Publication Date: 08-29-2026

Tony (2026) review

Dir. Matt Johnson

By: Steve Pulaski

Rating: ★★★

Your days in grade school and later high school are defined by being exposed to a plethora of subjects and ideas. You’re absorbing and regurgitating information more than actually harnessing it. By the time you get to college, or perhaps head right into the workforce, you think you have an idea of who you are, until you discover that you haven’t really done anything yet. It’s not until you’re subsequently in many different situations for the first time in your life — be it on the job, with friends, at a party, confronted with drugs and alcohol, or the prospect of romance — that you realize that you’re a rookie in the game of life. There are countless “firsts” for nearly everything you encounter. What precedes the dawn of your adulthood was merely practice, as useless as some of it proved to be in the long run.

This is the underlying theme of Matt Johnson’s Tony, a biopic on the early years of Anthony Bourdain, whose own words used in the opening of the film define the character with whom we’re about to spend 100 minutes with pinpoint self-awareness that didn’t come until much later in his own life: “I was — to be frank — a spoiled, miserable, narcissistic, self-destructive and thoughtless young lout, and badly in need of a good ass-kicking.” Suffice to say, he took enough physical and metaphorical blows to become the celebrity chef, author, and traveling documentarian who was beloved by many until his suicide in 2018 at the age of 61.

Adapted from Bourdain’s memoir Kitchen Confidential, Tony focuses on his early years, where he learned a lesson in providence, among other things. Set over the course of a summer in 1975, it opens with 19-year-old “Tony” Bourdain (Dominic Sessa, The Holdovers) pitching an idea for a novel to a fellowship committee at Vassar College. Confident he landed the grant that will kickstart his early efforts to succeed Saligner and Kerouac, he celebrates by getting drunk at a local east coast dive, where liquid courage prompts him to talk to his high school crush, Nancy (Emilia Jones). She is spending the upcoming summer in Provincetown. At dinner with his parents, we see that Tony’s pompous-ass mother (Dagmara Domińczyk) was the source of his love of words like “bildungsroman” and also the reason he can’t even impress himself, let alone anyone else.

Shocker, the caddish youth doesn’t get the fellowship, so he makes the impulsive move to travel to Provincetown to win over Nancy anyway. One thing leads to another, and after making a drunken ass of himself at a local seafood joint, Tony ends up working for an unnamed chef (Antonio Banderas) in his kitchen, sharing the cramped quarters with other social degens. Slobbish Dimitri (Stavros Halkias, roly-poly and hilarious as usual) and ultra-cool Sal (Leo Woodall) take Tony under their wings as he works off one hangover after another by washing dishes. He gets especially close to Sal, who introduces him to cocaine and the art of bullshitting his way into getting lucky with his cool older brother energy. While Sal might be the alpha-male of the scrappy, unkempt kitchen, the likes of which would make any health inspector faint, Banderas “Chef” proves to be the soul of it. During one violent confrontation with Sal, Chef tells him that he is the “Sin Eater,” the one who takes on the sins of the rest of the kitchen so that the souls of his subordinates can remain clean.

Hot off of the acclaimed Nirvana the Band the Show the Movie, director/co-writer Matt Johnson — whose debut, The Dirties was one of my favorite films of 2013 — seems aware that this story, at its core, is another riff on “the summer that changed everything” formula. Working with co-writers Matthew Miller, Todd Bartels, and Lou Howe, Johnson entrusts much of the film’s success with Sessa, the young upstart actor who captivated us with his tender performance in The Holdovers. Sessa’s Tony manufactures confidence to mask his awkwardness and indecisiveness. When he runs into Nancy during his time in Provincetown, the details of his story always change, but he is quick to say he is a writer, despite not one moment in the film showing him writing anything. Sessa is not only the focal point of the story, but he is the emotional barometer. Johnson is quick to segue from scene-to-scene, self-aware that lingering could prompt some treacly bits or otherwise well-worn conventions that would undo the naturalistic progression of the entire narrative. Sessa proves he’s the real deal, shouldering the weight of a movie that moves like the ocean that overlooks its characters so very often.

Tony is unshowy, so removed from the flash, needle-drops, and quick summations of notable chapters in its titular figure’s life that permeate many biopics. While I’m not personally well-versed in the exploits of Bourdain — though his blurb on Chicago is one of the best I’ve ever read about the city I consider home — I found myself forgetting at times this is a movie about his salad days. It’s nondescript at times, and that’s not a criticism. There’s a universality to this story of a young, cocksure hot-shot who harbors misguided beliefs on how the world works while simultaneously not knowing a damn thing about himself due to a lack of personal experience and unchecked insecurities. What a fine work of bildungsroman this proves to be, a phrase that would satisfy Tony’s mother, if only for a fleeting moment.

Starring: Dominic Sessa, Antonio Banderas, Emilia Jones, Leo Woodall, Stavros Halkias, Dagmara Domińczyk, and Rich Sommer. Directed by: Matt Johnson.