Jon Favreau Described This Chef Scene As The Toughest By Far
From cubanos to pasta aglio e olio and quite possibly the best grilled cheese in cinematic history, it's hard not to watch the 2014 movie "Chef," now streaming on Netflix, without getting hungry. Food-centric movies like "Ratatouille" and "Big Night" are known for highlighting technically challenging recipes, but much of the appeal of the food from "Chef" lies in its simplicity. After all, "Chef" at its core is about a father and a son, Carl (Jon Favreau) and Percy (Emjay Anthony), who start a food truck and cook together for a summer. However, while Favreau didn't find any of the food scenes all that difficult to film, he remembers the father-son goodbye scene as a "logistical nightmare of a day that was far too ambitious" (via Vulture).
Favreau, who produced, directed, wrote, and acted in the film, told Vulture that this scene ended up undergoing the most change because of how important the father-son relationship arc was. "It was the most emotional scene Emjay had done because it was also the last scene of the movie shoot," Favreau shared. "When I say to him, 'Your summer's over and we're not gonna be having fun like this anymore,' it was also about the summer we had spent together, since it was his first big part in a movie like that." Capturing all that emotion in one definitive scene, proved to be a lot tougher than making cubanos on camera.
Wolfgang Puck wasn't impressed by Favreau's cooking skills in 'Chef'
For all the heartfelt storytelling elements of the film, there's no doubt Favreau hit the nail on the head. In fact, he told Vulture it was the film's portrayal of Carl and Percy's relationship that he was most proud of. As for his role as a professional chef — well, Wolfgang Puck wasn't exactly a fan. According to Puck, Favreau cooked more like a prep cook than a chef, and is not as skilled as he claims (via GQ, on YouTube). Puck revealed that Favreau's hands in certain scenes were not his own, but those of a real professional. Of course, Puck's harsh comments are all in good fun, as the two are friends, and Puck even appeared in the first season of the movie's spinoff docuseries, Favreau's "The Chef Show" on Netflix.
Puck also taught Favreau how to properly cook an omelet, an occasion that both remember with fondness. "I put it in the garbage can, and he was sweating. It was a lot of fun," Puck shared with GQ. Favreau recalled, "I was honored by it, so that's nothing compared to the flopsweat that you feel when you're dying onstage in an improv scene" (via Chicago Tribune). Clearly Favreau is a performer at heart, so while he may have not lived up to Puck's cooking standards in "Chef," he still managed to make an iconic food movie.