June 17, 2025 • 45 mins
What’s it like to be the right hand to two of the most iconic and complicated chefs of our time? Laurie Woolever dishes on life behind the scenes with Anthony Bourdain and Mario Batali, revealing the chaos, contradictions, and quiet moments that shaped her memoir, the New York Times Bestselling Care and Feeding.
From a small town in upstate New York to the kitchens and offices of culinary giants, Woolever's journey is raw, riveting, and deeply personal. She opens up about toxic kitchens, battling addiction in a booze-soaked industry, and the long road to sobriety and self-worth.
This isn’t just a peek behind the celebrity curtain; it’s a powerful story of resilience, reinvention, and claiming your own spotlight.
Purchase her book:
Care and Feeding a Memoir by Laurie Woolever
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Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Janette (00:00):
Hi Rachel, hey, Jeanette, we just had the
interview with Lori Wollever.
The book is Care and Feedingand we just talked to her about
it.
She used to be the assistant toAnthony Bourdain and Mario
Batali.
Batali, and she has writtenthis book.
That isn't necessarily aboutthem but it does.
Rachel (00:18):
It's a memoir, it's about her.
She goes into depth about whatit was like to work for them and
also in those environments, butit really does take the reader
through her journey in the foodindustry as a writer, as a chef,
as a cookbook editor,co-creator, and also her
marriage and being a mother.
(00:40):
And she's very vulnerable onthe page.
Janette (00:42):
Yeah, it's a revealing look at her life and the
struggles that she had withsubstance abuse and also how she
navigated working in such achaotic industry as the food
industry, and it's a fascinatingread.
She's an excellent writer andthere's something interesting in
(01:03):
it, I think, for everyone.
Enjoy, welcome, lori.
Welcome to Lost in Jersey.
Laurie Woolever (01:12):
Thank you Very excited to be here.
Janette (01:14):
We like to, when we get started, tell how we know you.
I was just looking for a goodbook to read and I was skimming
the New York Times new releasebooks and top ones and I think
your book came out at numbereight or something like that,
right at the kick.
And I must have been just theresimultaneously and I was like
you know, this is something Iusually wouldn't read.
I think I'm going to read thisand I got into it right away.
(01:36):
Great, I love to hear that.
And you know, the funny thingwas is, as I was reading, I was
like, okay, there's got to be aNew Jersey connection in here.
Laurie Woolever (01:43):
And then there it was yeah, yeah, there are a
couple of points of Jersey inthere for sure.
I am from a small village inupstate New York, outside of
Syracuse, called Chittenango.
It's population just under5,000.
And it's a real, I guess.
It's a suburb of Syracuse and Igrew up there.
(02:06):
I went to college at CornellUniversity in Ithaca, new York,
which is maybe an hour or sofrom where I grew up, and then I
moved to New York City in 1996when I graduated from college.
So I was definitely from a verysmall town, had no connection
to New York City really, until Iwas older, and I've been in New
York ever since.
(02:26):
My parents did live in NewJersey for five years right
after I graduated college.
Janette (02:32):
Well, when you're talking about your background,
I'm curious because you have twodifferent, really big career
paths that you have had, whichis writing and cooking.
In your child and growing up,do you ever look back and think
of how did those develop thoseparticular interests?
Laurie Woolever (02:50):
Well, I always wanted to be a writer.
This was something from myearliest memories.
I remember sort of tellingmyself stories telling myself.
I got to remember this becauseI'm going to write it down later
.
I'm going to tell this story.
I was always interested in kindof collecting the details of
the day.
I was a big diary keeper from avery young age.
Judy Blume my mother got me aJudy Blume diary when I was
(03:13):
eight years old.
Ooh, lucky.
Yeah, I can see it in my mindnow.
I think I got rid of it a longtime ago.
But yeah, I was always tellingstories and I really excelled in
English and creative writing inschool and writing little plays
and performing.
So that was just kind ofinherent to who I was.
And then, when it came to schoolprojects, I would always
(03:36):
gravitate toward the food.
You had an option you can makea poster of the living cell or
you can make a cake or somethingto do with food.
So I was always like I'm goingto make the mitochondria cake or
whatever it was.
So it was something that I wasjust interested in.
I mean, I like to eat, you know, and I like novelty foods and
junk food and TV commercialsabout cereal and all of that
(03:59):
stuff was just really capturedmy imagination, and we made a
lot of cakes and a lot of bakedgoods.
That was like a way to spendtime with my mom as a kid.
As a college student I startedlearning how to cook for myself
just out of necessity, and thenI realized it was something that
I really enjoyed.
That was very soothing, and Iwent to a very competitive,
intense college and I neededways to kind of unwind.
(04:23):
So I found that I reallyenjoyed putting on some music
and opening up a cookbook andworking my way through a recipe.
And I thought when I graduatedwell, I still want to be a
writer, but I know that I haveto earn money somehow.
I have to have a skill and Ihave to know something.
I have to have a body ofknowledge to write about.
That's more than just me and mythoughts.
(04:44):
And so I thought well, whydon't I go to cooking?
A body of knowledge to writeabout, that's more than just me
and my thoughts.
And so I thought, well, whydon't I go to cooking school,
learn how to cook?
I had this sort of delusionalidea that I would cook and it
wouldn't take up that much of mytime or energy and then I could
really focus on being a writer.
Of course, being a professionalcook is very intense and all
encompassing and it's not reallysomething you can just do
(05:06):
casually, which I learned.
But I was able to take thecooking side of things and the
skills that I learned inculinary school and combine that
with the writing and started acareer as a food writer and
editor.
So they kind of came togetherin that way and now they've
diverged a little bit.
I did write this memoir, whichcertainly has a lot of food and
food experiences in it.
(05:27):
The older I get and the more Iwrite.
Now the writing that reallymoves me is more personal and
more historical and less aboutfood, but I also have.
I certainly am continuing tosupport myself co-editing or
co-authoring cookbooks and doingrestaurant reviews and whatever
I can do to keep my name outthere.
Rachel (05:46):
I found it so interesting when you write about
in the book how you were inculinary school and knew you had
that feeling immediately like Idon't want to be a chef.
I thought that was sointeresting because I would feel
that if you're reallypassionate about food and you're
going to culinary school, thatthat would be what you would
assume would be the path.
But there is already that fearof sort of knowing what it could
(06:11):
be like.
But then yet you were fullythrown in to.
You know, especially withBatali, like that intense bro
environment during that bad boychef era of the not just the
intensity of a kitchen, it'slike that times a million
because of who you were workingwith.
Laurie Woolever (06:31):
Yeah, yeah, I, um, I wish that I had had more
self-confidence and more sort ofvision as a culinary student.
I wish that I had been able tostick with it a little bit
longer and try and be a linecook.
Uh, at the same time, if Ihadn't sort of opted out of that
path, I wouldn't have taken thejob with Mario and I, you know,
arguably everything would haveturned out different in my life.
(06:52):
But I had such a such a kind ofI don't know.
I've heard it attributed tothis sort of gifted and talented
kids, you know, who were putinto these advanced programs in
elementary school and highschool and sort of told that
they were special and gifted andyou know, things came easily to
me.
And then for the rest of mylife they really didn't.
(07:13):
You know, because I was justI'm just a normal person and
just because I did well in youknow, elementary school, math or
whatever didn't mean that allof life was going to be easy for
me.
But it kind of set me up to tobe very uncomfortable with
anything that was challenging ordidn't come immediately easy to
me.
And it doesn't.
I don't think anybody startsculinary school and is instantly
(07:33):
very good at it.
It's just a skill you have todevelop like any other skill or
craft.
So I was just very uncomfortablewith the idea that I was not
good at it, that I was going tohave to work hard and that I was
going to have to earn my dues.
And I and I, just I didn't likepeople being upset with me
failure.
I mean not that anybody lovesthese things, but I just had
such a low tolerance for thatfeeling of being mediocre, of
(07:58):
failing, of having to dosomething over and over again,
of somebody kind of, you know,riding me like I just I just
wanted nothing to do with it,and that's a lot of what it is
to be a young cook.
So yeah, and then, you know,for all of my ways of trying to
avoid that life, I ended upgetting, you know, thrown into
the kitchen.
When I were early on in my timeworking as Mario Batali's
(08:19):
assistant, there was an instancewhere someone just didn't show
up and the restaurant was aboutto open and they hadn't.
You know, they needed somebodyto come in and fill in in the
kitchen, and so I, I did it andI loved reading about that, that
getting thrown in at Babbo.
Janette (08:33):
I mean, yeah, you know what's really interesting about
that too, is that I was lookingback over it and it was kind of
accidental that you got that job.
It it was like a, wasn't itlike a temp agency or something?
Laurie Woolever (08:46):
Not exactly, but the woman who ran the
careers program at the culinaryschool.
She said you've got to go workin a restaurant kitchen.
You can't just, you know, optout of it because no one's going
to take you seriously.
But then I did.
I did get a job in a kitchen.
I lasted for four days.
I was hired as the, as theguard manger, which is like the
salad station, and then somebodygot fired and I got moved up to
(09:08):
pastry chef, where I had nobusiness.
Rachel (09:11):
Yeah, that was terrifying.
Laurie Woolever (09:12):
Yeah.
So then she said, all right,well, I'll send you on this
interview with Mario Batali.
So then it worked out.
There was another maybe you'rethinking of earlier in the book
I did before I went to cookingschool.
I worked for two years as acook for a family and that was
through an agency I hadinterviewed.
They hired someone who hadprofessional training and she
(09:33):
only lasted a few weeks becauseshe was so committed to the idea
that in order for food to tastegood, it has to have butter in
it, it has to have salt, it hasto be fried and all the things
that we add to food to make itreally delicious.
And she wasn't willing tofollow their dictates.
We want fat free, steamed, nosalt, no flavor, no flavor.
Rachel (09:53):
Yeah.
Laurie Woolever (09:53):
So they, they fired her and they hired me and
I was like great, you know, Ibarely know what I'm doing as a
cook.
So you want me to steamvegetables and make you know
plain pasta, like OK.
So you want me to steamvegetables and make you know
plain pasta, like okay.
So yeah, it was just.
You know, my career has been aseries of these sort of
switchbacks and unlikely rightplace at the right time.
And you know a lot of luck anda lot of just.
(10:15):
You know, I think the more, thebetter you are at something and
the more you're able to show upand be indispensable, the
better your luck gets.
