Shortly after graduating from the Culinary Institute of America in 1978, Anthony Bourdain spent his days cooking in some of the most famous restaurants in New York City. In his free time, he started publishing works of fiction, too, but it was only his nonfiction short stories and books like Kitchen Confidential that ever received widespread attention. It looks like that’s about to change, because Bourdain’s second novel, the 1997 crime thriller Gone Bamboo, has just been picked up for a TV series adaptation.
Producers Webster and Robert Stone have acquired the rights to Gone Bamboo and plan to create a pilot for a scripted series, reports Deadline. Before now, the Stone brothers’ producing credits have included The Conspirator, Gone in Sixty Seconds, and The Negotiator — aka Hollywood action-thriller movies that should let you know Bourdain’s work will be in good hands.
While there’s no cast or script formally announced just yet, the TV series will likely follow Bourdain’s original ideas in Gone Bamboo pretty closely. In the book, a sharpshooting hedonistic assassin named Henry Denard messes up one of the biggest hits of his career. To keep the peace and dispatch the villains once and for all, Henry teams up with his equally skilled wife to finish the job, all while soaking in the tropical vibes of the island of St. Martin.
“I wanted to write a sociopath beach book,” Bourdain wrote in the book’s introduction. “I wanted a hero and heroine as lazy, mercenary, lustful, and free of redeeming qualities as I sometimes see myself.”
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For a man responsible for some of the best TV shows of the 2010s, it’s tempting to believe the late cook and Emmy-winning television star would be pleased to see his book being adapted. Unfortunately, we can only imagine what he would have said, as Bourdain passed away in 2018 at the age of 61. His loss shook the entertainment world and brought in tributes from Barack Obama, Pearl Jam, Josh Homme, and countless others.