A chef is yelling at an underling: “I will kill your whole family if you don’t get this right!” The chef is Charlie Trotter, but he is filmed not at work, but for a scene in My Best Friend’s Wedding; Trotter’s cameo in the 1997 movie played up to his reputation as a tyrannical perfectionist. He opened his eponymous restaurant in Chicago aged 27, swiftly becoming a rock-star celebrity chef. In 2012, Trotter dramatically closed the kitchen on its 25th anniversary and died a year later of a stroke aged 54. This documentary about him is a solid if slightly unsatisfying portrait, lacking real depth or flavour.
Trotter was born into a wealthy family (raised on hotdogs and meatloaf, jokes his mother). Mostly self-taught, he got an education in gastronomy by eating his way around Europe. In 1987 he opened Charlie Trotter’s in Chicago, bankrolled by his father, Bob, another workaholic. Trotter desperately wanted to please his dad, who in retirement threw himself into helping make his son’s restaurant a success. Trotter Sr later had misgivings, which he put into a letter advising Charlie to stop bullying kitchen staff (Trotter’s tirades were legendary). The dynamics of their father-son relationship look intriguing but, like a lot about Trotter’s life, questions hover in the air, unasked or unanswered.
