Anthony Bourdain’s former assistant Laurie Woolever has shared her final text exchange with the celebrity chef ahead of his death in 2018.
Woolever has shared the messages in her new book Care and Feeding, out on March 25.
Bourdain was in France filming his CNN series Parts Unknown when Woolever said photos of the celebrity chef’s girlfriend Asia Argento with another man were published in various media outlets.
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“Everyone was walking the tightrope, trying to give him both the emotional support he seemed to need and the space to process his pain with a measure of private dignity,” Woolever wrote in a excerpt from the book which has been published by the New York Post.
Bourdain was scheduled to return to New York soon where he was booked in for a haircut, a visit to the doctor and a personal trainer.
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Woolever texted to Bourdain: “I hope you’re doing OK.”
Bourdain responded: “I’ll live and we’ll survive.”
But he never returned to New York.
Bourdain died by suicide in his hotel room at the age of 61, his body found by friend, Le Bernardin chef Eric Ripert, on June 8.
Woolever had been working with Bourdain for almost 10 years when he died.
Her job included helping him write his books and managing his schedule.
With a background in food Woolever was the perfect person to help Bourdain with his work.
The pair had been through extraordinary challenges together and he had generously helped her during her divorce and when she stopped drinking.
Bourdain had found fame after an essay he wrote exposing the the secrets of a Manhattan restaurant.
It was published in The New Yorker. Next he wrote a New York Times best-selling book continuing his trope called Kitchen Confidential: Adventures in the Culinary Underbelly.
What followed was numerous TV series which saw Bourdain travel the world exploring food and culture off the beaten track.
For much of that time Woolever was by his side.
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Bourdain was married to Ottavia Busia, a mixed martial artist, from 2007 until 2016. The couple shared daughter Ariane, 17.
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Bourdain met Italian actress Asia Argento in 2016 while filming the Rome episode of Parts Unknown in which she featured.
At the time Argento, 49, was dealing with the fallout over claims she had been sexually assaulted by Harvey Weinstein in the 1990s.
Bourdain fell hard for the Italian actress the pair began dating.
In the book Woolever described how his new love interest changed her job.
She now had to clear Bourdain’s schedule as much as possible so he could spent time with Argento and send various gifts to her.
“My job responsibilities became ever-more oriented toward helping Tony revolve like a planet around his girlfriend, the blinding sun,” she wrote in the book.
This proved difficult for Woolever who wasn’t used to Bourdain being so high-maintenance.
Things became worse, she wrote, when Argento was hired to replace a director on Parts Unknown and the actress reportedly ordered Bourdain fire a longtime cameraman he worked with because she didn’t get along with him, which the celebrity chef did.
While Woolever said she was “angry” at how Argento treated Bourdain, she doesn’t hold the actress responsible for his death.
“The cause of Tony’s death was Tony, a human, mortal, grown man who loved and suffered so deeply that it killed him,” she writes.
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