But I know at the beginning itwas just really good timing that
I ended up working for Marioand then Mario introduced me to
Tony right at the right time forthe next stage in my career,
Before we get into the middlepart of your career before you
(10:38):
talk a lot about the struggleyou had after college and the
jobs that you had and thebehavior that you were
displaying.
Janette (10:47):
You know that started before it got even worse and
worse and worse.
And I'm also curious like didyou have any of that displaying
early on?
Because you were talking abouthow, when you were young, you
were very good at many thingsthat you did.
But were you, were you findingyourself at an early age trying
to cope with failure or problemslike that?
Or did it start in high school,for example, with the bad
(11:09):
behavior like drinking too muchor smoking pot?
If we want to call it badbehavior coping mechanisms, sure
yeah.
Laurie Woolever (11:16):
Yeah, I would say all of that started for me
in high school, I think.
Up until adolescence I was arule follower and, you know,
afraid of getting in trouble andall of that sort of all of the
anti-drug campaigns of the ofthe 1980s really like made a big
impact on me.
It's like great, I don't.
(11:38):
I never want to feel that way.
It totally worked on me untilit didn't, but even even I think
it's.
I was very afraid to smoke pot.
I had a boyfriend who smokedpot and I was like crying, like
you're gonna ruin your life.
And then one day it was like aswitch flipped and I was like,
all right, give me that, let metry it.
And then it was like I likethis, this is working.
Yeah, and this, you know thesame with true.
(12:00):
I mean, drinking started alittle bit earlier, but yeah, I
was sort of a typical teenager,experimenting with drugs and
alcohol but still makingincredible grades.
All the clubs, all the music,everything I needed to do to
have a great college application.
I became a very skilled liar.
Sometimes I got caught, butmostly I didn't.
(12:20):
I was crossing state lines withmy friends to go see concerts
and stay overnight and tellingmy mom.
I was at a friend's house and Ithink I had built up all this
sort of goodwill.
I think about it a lot nowbecause I have a 16-year-old and
I'm like, what are his movesFor now?
He's, I think, a terrible liar,so I've been able to kind of
figure out what he's doing.
(12:42):
But yeah, I'd say it was ateenage years and I don't know
that I had a name for what Ifelt.
I think I was anxious andprobably a little prone to
depression, but I definitelyused drugs and alcohol as a
coping mechanism all throughcollege.
And then, once college was over, it was like well, now I have
all this much more freedom and Ihave an income and I don't have
(13:02):
the pressure of having to writepapers and study for exams.
All I have to do is show up towork, and that's actually much
easier than college.
So here we go.
My feeling about it was no onereally identified as a problem
drinker or a drug addict,because it was what everybody
was doing, or at least whateveryone all of my friends were
doing.
It was just room tone.
(13:22):
And then when I was inrestaurants, that's what all my
colleagues were doing and myboss.
So I just I self-selectedpeople who were going to just
make me feel like what I wasdoing was totally normal, and it
wasn't until much later that itwas like not everybody chooses
this coping mechanism, or noteveryone gets so drunk that they
do regrettable things everytime.
(13:44):
It took me a very long time,but it definitely was the slow
boil.
I mean, at some point I writeabout, you know, one of my
colleagues, the two of us beinglike the frogs in the pot and we
have no idea because we're justyou know we're just getting
drunk at work.
Rachel (13:57):
Yeah, yeah, it is a definitely a specific time in
our culture and also therestaurant industry with the
intensity.
You could see how that couldeasily happen to somebody.
But you did reach out for help,you know, by finding a
therapist, which I thought wasso interesting, that you there
(14:19):
was something, I mean you tellus but that seemed like you were
aware.
You were aware of some of yourbehaviors that you weren't happy
with.
That wasn't making you happier.
Yeah, it's funny?
Laurie Woolever (14:33):
I don't think I ever, for it took me a very
long time and probably not tillI got sober to ever frame it as
my behaviors.
It was really my feelings, mysort of, you know.
I'm just like why am I sounhappy?
Why am I so depressed?
Why can't I figure out what todo?
You know, I have a very goodfriend whose mother was a
therapist and I was close withher whole family and spent a lot
(14:53):
of time with them.
So I was really.
It was through spending timewith that family that I started
to warm up to the idea oftherapy and see it as, because I
grew up, you know, my familyand the culture that I grew up
in was very much like what doyou mean?
Therapy?
What's wrong with you?
You know, kind of just muchmore working class, kind of like
Irish, catholic, italian,polish people that just are like
(15:15):
we don't have the money fortherapy and even if we did,
that's for crazy people, youknow, or like what's your
problem?
I'll give you something to cryabout.
So it wasn't until I met peoplethat had a different outlook,
that it was like oh, this issomething that I could probably
benefit from and, and you knowit's, it's okay, it's not
shameful and it's not, you know,wildly self-indulgent to see a
therapist.
(15:35):
So I am really I'm gratefulthat that my mind was expanded a
little bit at that point.
Yeah, and I just I just wantedto figure it out, figure out how
to, how to feel better.
And it took me a very long timeto even recognize that.
You know all the drinking thatI was doing, you know alcohol is
a depressant, and the idea thatI was somebody who had been
(15:57):
diagnosed as depressive and Iwas taking medication and it
somehow it didn't really occurto me that like you're just
pouring a Right.
So yeah, it just to me.
Now it's.
It all seems very obvious whatI was doing, but it I wasn't
really open to it, to thecritique of anything, any of the
(16:17):
ways that I chose to cope.
Janette (16:19):
Right.
Well, your life also during that.
The way the book runs is thatyou know you take us through the
journey of you, your careerprogression, and there's a lot
of drinking and smoking pot, butthen you find yourself really
in the just the heart, thepinnacle of the food industry,
which kind of promotes thatbehavior as well.
(16:39):
And I think what's interestingin the book is that it's a raw
look at it all of yourrelationship in trying to get in
a relationship and then beingmarried and the struggles you're
having in your own relationship.
But we're rooting for you.
You know throughout the wholestory that you're gonna have an
epiphany or the right turn isgoing to happen, and it does
(17:01):
happen for you.
You know it does happen in yourlife that you do find sobriety.
So it's kind of in a way, ahappy you know happy turn of
events that you find thisawareness.
But along the way we do see thefood industry and also you
navigating it so interestingly,with you working for Batali and
(17:23):
then getting introduced, as youmentioned earlier, through him
to Anthony Bourdain and thenbecoming his assistant or
however you want to put it, andhaving to experience all of that
.
In reflection of that, I knowthat Rachel was looking at that
a lot with the Vitella.
She worked in the food industryherself.
Rachel (17:41):
She worked for Rachel Ray I found so many quotes from
what you wrote that just reallybrought it home and I think
reading it I was re-angered.
I graduated in 94 and went offto work at a very corporate
before I made the move overthere very corporate management
consulting and when you had thatperson at the temp agency say
(18:04):
something like you know, youhave to get a gym membership and
you have to do this, and I wastold I couldn't wear pantsuits,
I had to wear skirts and I hadto wear sheer pantyhose.
It was all men I was inengineering at the time, so it
was definitely all men and mebut that they were wanting me to
look a certain way and then yetwalk into a meeting and they
(18:27):
would ask me to get their coffee.
It is like a relentless feelingof insecurity, obviously, but
also this like furious rageunderneath it.
And then how do you cope withthat?
Like where do you put that?
So when you were saying I thinkyou said there was like fear,
surrounded by men, and how youneed to dress and behave and
you're playing a part in a play,but you don't know the lines I
(18:51):
was like that's exactly it.
It's like you were cast in thispart and there's all these
things you need to do to keepthe part.
But you don't know them and theway they're taught to you is
through bullying and aggressionand sexual misconduct.
And someone else you quotedsaid it was like that kind of
dirty uncle that you kind ofhave to be nice to because he
(19:14):
might slip you $100.
Laurie Woolever (19:15):
Yeah, and the power dynamic is absolutely
tilted.
You're just kind of at the whimof does my boss think I'm
attractive?
Which is horrible.
Why do you even think of that?
Yeah, yeah.
And then, even if my boss doesthink I'm attractive, well,
that's gross too.
No, don't touch me.
Janette (19:33):
But isn't there also the strange dichotomy of that
Like, for example, with me?
I hung out with a lot of guysin college and afterwards and we
just all partied, we all gotdrunk.
I was part of it.
It was like we were allmisbehaving yeah no-transcript.
Rachel (20:12):
how?
Because we all know about,obviously, the Me Too movement
and what happened to Mario afterthat, but that he was a bully,
but he was also generous.
I mean there are two sides tothat.
It doesn't mean that excuseshim at all, but that people are
many things but that people aremany things.
Laurie Woolever (20:38):
Yeah, I wanted to really write with some nuance
about that because maybe inpart to assuage my own sense of
was I complicit in this.
I laughed at the jokes and Ihung out with the guys and I
definitely perpetuated this kindof raunchy culture because
that's my sense of humor, and Ithought, like isn't it cool that
I can go to work and make thesejokes and drink with the guys
and you know it's whatever.
So I wanted to, you know, justwrite with a little nuance and
(21:02):
say that.
And also the fact that workingfor Mario, which was difficult
in some ways, really set me upfor a lot of success, and you
know he was very savvy aboutseeing what was it that was
going to motivate me and whatcould he.
He certainly wasn't going topay me a lot of money and he
wasn't going to treat me with atremendous amount of respect,
but what he could do to keep meloyal was to connect me to
(21:26):
people that could help me withmy writing career, and he was
getting all kinds of things, theamount of stuff that rich
people and famous people andsuccessful people get for free
is just amazing.
Rachel (21:36):
It's insane.
Laurie Woolever (21:38):
So it'd be like oh, you want hockey tickets,
you want here, I've got theseWillie Nelson tickets.
I don't want them.
You know, here's a bottle ofthis, bottle of that.
You know some CDs, yeah,concert.
Rachel (21:47):
Yeah, so, and I you know I was young enough and
definitely you know some CDs,yeah, concert.
Laurie Woolever (21:49):
Yeah, so, and I , you know, I was young enough
and definitely, you know, poorenough, and I was like this is
great, look at my job, is socool, you know.
So I wanted to just, you know,share all of that, just to try
and explain, you know why it was, because I think a lot of
people go why didn't you quit?
Why didn't you say something?
Why didn't you fight back?
It's like, well, a because Ihad no power and B because I was
(22:12):
young and I was like, totally,you know, blinded by all of the
sort of you know, the and thefun and the free drinks and the
dinners out, and you know, thatwas, for better or worse, like
that was really that kept me inplace.
