In bed with the hot chef

CARÊME, the new AppleTV+ series about the first celebrity chef, was developed and created by Ian Kelly based on a book he wrote over two decades ago

Marie-Antoine Carême became head chef to prominent people including Charles Maurice de Talleyrand-Périgord, Tsar Alexander I of Russia and the Prince Regent in Britain

‘How did you two first meet?’

How intimate is that question? I’ve been reflecting on this of late, as my 20 year relationship with Antonin Carême blossoms into a full-on screen romance, one which is also quite sexy, as it happens. Carême transformed our ideas of food and cooking in the 19th century, rising from the slums of Paris to cook for monarchs, tyrants, the czar; along the way he systematised gastronomy and was among the first to suggest that you try this at home. AppleTV+ came into the story about three years ago — and is now hitting the screen in eight episodes, starring César Award-winner Benjamin Voisin along with Jérémie Renier and Lyna Khoudri. But for me, this has been a much longer affair, one that gave me my first book and my first play in New York, as well as now this long-dreamt of expedition onto screen. Carême and I, we’ve been through a lot.

Biographers, like actors maybe, tend to fall in love with their subjects and see the world from their point of view. It’s an occupational hazard. Alison Steadman still sees Pride and Prejudice from Mrs Bennet’s point of view. Any actor playing The Thane will tell you the bloodied regicide is also a totally relatable disappointing husband. So I suppose it was inevitable that all these years of living with Antonin, from book to stage to screen, would result in a certain lack of distance. Even so, it’s mighty odd to see young Benjamin Voisin play him — play me, it feels — over eight hours of lavish television drama.

People ask how it all began, and I don’t entirely recall. The truth is, it’s like I’ve always known him, which is, I suppose, one of the definitions of true love. I know one fellow biographer who carried a passport-sized photo of a biographical subject in a wallet, long before actually starting work on a book. Likewise, I think I had been aware of the idea of Carême for years before I started mulling on the story for drama — and so for biography.