourdain’s death. To fill in the gaps of his narration, the production company will use audio of Bourdain gathered while shooting.) The series will also remain on Netflix indefinitiely; the series was originally scheduled to leave the streaming site on June 16, but a push from fans led Netflix to keep it available.
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