Janette (22:25):
But what's interesting is that the way that you talk
about Anthony Bourdain is thathe didn't do any of that.
Laurie Woolever (22:32):
Yeah, I think his persona might've led people
to think it.
I certainly.
Before I met him in person forthe first time I thought, oh,
this is going to be like justanother version of Mario.
But he's tall and thin and hasa French name.
But he was nothing like that,because I had read his book and
I had read the piece in NewYorker.
He was shy and a little bitsocially awkward and didn't
(22:55):
really make eye contact.
He was just a very, verydifferent kind of guy.
Now I will say also there arejokes that he would make and
lines of inquiry, especiallyearly on in his television
career, that I don't think haveaged very well, and there are a
lot of dead hooker jokes andjokes at the expense of the
Britney Spears and the ParisHiltons of the world that I
(23:18):
think in their time were very aucourant jokes.
I don't want to tarnish hismemory at all but just to say,
just in the spirit of fairness,he also could lean into that
boys will be boys kind ofmisogyny for humor.
But as a person, in hispersonal conduct, in his, you
know, in the way that he dealtwith with employees and others,
(23:39):
was always very I mean,respectful, to the point of
almost being fearful.
You know, I think he was sortof afraid of women in a way.
That was like great, you know,be afraid.
I think it's's just, they werejust fundamentally very
different people, even though Ithink they mario and tony had a
lot of similarities, both fromnew jersey.
Yeah, oh, actually that's nottrue I don't know, it's totally
(24:00):
tony mario went to rutgers, so I, so that's his jersey
association um.
And his brother went toprinceton, but um, but so that
he did have a jersey.
His jersey ties.
But tony know, born and raisedin New Jersey.
Janette (24:12):
Well, okay, on that point of New Jersey and in the
career transition, before youstarted working for Anthony
Bourdain, you had a stint in NewJersey.
You went and worked in magazine, yes, so tell us a little bit
about this.
And it's also it's interestingbecause you talk about it's like
right between right beforewebsites and Instagram and
(24:34):
everything took over, and soit's kind of this transition
period.
Laurie Woolever (24:37):
Yeah, I applied for a job editing a magazine
called Art Culinare, which atthe time was based in Morristown
, new Jersey, and it was ownedby a gentleman who has since
sold it.
So I want to make that clear,because it is still a viable
magazine, but now it's based inNorthern California and the
people who publish it are lovelyand they have nothing to do
(24:59):
with this.
The person who I worked foryeah.
But so this former chef had.
He bought a beautifulschoolhouse building in
Morristown and he lived in it.
And they also ran the office ofthe magazine out of the
schoolhouse.
And it's this beautiful, fullcolor, gigantic photographs of
(25:20):
chefs, beautiful plated dishes,with recipes and interviews, and
it was a dream job in a lot ofways.
I had never been an editorbefore and then suddenly I was
the executive editor and, as itturned out, it was an extreme.
There was no other.
Rachel (25:34):
I didn't have any editors below me, so I was, I
was the editorial staff, theexecutive, the assistant, the
editor, all the way down, I wasthe internal.
Yeah, you're all of it.
Laurie Woolever (25:45):
Yeah, was living in the East Village of
Manhattan at the time, so it wasa not insignificant commute.
Rachel (25:51):
No, that's horrible.
Laurie Woolever (25:53):
Yeah, but because it was going in the
opposite direction.
I always got a seat on thetrain in both directions, but it
was like a good close to fourhours a day just getting back
and forth.
That's a lot.
You know, I wasn't married yetI didn't have a kid.
You know I had a lot of time onmy hands and I would read the
paper or I would do work on thetrain or I would get stoned and
(26:14):
stare out the window at the endof the day, sometimes at the
beginning of the day too.
And so, yeah, that was myJersey, my experience.
The magazine was in a difficultplace.
Like you said, I started in2004.
They were very late adopters.
We had only a very rudimentarywebsite.
Everything was.
None of the content that wemade was available online, and
(26:35):
that was a, you know, a ploy toget people to continue to
subscribe, but they just thenumbers really plummeted during
my time there.
I don't think I had anything todo with it, I think I kept it.
It was hard to tell from editorto editor.
You know many changes, but Ithink people were just
discovering like, oh, I don'thave to pay all this money to
get this hardcover thing.
(26:56):
That, then is taking up room inmy house.
I can just go online.
So after a few years atUrquhlan Air, I was ready to
leave and I wanted to stay inmagazines.
So I ended up getting hired atWine Spectator magazine and it
was great to be back inManhattan.
I could walk to work.
Rachel (27:12):
They had great events.
My sister-in-law worked therein the events.
She worked at Bon Appetit andthen at Wine Spectator and she
invited us to the MarriottMarquis event with all the wine
booths everywhere.
It was so cool.
Laurie Woolever (27:26):
Yeah, the wine experience.
I think they still do that.
It's wild.
So I did that for a few years.
In that time period I gotengaged, I got married and I had
a baby and there was a pointwhere it started to feel really
arduous to put the baby indaycare.
By that point I had moved toQueens.
(27:46):
So then, rushing to Manhattan,get to work on time, do my job,
get back to the daycare and pickthe baby up before six o'clock
and I just was ready for achange.
I had had a little bit of apart time arrangement or a four
day a week arrangement, and thenWine Spectator I'll tell the
story because I'm still bitterabout it.
They said it was, it was finewith them.
(28:07):
And then someone else was aboutto have a baby and said I'd
like to do what Lori's doing andthey said no, you can't do it.
And we're going to pull theplug on her arrangement too,
because this is not a familyfriendly company, which was
tough, tough to take, especiallybecause the publisher's
daughters were coming and goingas they please doing whatever
they wanted, anyway, yeah, so.
(28:28):
So at that point I startedlooking for some other kind of
job, just reached out toeveryone I knew and said I'm
looking for part time work orsomething I can do from home,
something that's flexible.
You know, I think one of theonly people that wrote back to
me very quickly was TonyBourdain and said you know, my
assistant is actually on her wayout.
Do you think that that is thatsomething you'd ever want to do?
And it again, it was just amatter of you know, it was like
(28:51):
the right, the right week for meto to make that move.
Janette (29:00):
You ended up traveling the world and you know going
within them, all these differentlocations and seeing.
I know there's one story in thebook about your Sri Lanka.
Rachel (29:05):
I was so stressed out for you.
Janette (29:07):
And I think you were newly sober at that time too,
yeah, during that, and so Ithink the whole time I was like,
oh my God, she keeps going intothat liquor store, she's going
to drink, she's going to, andyou didn't.
So which it was reallyimpressive that you made it
through that crazy journey, andI also kind of felt like, oh,
there's good people everywhere.
Laurie Woolever (29:25):
Yeah, yeah, I think I mean, the only person
who I think had bad intentionswas the guy that was following
me.
Yeah, but everyone else that Iencountered, I think, was, you
know, there was a, there was acommunication barrier and there
was.
You know, I was kind ofstressed out of my mind but yeah
it, you know.
Fortunately everything endedwell and yes.
Rachel (29:43):
Yeah, I mean speaking of that, and then you were sober
there.
I think one of the things I wasjust wondering while I was
reading.
I appreciate the honesty andthe vulnerability you're willing
to put on the page.
It's almost reads factual like.
This is what I did and this iswhat was happening.
Like Jeanette said, we wererooting for you and hoping that
you would get to a place whereyou would feel strong enough to
(30:06):
make the commitment to yourselfto find a better way and a
better life for you, andwhatever that would look like.
How do you feel that thatfinally built up and happened
for you?
Well, there were a series ofchanges.
Laurie Woolever (30:22):
The first one was deciding to stop drinking,
and that made it easier to seemore clearly what my life was
and where I was at and how tomake more changes.
I mean, so it took me another18 months to stop smoking pot.
It's just that I was justreally, you know, I was like,
well, all right, well, I cangive up the booze, but, man, I
(30:44):
need the pot to manage myanxiety.
And what I didn't reallyrealize is that it was actually
just exacerbating my anxiety.
It wasn't making anythingbetter, it was making things
harder for me.
But until I gave it up for real, I couldn't really see that.
And then there was a, you know,there was sort of a series of
unfortunate events where mymarriage blew up and a few weeks
later Tony died and I knew thatmy marriage needed to end.
(31:08):
But I didn't expect it to endthe way that it did, and in some
ways it was a blessing, becauseit just sort of ripped the
bandaid off, yeah, whereas I wastrying to kind of, you know,
slowly take out the stitcheswith no pain.
Rachel (31:20):
Well, cause you were as you said earlier.
You didn't like to make anyoneunhappy.
Yeah, be confrontational.
Laurie Woolever (31:26):
I was trying to sort of get away with it
without, you know, causing anydamage.
It's not the way it turned out.
I can't say that my life is atall better because Tony's not
around.
Certainly the opposite is true.
I wish every day that he werestill around and I know my
career and my life would bedifferent.
I arguably wouldn't havewritten the book that I wrote,
(31:47):
but I know that I would havecontinued to do great projects
with him and probably would havedone something slightly
different on my own.
But I'd say if there's any sortof thin silver lining to any of
that is that I did start totake the idea of mental health a
little more seriously.
I was in therapy for 20 yearsbut I sort of kept my substance
(32:09):
abuse stuff very separate frommy mental health stuff and I
started to realize that it's allof a piece.
It all happens inside yourbrain and your body and things
are different for me now thanthey were last year or the year
before that, and I think I'm ina different place than when I
started writing my book, versusnow that the book is out in the
(32:30):
world.
I mean, I think it's one of thewonderful things about the
12-step programs are that youcontinue to kind of.
I mean, that's one of thetenets, is you?
You know you're willing to growalong spiritual lines and when
I first heard that I was like,oh God, what you know, I just
want to stop drinking.
I don't want any of thisspiritual lines crap.
But after day you keep goingback and you hear people tell
(32:51):
their stories and you thinkabout your own life and you do
realize that it's like, well,just because I'm a certain age,
there's no reason I can't keepgrowing up and maturing and
learning more about myself andlearning how to be a slightly
better person in the world.
So I'm really grateful for allof that.
I mean, I almost feel lucky tohave to have gotten to the place
where I needed to be in a 12step program, because I don't
(33:14):
know that I would have found myway to spiritual growth.
I'm doing air quotes, but I youknow.
Janette (33:21):
But I do mean it.
Yeah, a little bit of sarcasm,but a little bit of love for it
as well, yeah.
But well, to that point is thatyou know, along the tenets of
program there are people thatyou're telling that have to,
like your son and your husband.
Have you had any fallout fromthat?
That?
You know that you talked aboutsomeone in this book and that
(33:42):
you've had to have to sit downor make an amends or say I'm
sorry, prevent that in the wholeprocess.
Laurie Woolever (33:50):
I tried to proceed with caution before I
even started so that I wouldn'thave to make amends.
Mary Carr, her book, the Art ofMemoirs super, super useful as
a blueprint for how to proceedwith sensitivity.
So I tried to do that andreally just keep the focus on
telling my own story.
With respect to my son, Ichanged his name and really
(34:12):
didn't write much about himafter the age of, I think, eight
or nine.
I mean, that's kind of you know.
The book ends a few years later.
But I thought about him a lot,like what is he going to think
about this book?
As I said, he's 16.
He could not care less aboutwhat I'm doing and my career.
He's not interested in readingthe book.
I have offered it to him andI've said if you want to read it
(34:33):
, we could talk about it.
Couldn't be less interested andI think that's totally
appropriate and I'm thrilled.
Rachel (34:37):
That is age appropriate.
Janette (34:39):
Yeah, we have teenagers are so caring about their
parents at all.
Laurie Woolever (34:42):
Yeah, and I think, god, if I were his age,
or even if I were my own age,and my mother wrote a book about
her feelings, I'd be like, ohGod, no, you know I had would
have no interest in it At somepoint.
He'll probably read it whenhe's older, maybe, and we'll
talk about it.
And then, as far as my exhusband you know, I also really
tried to treat that wholesituation with as much
sensitivity and respect as Icould and just really again keep
(35:06):
the focus on me, my behavior,my decisions, my feelings, and
not use it as a place torelitigate any conflict.
Obviously, it takes two to makea marriage work or fail.
But whatever feelings I hadaround his participation and the
failure of our marriage, Ididn't think it was.
This is not the place for thatand I think it's clear from
reading it that I'm the one whodid the damage, I'm the one who
(35:28):
behaved badly.
So I let him know that I waswriting it and I offered to, I
gave him an advanced copy and,you know, marked up the places
where he was mentioned so thathe wouldn't have to read the
whole thing if he didn't want to.
And we have not spoken about itsince then and we, you know we
speak regularly because we'reco-parenting our son, but he has
not said to me I read it and Iwant to talk about it, or I've
(35:50):
got a conflict with this or thathe may not have read it, I
don't know.
Janette (35:53):
But with respect to the book and your career, I know
that when Anthony Bourdainpassed away, there was a lot
about you being part of his lasttext that he had texted you the
night before.
I believe it was, and I thinkhe what was the quote exactly?
Laurie Woolever (36:09):
He said we'll survive and I'll live.
And by we'll survive he meant,you know, he and his, his
girlfriend, who were havingtrouble in their relationship.
So we'll survive and I'll live.
Rachel (36:19):
That is just when I read that.
It's really hard to.
I can't even imagine what youwere thinking.
Laurie Woolever (36:24):
I mean yeah yeah, it's just really.
It was really just like man,you said you would live, you
know, it was like the one thingyou said you were going to do
and I think when he, when hewrote that to me, he meant it.
You know, and I think you knowthings took a turn for him a few
hours later, 12 hours later,whatever it was.
(36:46):
But I don't think and this ismy you know, we will never know
right, because you just younever know.
You only have the evidencethat's left behind.
But my strong belief is that hewasn't sitting around waiting
until everyone left him alone sothat he could end his life.
I really think it was a veryspontaneous decision, made in a
moment of extreme pain andanguish and humiliation and
anger, and unfortunately, it wasa decision that there's no
going back from.
(37:06):
I mean, at what point?
Because I know that you arekind of considered an authority
(37:27):
on him and writing on him.
How did you make that decisionto go ahead, had this good way
of working together and it wasjust meant to be another in a
series.
So we were not very far intothat process, but I felt the
obligation to finish it, notleast in part because I had
already gotten my advance andneeded it to support myself and
I didn't want to have to give itback and I, you know, it was
(38:02):
really that one was a great wayto kind of dive into all of his
work and watch a lot of hisshows again and reread the
things he'd written and reallyjust sort of.
You know it was part of thegrieving process was to sort of
spend time with him on the pageand on the screen and at the
same time, you know, a few weeksafter he died, his publisher
came to me with the idea for theoral biography and asked me if
I would want to do it and youknow I didn't even think about
saying no.
I thought here's another way tosort of spend time with him, to
get to know him, to spend timewith all of these people who
knew him and loved him indifferent ways at different
(38:24):
points in his life.
Really, at the end of thatprocess I really understood him
a lot better.
I thought I knew everythingabout him because of my job and
I talked to probably over 90people and every single one of
them I learned some a new storyor a new fact or a new facet of
his life, that that I hadn'tknown before.
Rachel (38:42):
I like how you quote so many people and it's the way of
seeing him through otherpeople's eyes not just your own,
but the and the fact that yousaid in an interview I read how
you were interviewed yourselffor the book but because you
were the editor and the creator,it already had your point of
view or perspective, so youdidn't feel you needed to need
(39:04):
to have your own quote voice inthere.
But I had copied down thatNigella Lawson quote.
She said Tony had a way oftalking about himself honestly
without revealing himself really.
She said I mean everything youread about him.
He's not telling lies, he'shiding in plain sight, and I
thought that really summed it upfor why.
Laurie Woolever (39:28):
Also, everyone was confused after his death why
, also, everyone was confusedafter his death?
Yeah, and he was, you know, heshared what he needed to share
and I think he did sometimesreally love his life and love
that he was getting to go allthese places and meet people and
do all of these things, andsometimes he would sort of say
I'm tired, I'm burnt out.
It was much, much morecomplicated than I think the
(39:50):
public persona would lead aperson to believe.
Rachel (39:53):
And do you think writing that book?
It's not a memoir, it's like anoral history.
But did that prepare you orexcite you or ignite you to want
to write your own memoir andyour own words?
Laurie Woolever (40:05):
Yeah, it was.
I mean, it was a great exercise.
Both of those books were agreat exercise in knowing that I
can start with just a pile ofraw data or start with nothing
and make a book, that I'mcapable of doing that, that I
have the focus and the abilityto do it.
I think that I have alwayswanted to write the memoir.
(40:28):
Long before, even before Istarted working for Tony, I
always thought, well, I'm havingall these experiences, I'm
writing things down, I've gotjournals and I've got emails and
I've got, you know, greatmemory, despite how much abuse
I've, you know, given to mybrain over the years with drugs
and alcohol.
So it's something that I'velong wanted to do.
(40:48):
But I think I had to sort ofclear the desk and get those two
projects done and then feel,you know both that I was sort of
a viable commodity in thepublishing world and also that,
okay, I've told those stories.
And now I think, yeah, I wantedto come out from the shadow a
little bit.
And I think that you knowpeople like Mario and Tony.
They cast such long shadowsthat I don't think you ever
(41:08):
fully get out from under them ifyou've been associated with
them professionally.
But I thought well, let me atleast take this opportunity now
to tell more of my story andwhat things were like from my
perspective, and things that aremaybe a little bit more
relatable.
And what I've found in thefeedback that I've gotten to my
memoir is that it's likeeveryone else the 99, you know,
(41:30):
the 99% of us that are behindthe scenes right, there's so
many people behind the scenes.
Rachel (41:37):
Having known that, working on Rachel Ray's website
and her cooking her foodmagazine, every day with Rachel
Ray, I mean, you see theswirling vortex that is the
assistants, the producers, prpeople, everybody who needs a
piece of them.
It's really, it's frighteningat times, yeah, and it's
(41:59):
everyone feels, at least from myexperience.
Laurie Woolever (42:02):
We all felt like ownership and care and
wanting to make the best,whatever TV show, book, movie,
but it's, you know, you're whenit, when it's out there, it's
just like oh, that's Tony show,that's Rachel's magazine.
Right, there's, there's.
I want to shine a little bit oflight on the rest of us who
care a lot and who work reallyhard.
Janette (42:22):
Yeah, I think that every I mean most people want to
tell their story.
Even if it seems as if they'rejust a mom down the road, they
have a story to be told.
I mean, they had a childhood,they went through things.
It's like you know, with yourfriends you were like you wanna
tell people the struggles thatyou have and what you've
overcome and what you've done,and it's just, I mean, I think
(42:44):
if you've done anything, it iskind of an amazing
accomplishment to write your ownautobiography you know to say
this is what I went through,because I think we all want to
do that.
I'm sure you've left out somestories or your editor made you
cut quite a few things for for avariety of reasons, but I
really am happy, you know, whenpeople do do this and I'm happy
(43:06):
for you that you had thisopportunity to to get it all out
.
You know, and also had thevehicle of this other interest
that people will listen becauseof these long shadow figures,
people.
There's like a breadcrumb inthere that you're like.
I kind of know a little bitabout this woman, but what more
do I need to know?
And it's a fascinating story.
Laurie Woolever (43:25):
Well, thank you .
Janette (43:26):
It's a fascinating story.
I really enjoyed reading it andI think people should read it.
It's got a lot of you've gotsuch a great skill for writing
and telling stories.
And there's these scenes youknow about the whipped cream
scenes that really stand out.
You really paint vividvignettes Trying to lose weight.
You know the self-destructivebehavior.
There's a piece of all of us inyour story and we can relate in
(43:49):
some ways or another.
So I recommend it and I'm soglad that we got a chance to
talk with you.
We usually close theseinterviews by asking you to say
something that you love aboutNew Jersey.
Laurie Woolever (44:01):
Yeah Well, so my ex-husband was from New
Jersey and his family.
A lot of them are still there,so we'd spend a lot of time.
And the thing that I reallyloved, especially at this time
of year, is going to the beach.
I mean just the beaches.
The New York beaches havenothing on New Jersey.
So we would go, depending onwho we were with and where we
were.
We would go to Bradley Beachbecause we had a place, a
(44:24):
friend's house, we could park at, so that was a big deal.
Or when our son was of acertain age, we would go to
Point Pleasant or to Seaside anddo the boardwalk fun stuff.
We love Sandy Hook.
Take the ferry from Manhattanto Sandy Hook and go to the part
where everyone keeps theirclothes on.
We went to Brigantine onesummer and spent a week there.
(44:45):
I think people have no idea.
If you don't know, if you'venever been, it's like you can't
believe how clean and cold theocean is, beautiful, wide sandy
beaches.
I mean it's just extraordinary.
Janette (44:54):
What's really funny about that?
I think you've gone to morebeaches than both Rachel and I
combined.
Rachel (45:00):
Totally.
Janette (45:01):
And you don't even listen when.
Rachel (45:03):
I replay and edit this.
I'll write those down.
Yeah, I don't know.
Janette (45:07):
Well, thank you so much for joining us on Lost in
Jersey.
Laurie Woolever (45:10):
Thank you both so much.
Rachel (45:15):
This podcast was produced by Rachel Martens and
Jeanette Afsharian.
You can find us on Spotify,iTunes and Buzzsprout.
Thanks for listening.
See you next week.
Hi Rachel, hey, Jeanette, we just had the
interview with Lori Wollever.
The book is Care and Feedingand we just talked to her about
it.
She used to be the assistant toAnthony Bourdain and Mario
Batali.
Batali, and she has writtenthis book.
That isn't necessarily aboutthem but it does.
Rachel (00:18):
It's a memoir, it's about her.
She goes into depth about whatit was like to work for them and
also in those environments, butit really does take the reader
through her journey in the foodindustry as a writer, as a chef,
as a cookbook editor,co-creator, and also her
marriage and being a mother.
(00:40):
And she's very vulnerable onthe page.
Janette (00:42):
Yeah, it's a revealing look at her life and the
struggles that she had withsubstance abuse and also how she
navigated working in such achaotic industry as the food
industry, and it's a fascinatingread.
She's an excellent writer andthere's something interesting in
(01:03):
it, I think, for everyone.
Enjoy, welcome, lori.
Welcome to Lost in Jersey.
Laurie Woolever (01:12):
Thank you Very excited to be here.
Janette (01:14):
We like to, when we get started, tell how we know you.
I was just looking for a goodbook to read and I was skimming
the New York Times new releasebooks and top ones and I think
your book came out at numbereight or something like that,
right at the kick.
And I must have been just theresimultaneously and I was like
you know, this is something Iusually wouldn't read.
I think I'm going to read thisand I got into it right away.
(01:36):
Great, I love to hear that.
And you know, the funny thingwas is, as I was reading, I was
like, okay, there's got to be aNew Jersey connection in here.
Laurie Woolever (01:43):
And then there it was yeah, yeah, there are a
couple of points of Jersey inthere for sure.
I am from a small village inupstate New York, outside of
Syracuse, called Chittenango.
It's population just under5,000.
And it's a real, I guess.
It's a suburb of Syracuse and Igrew up there.
(02:06):
I went to college at CornellUniversity in Ithaca, new York,
which is maybe an hour or sofrom where I grew up, and then I
moved to New York City in 1996when I graduated from college.
So I was definitely from a verysmall town, had no connection
to New York City really, until Iwas older, and I've been in New
York ever since.
(02:26):
My parents did live in NewJersey for five years right
after I graduated college.
Janette (02:32):
Well, when you're talking about your background,
I'm curious because you have twodifferent, really big career
paths that you have had, whichis writing and cooking.
In your child and growing up,do you ever look back and think
of how did those develop thoseparticular interests?
Laurie Woolever (02:50):
Well, I always wanted to be a writer.
This was something from myearliest memories.
I remember sort of tellingmyself stories telling myself.
I got to remember this becauseI'm going to write it down later
.
I'm going to tell this story.
I was always interested in kindof collecting the details of
the day.
I was a big diary keeper from avery young age.
Judy Blume my mother got me aJudy Blume diary when I was
(03:13):
eight years old.
Ooh, lucky.
Yeah, I can see it in my mindnow.
I think I got rid of it a longtime ago.
But yeah, I was always tellingstories and I really excelled in
English and creative writing inschool and writing little plays
and performing.
So that was just kind ofinherent to who I was.
And then, when it came to schoolprojects, I would always
(03:36):
gravitate toward the food.
You had an option you can makea poster of the living cell or
you can make a cake or somethingto do with food.
So I was always like I'm goingto make the mitochondria cake or
whatever it was.
So it was something that I wasjust interested in.
I mean, I like to eat, you know, and I like novelty foods and
junk food and TV commercialsabout cereal and all of that
(03:59):
stuff was just really capturedmy imagination, and we made a
lot of cakes and a lot of bakedgoods.
That was like a way to spendtime with my mom as a kid.
As a college student I startedlearning how to cook for myself
just out of necessity, and thenI realized it was something that
I really enjoyed.
That was very soothing, and Iwent to a very competitive,
intense college and I neededways to kind of unwind.
(04:23):
So I found that I reallyenjoyed putting on some music
and opening up a cookbook andworking my way through a recipe.
And I thought when I graduatedwell, I still want to be a
writer, but I know that I haveto earn money somehow.
I have to have a skill and Ihave to know something.
I have to have a body ofknowledge to write about.
That's more than just me and mythoughts.
(04:44):
And so I thought well, whydon't I go to cooking?
A body of knowledge to writeabout, that's more than just me
and my thoughts.
And so I thought, well, whydon't I go to cooking school,
learn how to cook?
I had this sort of delusionalidea that I would cook and it
wouldn't take up that much of mytime or energy and then I could
really focus on being a writer.
Of course, being a professionalcook is very intense and all
encompassing and it's not reallysomething you can just do
(05:06):
casually, which I learned.
But I was able to take thecooking side of things and the
skills that I learned inculinary school and combine that
with the writing and started acareer as a food writer and
editor.
So they kind of came togetherin that way and now they've
diverged a little bit.
I did write this memoir, whichcertainly has a lot of food and
food experiences in it.
(05:27):
The older I get and the more Iwrite.
Now the writing that reallymoves me is more personal and
more historical and less aboutfood, but I also have.
I certainly am continuing tosupport myself co-editing or
co-authoring cookbooks and doingrestaurant reviews and whatever
I can do to keep my name outthere.
Rachel (05:46):
I found it so interesting when you write about
in the book how you were inculinary school and knew you had
that feeling immediately like Idon't want to be a chef.
I thought that was sointeresting because I would feel
that if you're reallypassionate about food and you're
going to culinary school, thatthat would be what you would
assume would be the path.
But there is already that fearof sort of knowing what it could
(06:11):
be like.
But then yet you were fullythrown in to.
You know, especially withBatali, like that intense bro
environment during that bad boychef era of the not just the
intensity of a kitchen, it'slike that times a million
because of who you were workingwith.
Laurie Woolever (06:31):
Yeah, yeah, I, um, I wish that I had had more
self-confidence and more sort ofvision as a culinary student.
I wish that I had been able tostick with it a little bit
longer and try and be a linecook.
Uh, at the same time, if Ihadn't sort of opted out of that
path, I wouldn't have taken thejob with Mario and I, you know,
arguably everything would haveturned out different in my life.
(06:52):
But I had such a such a kind ofI don't know.
I've heard it attributed tothis sort of gifted and talented
kids, you know, who were putinto these advanced programs in
elementary school and highschool and sort of told that
they were special and gifted andyou know, things came easily to
me.
And then for the rest of mylife they really didn't.
(07:13):
You know, because I was justI'm just a normal person and
just because I did well in youknow, elementary school, math or
whatever didn't mean that allof life was going to be easy for
me.
But it kind of set me up to tobe very uncomfortable with
anything that was challenging ordidn't come immediately easy to
me.
And it doesn't.
I don't think anybody startsculinary school and is instantly
(07:33):
very good at it.
It's just a skill you have todevelop like any other skill or
craft.
So I was just very uncomfortablewith the idea that I was not
good at it, that I was going tohave to work hard and that I was
going to have to earn my dues.
And I and I, just I didn't likepeople being upset with me
failure.
I mean not that anybody lovesthese things, but I just had
such a low tolerance for thatfeeling of being mediocre, of
(07:58):
failing, of having to dosomething over and over again,
of somebody kind of, you know,riding me like I just I just
wanted nothing to do with it,and that's a lot of what it is
to be a young cook.
So yeah, and then, you know,for all of my ways of trying to
avoid that life, I ended upgetting, you know, thrown into
the kitchen.
When I were early on in my timeworking as Mario Batali's
(08:19):
assistant, there was an instancewhere someone just didn't show
up and the restaurant was aboutto open and they hadn't.
You know, they needed somebodyto come in and fill in in the
kitchen, and so I, I did it andI loved reading about that, that
getting thrown in at Babbo.
Janette (08:33):
I mean, yeah, you know what's really interesting about
that too, is that I was lookingback over it and it was kind of
accidental that you got that job.
It it was like a, wasn't itlike a temp agency or something?
Laurie Woolever (08:46):
Not exactly, but the woman who ran the
careers program at the culinaryschool.
She said you've got to go workin a restaurant kitchen.
You can't just, you know, optout of it because no one's going
to take you seriously.
But then I did.
I did get a job in a kitchen.
I lasted for four days.
I was hired as the, as theguard manger, which is like the
salad station, and then somebodygot fired and I got moved up to
(09:08):
pastry chef, where I had nobusiness.
Rachel (09:11):
Yeah, that was terrifying.
Laurie Woolever (09:12):
Yeah.
So then she said, all right,well, I'll send you on this
interview with Mario Batali.
So then it worked out.
There was another maybe you'rethinking of earlier in the book
I did before I went to cookingschool.
I worked for two years as acook for a family and that was
through an agency I hadinterviewed.
They hired someone who hadprofessional training and she
(09:33):
only lasted a few weeks becauseshe was so committed to the idea
that in order for food to tastegood, it has to have butter in
it, it has to have salt, it hasto be fried and all the things
that we add to food to make itreally delicious.
And she wasn't willing tofollow their dictates.
We want fat free, steamed, nosalt, no flavor, no flavor.
Rachel (09:53):
Yeah.
Laurie Woolever (09:53):
So they, they fired her and they hired me and
I was like great, you know, Ibarely know what I'm doing as a
cook.
So you want me to steamvegetables and make you know
plain pasta, like OK.
So you want me to steamvegetables and make you know
plain pasta, like okay.
So yeah, it was just.
You know, my career has been aseries of these sort of
switchbacks and unlikely rightplace at the right time.
And you know a lot of luck anda lot of just.
(10:15):
You know, I think the more, thebetter you are at something and
the more you're able to show upand be indispensable, the
better your luck gets.
But I know at the beginning itwas just really good timing that
I ended up working for Marioand then Mario introduced me to
Tony right at the right time forthe next stage in my career,
Before we get into the middlepart of your career before you
(10:38):
talk a lot about the struggleyou had after college and the
jobs that you had and thebehavior that you were
displaying.
Janette (10:47):
You know that started before it got even worse and
worse and worse.
And I'm also curious like didyou have any of that displaying
early on?
Because you were talking abouthow, when you were young, you
were very good at many thingsthat you did.
But were you, were you findingyourself at an early age trying
to cope with failure or problemslike that?
Or did it start in high school,for example, with the bad
(11:09):
behavior like drinking too muchor smoking pot?
If we want to call it badbehavior coping mechanisms, sure
yeah.
Laurie Woolever (11:16):
Yeah, I would say all of that started for me
in high school, I think.
Up until adolescence I was arule follower and, you know,
afraid of getting in trouble andall of that sort of all of the
anti-drug campaigns of the ofthe 1980s really like made a big
impact on me.
It's like great, I don't.
(11:38):
I never want to feel that way.
It totally worked on me untilit didn't, but even even I think
it's.
I was very afraid to smoke pot.
I had a boyfriend who smokedpot and I was like crying, like
you're gonna ruin your life.
And then one day it was like aswitch flipped and I was like,
all right, give me that, let metry it.
And then it was like I likethis, this is working.
Yeah, and this, you know thesame with true.
(12:00):
I mean, drinking started alittle bit earlier, but yeah, I
was sort of a typical teenager,experimenting with drugs and
alcohol but still makingincredible grades.
All the clubs, all the music,everything I needed to do to
have a great college application.
I became a very skilled liar.
Sometimes I got caught, butmostly I didn't.
(12:20):
I was crossing state lines withmy friends to go see concerts
and stay overnight and tellingmy mom.
I was at a friend's house and Ithink I had built up all this
sort of goodwill.
I think about it a lot nowbecause I have a 16-year-old and
I'm like, what are his movesFor now?
He's, I think, a terrible liar,so I've been able to kind of
figure out what he's doing.
(12:42):
But yeah, I'd say it was ateenage years and I don't know
that I had a name for what Ifelt.
I think I was anxious andprobably a little prone to
depression, but I definitelyused drugs and alcohol as a
coping mechanism all throughcollege.
And then, once college was over, it was like well, now I have
all this much more freedom and Ihave an income and I don't have
(13:02):
the pressure of having to writepapers and study for exams.
All I have to do is show up towork, and that's actually much
easier than college.
So here we go.
My feeling about it was no onereally identified as a problem
drinker or a drug addict,because it was what everybody
was doing, or at least whateveryone all of my friends were
doing.
It was just room tone.
(13:22):
And then when I was inrestaurants, that's what all my
colleagues were doing and myboss.
So I just I self-selectedpeople who were going to just
make me feel like what I wasdoing was totally normal, and it
wasn't until much later that itwas like not everybody chooses
this coping mechanism, or noteveryone gets so drunk that they
do regrettable things everytime.
(13:44):
It took me a very long time,but it definitely was the slow
boil.
I mean, at some point I writeabout, you know, one of my
colleagues, the two of us beinglike the frogs in the pot and we
have no idea because we're justyou know we're just getting
drunk at work.
Rachel (13:57):
Yeah, yeah, it is a definitely a specific time in
our culture and also therestaurant industry with the
intensity.
You could see how that couldeasily happen to somebody.
But you did reach out for help,you know, by finding a
therapist, which I thought wasso interesting, that you there
(14:19):
was something, I mean you tellus but that seemed like you were
aware.
You were aware of some of yourbehaviors that you weren't happy
with.
That wasn't making you happier.
Yeah, it's funny?
Laurie Woolever (14:33):
I don't think I ever, for it took me a very
long time and probably not tillI got sober to ever frame it as
my behaviors.
It was really my feelings, mysort of, you know.
I'm just like why am I sounhappy?
Why am I so depressed?
Why can't I figure out what todo?
You know, I have a very goodfriend whose mother was a
therapist and I was close withher whole family and spent a lot
(14:53):
of time with them.
So I was really.
It was through spending timewith that family that I started
to warm up to the idea oftherapy and see it as, because I
grew up, you know, my familyand the culture that I grew up
in was very much like what doyou mean?
Therapy?
What's wrong with you?
You know, kind of just muchmore working class, kind of like
Irish, catholic, italian,polish people that just are like
(15:15):
we don't have the money fortherapy and even if we did,
that's for crazy people, youknow, or like what's your
problem?
I'll give you something to cryabout.
So it wasn't until I met peoplethat had a different outlook,
that it was like oh, this issomething that I could probably
benefit from and, and you knowit's, it's okay, it's not
shameful and it's not, you know,wildly self-indulgent to see a
therapist.
(15:35):
So I am really I'm gratefulthat that my mind was expanded a
little bit at that point.
Yeah, and I just I just wantedto figure it out, figure out how
to, how to feel better.
And it took me a very long timeto even recognize that.
You know all the drinking thatI was doing, you know alcohol is
a depressant, and the idea thatI was somebody who had been
(15:57):
diagnosed as depressive and Iwas taking medication and it
somehow it didn't really occurto me that like you're just
pouring a Right.
So yeah, it just to me.
Now it's.
It all seems very obvious whatI was doing, but it I wasn't
really open to it, to thecritique of anything, any of the
(16:17):
ways that I chose to cope.
Janette (16:19):
Right.
Well, your life also during that.
The way the book runs is thatyou know you take us through the
journey of you, your careerprogression, and there's a lot
of drinking and smoking pot, butthen you find yourself really
in the just the heart, thepinnacle of the food industry,
which kind of promotes thatbehavior as well.
(16:39):
And I think what's interestingin the book is that it's a raw
look at it all of yourrelationship in trying to get in
a relationship and then beingmarried and the struggles you're
having in your own relationship.
But we're rooting for you.
You know throughout the wholestory that you're gonna have an
epiphany or the right turn isgoing to happen, and it does
(17:01):
happen for you.
You know it does happen in yourlife that you do find sobriety.
So it's kind of in a way, ahappy you know happy turn of
events that you find thisawareness.
But along the way we do see thefood industry and also you
navigating it so interestingly,with you working for Batali and
(17:23):
then getting introduced, as youmentioned earlier, through him
to Anthony Bourdain and thenbecoming his assistant or
however you want to put it, andhaving to experience all of that
.
In reflection of that, I knowthat Rachel was looking at that
a lot with the Vitella.
She worked in the food industryherself.
Rachel (17:41):
She worked for Rachel Ray I found so many quotes from
what you wrote that just reallybrought it home and I think
reading it I was re-angered.
I graduated in 94 and went offto work at a very corporate
before I made the move overthere very corporate management
consulting and when you had thatperson at the temp agency say
(18:04):
something like you know, youhave to get a gym membership and
you have to do this, and I wastold I couldn't wear pantsuits,
I had to wear skirts and I hadto wear sheer pantyhose.
It was all men I was inengineering at the time, so it
was definitely all men and mebut that they were wanting me to
look a certain way and then yetwalk into a meeting and they
(18:27):
would ask me to get their coffee.
It is like a relentless feelingof insecurity, obviously, but
also this like furious rageunderneath it.
And then how do you cope withthat?
Like where do you put that?
So when you were saying I thinkyou said there was like fear,
surrounded by men, and how youneed to dress and behave and
you're playing a part in a play,but you don't know the lines I
(18:51):
was like that's exactly it.
It's like you were cast in thispart and there's all these
things you need to do to keepthe part.
But you don't know them and theway they're taught to you is
through bullying and aggressionand sexual misconduct.
And someone else you quotedsaid it was like that kind of
dirty uncle that you kind ofhave to be nice to because he
(19:14):
might slip you $100.
Laurie Woolever (19:15):
Yeah, and the power dynamic is absolutely
tilted.
You're just kind of at the whimof does my boss think I'm
attractive?
Which is horrible.
Why do you even think of that?
Yeah, yeah.
And then, even if my boss doesthink I'm attractive, well,
that's gross too.
No, don't touch me.
Janette (19:33):
But isn't there also the strange dichotomy of that
Like, for example, with me?
I hung out with a lot of guysin college and afterwards and we
just all partied, we all gotdrunk.
I was part of it.
It was like we were allmisbehaving yeah no-transcript.
Rachel (20:12):
how?
Because we all know about,obviously, the Me Too movement
and what happened to Mario afterthat, but that he was a bully,
but he was also generous.
I mean there are two sides tothat.
It doesn't mean that excuseshim at all, but that people are
many things but that people aremany things.
Laurie Woolever (20:38):
Yeah, I wanted to really write with some nuance
about that because maybe inpart to assuage my own sense of
was I complicit in this.
I laughed at the jokes and Ihung out with the guys and I
definitely perpetuated this kindof raunchy culture because
that's my sense of humor, and Ithought, like isn't it cool that
I can go to work and make thesejokes and drink with the guys
and you know it's whatever.
So I wanted to, you know, justwrite with a little nuance and
(21:02):
say that.
And also the fact that workingfor Mario, which was difficult
in some ways, really set me upfor a lot of success, and you
know he was very savvy aboutseeing what was it that was
going to motivate me and whatcould he.
He certainly wasn't going topay me a lot of money and he
wasn't going to treat me with atremendous amount of respect,
but what he could do to keep meloyal was to connect me to
(21:26):
people that could help me withmy writing career, and he was
getting all kinds of things, theamount of stuff that rich
people and famous people andsuccessful people get for free
is just amazing.
Rachel (21:36):
It's insane.
Laurie Woolever (21:38):
So it'd be like oh, you want hockey tickets,
you want here, I've got theseWillie Nelson tickets.
I don't want them.
You know, here's a bottle ofthis, bottle of that.
You know some CDs, yeah,concert.
Rachel (21:47):
Yeah, so, and I you know I was young enough and
definitely you know some CDs,yeah, concert.
Laurie Woolever (21:49):
Yeah, so, and I , you know, I was young enough
and definitely, you know, poorenough, and I was like this is
great, look at my job, is socool, you know.
So I wanted to just, you know,share all of that, just to try
and explain, you know why it was, because I think a lot of
people go why didn't you quit?
Why didn't you say something?
Why didn't you fight back?
It's like, well, a because Ihad no power and B because I was
(22:12):
young and I was like, totally,you know, blinded by all of the
sort of you know, the and thefun and the free drinks and the
dinners out, and you know, thatwas, for better or worse, like
that was really that kept me inplace.
Janette (22:25):
But what's interesting is that the way that you talk
about Anthony Bourdain is thathe didn't do any of that.
Laurie Woolever (22:32):
Yeah, I think his persona might've led people
to think it.
I certainly.
Before I met him in person forthe first time I thought, oh,
this is going to be like justanother version of Mario.
But he's tall and thin and hasa French name.
But he was nothing like that,because I had read his book and
I had read the piece in NewYorker.
He was shy and a little bitsocially awkward and didn't
(22:55):
really make eye contact.
He was just a very, verydifferent kind of guy.
Now I will say also there arejokes that he would make and
lines of inquiry, especiallyearly on in his television
career, that I don't think haveaged very well, and there are a
lot of dead hooker jokes andjokes at the expense of the
Britney Spears and the ParisHiltons of the world that I
(23:18):
think in their time were very aucourant jokes.
I don't want to tarnish hismemory at all but just to say,
just in the spirit of fairness,he also could lean into that
boys will be boys kind ofmisogyny for humor.
But as a person, in hispersonal conduct, in his, you
know, in the way that he dealtwith with employees and others,
(23:39):
was always very I mean,respectful, to the point of
almost being fearful.
You know, I think he was sortof afraid of women in a way.
That was like great, you know,be afraid.
I think it's's just, they werejust fundamentally very
different people, even though Ithink they mario and tony had a
lot of similarities, both fromnew jersey.
Yeah, oh, actually that's nottrue I don't know, it's totally
(24:00):
tony mario went to rutgers, so I, so that's his jersey
association um.
And his brother went toprinceton, but um, but so that
he did have a jersey.
His jersey ties.
But tony know, born and raisedin New Jersey.
Janette (24:12):
Well, okay, on that point of New Jersey and in the
career transition, before youstarted working for Anthony
Bourdain, you had a stint in NewJersey.
You went and worked in magazine, yes, so tell us a little bit
about this.
And it's also it's interestingbecause you talk about it's like
right between right beforewebsites and Instagram and
(24:34):
everything took over, and soit's kind of this transition
period.
Laurie Woolever (24:37):
Yeah, I applied for a job editing a magazine
called Art Culinare, which atthe time was based in Morristown
, new Jersey, and it was ownedby a gentleman who has since
sold it.
So I want to make that clear,because it is still a viable
magazine, but now it's based inNorthern California and the
people who publish it are lovelyand they have nothing to do
(24:59):
with this.
The person who I worked foryeah.
But so this former chef had.
He bought a beautifulschoolhouse building in
Morristown and he lived in it.
And they also ran the office ofthe magazine out of the
schoolhouse.
And it's this beautiful, fullcolor, gigantic photographs of
(25:20):
chefs, beautiful plated dishes,with recipes and interviews, and
it was a dream job in a lot ofways.
I had never been an editorbefore and then suddenly I was
the executive editor and, as itturned out, it was an extreme.
There was no other.
Rachel (25:34):
I didn't have any editors below me, so I was, I
was the editorial staff, theexecutive, the assistant, the
editor, all the way down, I wasthe internal.
Yeah, you're all of it.
Laurie Woolever (25:45):
Yeah, was living in the East Village of
Manhattan at the time, so it wasa not insignificant commute.
Rachel (25:51):
No, that's horrible.
Laurie Woolever (25:53):
Yeah, but because it was going in the
opposite direction.
I always got a seat on thetrain in both directions, but it
was like a good close to fourhours a day just getting back
and forth.
That's a lot.
You know, I wasn't married yetI didn't have a kid.
You know I had a lot of time onmy hands and I would read the
paper or I would do work on thetrain or I would get stoned and
(26:14):
stare out the window at the endof the day, sometimes at the
beginning of the day too.
And so, yeah, that was myJersey, my experience.
The magazine was in a difficultplace.
Like you said, I started in2004.
They were very late adopters.
We had only a very rudimentarywebsite.
Everything was.
None of the content that wemade was available online, and
(26:35):
that was a, you know, a ploy toget people to continue to
subscribe, but they just thenumbers really plummeted during
my time there.
I don't think I had anything todo with it, I think I kept it.
It was hard to tell from editorto editor.
You know many changes, but Ithink people were just
discovering like, oh, I don'thave to pay all this money to
get this hardcover thing.
(26:56):
That, then is taking up room inmy house.
I can just go online.
So after a few years atUrquhlan Air, I was ready to
leave and I wanted to stay inmagazines.
So I ended up getting hired atWine Spectator magazine and it
was great to be back inManhattan.
I could walk to work.
Rachel (27:12):
They had great events.
My sister-in-law worked therein the events.
She worked at Bon Appetit andthen at Wine Spectator and she
invited us to the MarriottMarquis event with all the wine
booths everywhere.
It was so cool.
Laurie Woolever (27:26):
Yeah, the wine experience.
I think they still do that.
It's wild.
So I did that for a few years.
In that time period I gotengaged, I got married and I had
a baby and there was a pointwhere it started to feel really
arduous to put the baby indaycare.
By that point I had moved toQueens.
(27:46):
So then, rushing to Manhattan,get to work on time, do my job,
get back to the daycare and pickthe baby up before six o'clock
and I just was ready for achange.
I had had a little bit of apart time arrangement or a four
day a week arrangement, and thenWine Spectator I'll tell the
story because I'm still bitterabout it.
They said it was, it was finewith them.
(28:07):
And then someone else was aboutto have a baby and said I'd
like to do what Lori's doing andthey said no, you can't do it.
And we're going to pull theplug on her arrangement too,
because this is not a familyfriendly company, which was
tough, tough to take, especiallybecause the publisher's
daughters were coming and goingas they please doing whatever
they wanted, anyway, yeah, so.
(28:28):
So at that point I startedlooking for some other kind of
job, just reached out toeveryone I knew and said I'm
looking for part time work orsomething I can do from home,
something that's flexible.
You know, I think one of theonly people that wrote back to
me very quickly was TonyBourdain and said you know, my
assistant is actually on her wayout.
Do you think that that is thatsomething you'd ever want to do?
And it again, it was just amatter of you know, it was like
(28:51):
the right, the right week for meto to make that move.
Janette (29:00):
You ended up traveling the world and you know going
within them, all these differentlocations and seeing.
I know there's one story in thebook about your Sri Lanka.
Rachel (29:05):
I was so stressed out for you.
Janette (29:07):
And I think you were newly sober at that time too,
yeah, during that, and so Ithink the whole time I was like,
oh my God, she keeps going intothat liquor store, she's going
to drink, she's going to, andyou didn't.
So which it was reallyimpressive that you made it
through that crazy journey, andI also kind of felt like, oh,
there's good people everywhere.
Laurie Woolever (29:25):
Yeah, yeah, I think I mean, the only person
who I think had bad intentionswas the guy that was following
me.
Yeah, but everyone else that Iencountered, I think, was, you
know, there was a, there was acommunication barrier and there
was.
You know, I was kind ofstressed out of my mind but yeah
it, you know.
Fortunately everything endedwell and yes.
Rachel (29:43):
Yeah, I mean speaking of that, and then you were sober
there.
I think one of the things I wasjust wondering while I was
reading.
I appreciate the honesty andthe vulnerability you're willing
to put on the page.
It's almost reads factual like.
This is what I did and this iswhat was happening.
Like Jeanette said, we wererooting for you and hoping that
you would get to a place whereyou would feel strong enough to
(30:06):
make the commitment to yourselfto find a better way and a
better life for you, andwhatever that would look like.
How do you feel that thatfinally built up and happened
for you?
Well, there were a series ofchanges.
Laurie Woolever (30:22):
The first one was deciding to stop drinking,
and that made it easier to seemore clearly what my life was
and where I was at and how tomake more changes.
I mean, so it took me another18 months to stop smoking pot.
It's just that I was justreally, you know, I was like,
well, all right, well, I cangive up the booze, but, man, I
(30:44):
need the pot to manage myanxiety.
And what I didn't reallyrealize is that it was actually
just exacerbating my anxiety.
It wasn't making anythingbetter, it was making things
harder for me.
But until I gave it up for real, I couldn't really see that.
And then there was a, you know,there was sort of a series of
unfortunate events where mymarriage blew up and a few weeks
later Tony died and I knew thatmy marriage needed to end.
(31:08):
But I didn't expect it to endthe way that it did, and in some
ways it was a blessing, becauseit just sort of ripped the
bandaid off, yeah, whereas I wastrying to kind of, you know,
slowly take out the stitcheswith no pain.
Rachel (31:20):
Well, cause you were as you said earlier.
You didn't like to make anyoneunhappy.
Yeah, be confrontational.
Laurie Woolever (31:26):
I was trying to sort of get away with it
without, you know, causing anydamage.
It's not the way it turned out.
I can't say that my life is atall better because Tony's not
around.
Certainly the opposite is true.
I wish every day that he werestill around and I know my
career and my life would bedifferent.
I arguably wouldn't havewritten the book that I wrote,
(31:47):
but I know that I would havecontinued to do great projects
with him and probably would havedone something slightly
different on my own.
But I'd say if there's any sortof thin silver lining to any of
that is that I did start totake the idea of mental health a
little more seriously.
I was in therapy for 20 yearsbut I sort of kept my substance
(32:09):
abuse stuff very separate frommy mental health stuff and I
started to realize that it's allof a piece.
It all happens inside yourbrain and your body and things
are different for me now thanthey were last year or the year
before that, and I think I'm ina different place than when I
started writing my book, versusnow that the book is out in the
(32:30):
world.
I mean, I think it's one of thewonderful things about the
12-step programs are that youcontinue to kind of.
I mean, that's one of thetenets, is you?
You know you're willing to growalong spiritual lines and when
I first heard that I was like,oh God, what you know, I just
want to stop drinking.
I don't want any of thisspiritual lines crap.
But after day you keep goingback and you hear people tell
(32:51):
their stories and you thinkabout your own life and you do
realize that it's like, well,just because I'm a certain age,
there's no reason I can't keepgrowing up and maturing and
learning more about myself andlearning how to be a slightly
better person in the world.
So I'm really grateful for allof that.
I mean, I almost feel lucky tohave to have gotten to the place
where I needed to be in a 12step program, because I don't
(33:14):
know that I would have found myway to spiritual growth.
I'm doing air quotes, but I youknow.
Janette (33:21):
But I do mean it.
Yeah, a little bit of sarcasm,but a little bit of love for it
as well, yeah.
But well, to that point is thatyou know, along the tenets of
program there are people thatyou're telling that have to,
like your son and your husband.
Have you had any fallout fromthat?
That?
You know that you talked aboutsomeone in this book and that
(33:42):
you've had to have to sit downor make an amends or say I'm
sorry, prevent that in the wholeprocess.
Laurie Woolever (33:50):
I tried to proceed with caution before I
even started so that I wouldn'thave to make amends.
Mary Carr, her book, the Art ofMemoirs super, super useful as
a blueprint for how to proceedwith sensitivity.
So I tried to do that andreally just keep the focus on
telling my own story.
With respect to my son, Ichanged his name and really
(34:12):
didn't write much about himafter the age of, I think, eight
or nine.
I mean, that's kind of you know.
The book ends a few years later.
But I thought about him a lot,like what is he going to think
about this book?
As I said, he's 16.
He could not care less aboutwhat I'm doing and my career.
He's not interested in readingthe book.
I have offered it to him andI've said if you want to read it
(34:33):
, we could talk about it.
Couldn't be less interested andI think that's totally
appropriate and I'm thrilled.
Rachel (34:37):
That is age appropriate.
Janette (34:39):
Yeah, we have teenagers are so caring about their
parents at all.
Laurie Woolever (34:42):
Yeah, and I think, god, if I were his age,
or even if I were my own age,and my mother wrote a book about
her feelings, I'd be like, ohGod, no, you know I had would
have no interest in it At somepoint.
He'll probably read it whenhe's older, maybe, and we'll
talk about it.
And then, as far as my exhusband you know, I also really
tried to treat that wholesituation with as much
sensitivity and respect as Icould and just really again keep
(35:06):
the focus on me, my behavior,my decisions, my feelings, and
not use it as a place torelitigate any conflict.
Obviously, it takes two to makea marriage work or fail.
But whatever feelings I hadaround his participation and the
failure of our marriage, Ididn't think it was.
This is not the place for thatand I think it's clear from
reading it that I'm the one whodid the damage, I'm the one who
(35:28):
behaved badly.
So I let him know that I waswriting it and I offered to, I
gave him an advanced copy and,you know, marked up the places
where he was mentioned so thathe wouldn't have to read the
whole thing if he didn't want to.
And we have not spoken about itsince then and we, you know we
speak regularly because we'reco-parenting our son, but he has
not said to me I read it and Iwant to talk about it, or I've
(35:50):
got a conflict with this or thathe may not have read it, I
don't know.
Janette (35:53):
But with respect to the book and your career, I know
that when Anthony Bourdainpassed away, there was a lot
about you being part of his lasttext that he had texted you the
night before.
I believe it was, and I thinkhe what was the quote exactly?
Laurie Woolever (36:09):
He said we'll survive and I'll live.
And by we'll survive he meant,you know, he and his, his
girlfriend, who were havingtrouble in their relationship.
So we'll survive and I'll live.
Rachel (36:19):
That is just when I read that.
It's really hard to.
I can't even imagine what youwere thinking.
Laurie Woolever (36:24):
I mean yeah yeah, it's just really.
It was really just like man,you said you would live, you
know, it was like the one thingyou said you were going to do
and I think when he, when hewrote that to me, he meant it.
You know, and I think you knowthings took a turn for him a few
hours later, 12 hours later,whatever it was.
(36:46):
But I don't think and this ismy you know, we will never know
right, because you just younever know.
You only have the evidencethat's left behind.
But my strong belief is that hewasn't sitting around waiting
until everyone left him alone sothat he could end his life.
I really think it was a veryspontaneous decision, made in a
moment of extreme pain andanguish and humiliation and
anger, and unfortunately, it wasa decision that there's no
going back from.
(37:06):
I mean, at what point?
Because I know that you arekind of considered an authority
(37:27):
on him and writing on him.
How did you make that decisionto go ahead, had this good way
of working together and it wasjust meant to be another in a
series.
So we were not very far intothat process, but I felt the
obligation to finish it, notleast in part because I had
already gotten my advance andneeded it to support myself and
I didn't want to have to give itback and I, you know, it was
(38:02):
really that one was a great wayto kind of dive into all of his
work and watch a lot of hisshows again and reread the
things he'd written and reallyjust sort of.
You know it was part of thegrieving process was to sort of
spend time with him on the pageand on the screen and at the
same time, you know, a few weeksafter he died, his publisher
came to me with the idea for theoral biography and asked me if
I would want to do it and youknow I didn't even think about
saying no.
I thought here's another way tosort of spend time with him, to
get to know him, to spend timewith all of these people who
knew him and loved him indifferent ways at different
(38:24):
points in his life.
Really, at the end of thatprocess I really understood him
a lot better.
I thought I knew everythingabout him because of my job and
I talked to probably over 90people and every single one of
them I learned some a new storyor a new fact or a new facet of
his life, that that I hadn'tknown before.
Rachel (38:42):
I like how you quote so many people and it's the way of
seeing him through otherpeople's eyes not just your own,
but the and the fact that yousaid in an interview I read how
you were interviewed yourselffor the book but because you
were the editor and the creator,it already had your point of
view or perspective, so youdidn't feel you needed to need
(39:04):
to have your own quote voice inthere.
But I had copied down thatNigella Lawson quote.
She said Tony had a way oftalking about himself honestly
without revealing himself really.
She said I mean everything youread about him.
He's not telling lies, he'shiding in plain sight, and I
thought that really summed it upfor why.
Laurie Woolever (39:28):
Also, everyone was confused after his death why
, also, everyone was confusedafter his death?
Yeah, and he was, you know, heshared what he needed to share
and I think he did sometimesreally love his life and love
that he was getting to go allthese places and meet people and
do all of these things, andsometimes he would sort of say
I'm tired, I'm burnt out.
It was much, much morecomplicated than I think the
(39:50):
public persona would lead aperson to believe.
Rachel (39:53):
And do you think writing that book?
It's not a memoir, it's like anoral history.
But did that prepare you orexcite you or ignite you to want
to write your own memoir andyour own words?
Laurie Woolever (40:05):
Yeah, it was.
I mean, it was a great exercise.
Both of those books were agreat exercise in knowing that I
can start with just a pile ofraw data or start with nothing
and make a book, that I'mcapable of doing that, that I
have the focus and the abilityto do it.
I think that I have alwayswanted to write the memoir.
(40:28):
Long before, even before Istarted working for Tony, I
always thought, well, I'm havingall these experiences, I'm
writing things down, I've gotjournals and I've got emails and
I've got, you know, greatmemory, despite how much abuse
I've, you know, given to mybrain over the years with drugs
and alcohol.
So it's something that I'velong wanted to do.
(40:48):
But I think I had to sort ofclear the desk and get those two
projects done and then feel,you know both that I was sort of
a viable commodity in thepublishing world and also that,
okay, I've told those stories.
And now I think, yeah, I wantedto come out from the shadow a
little bit.
And I think that you knowpeople like Mario and Tony.
They cast such long shadowsthat I don't think you ever
(41:08):
fully get out from under them ifyou've been associated with
them professionally.
But I thought well, let me atleast take this opportunity now
to tell more of my story andwhat things were like from my
perspective, and things that aremaybe a little bit more
relatable.
And what I've found in thefeedback that I've gotten to my
memoir is that it's likeeveryone else the 99, you know,
(41:30):
the 99% of us that are behindthe scenes right, there's so
many people behind the scenes.
Rachel (41:37):
Having known that, working on Rachel Ray's website
and her cooking her foodmagazine, every day with Rachel
Ray, I mean, you see theswirling vortex that is the
assistants, the producers, prpeople, everybody who needs a
piece of them.
It's really, it's frighteningat times, yeah, and it's
(41:59):
everyone feels, at least from myexperience.
Laurie Woolever (42:02):
We all felt like ownership and care and
wanting to make the best,whatever TV show, book, movie,
but it's, you know, you're whenit, when it's out there, it's
just like oh, that's Tony show,that's Rachel's magazine.
Right, there's, there's.
I want to shine a little bit oflight on the rest of us who
care a lot and who work reallyhard.
Janette (42:22):
Yeah, I think that every I mean most people want to
tell their story.
Even if it seems as if they'rejust a mom down the road, they
have a story to be told.
I mean, they had a childhood,they went through things.
It's like you know, with yourfriends you were like you wanna
tell people the struggles thatyou have and what you've
overcome and what you've done,and it's just, I mean, I think
(42:44):
if you've done anything, it iskind of an amazing
accomplishment to write your ownautobiography you know to say
this is what I went through,because I think we all want to
do that.
I'm sure you've left out somestories or your editor made you
cut quite a few things for for avariety of reasons, but I
really am happy, you know, whenpeople do do this and I'm happy
(43:06):
for you that you had thisopportunity to to get it all out
.
You know, and also had thevehicle of this other interest
that people will listen becauseof these long shadow figures,
people.
There's like a breadcrumb inthere that you're like.
I kind of know a little bitabout this woman, but what more
do I need to know?
And it's a fascinating story.
Laurie Woolever (43:25):
Well, thank you .
Janette (43:26):
It's a fascinating story.
I really enjoyed reading it andI think people should read it.
It's got a lot of you've gotsuch a great skill for writing
and telling stories.
And there's these scenes youknow about the whipped cream
scenes that really stand out.
You really paint vividvignettes Trying to lose weight.
You know the self-destructivebehavior.
There's a piece of all of us inyour story and we can relate in
(43:49):
some ways or another.
So I recommend it and I'm soglad that we got a chance to
talk with you.
We usually close theseinterviews by asking you to say
something that you love aboutNew Jersey.
Laurie Woolever (44:01):
Yeah Well, so my ex-husband was from New
Jersey and his family.
A lot of them are still there,so we'd spend a lot of time.
And the thing that I reallyloved, especially at this time
of year, is going to the beach.
I mean just the beaches.
The New York beaches havenothing on New Jersey.
So we would go, depending onwho we were with and where we
were.
We would go to Bradley Beachbecause we had a place, a
(44:24):
friend's house, we could park at, so that was a big deal.
Or when our son was of acertain age, we would go to
Point Pleasant or to Seaside anddo the boardwalk fun stuff.
We love Sandy Hook.
Take the ferry from Manhattanto Sandy Hook and go to the part
where everyone keeps theirclothes on.
We went to Brigantine onesummer and spent a week there.
(44:45):
I think people have no idea.
If you don't know, if you'venever been, it's like you can't
believe how clean and cold theocean is, beautiful, wide sandy
beaches.
I mean it's just extraordinary.
Janette (44:54):
What's really funny about that?
I think you've gone to morebeaches than both Rachel and I
combined.
Rachel (45:00):
Totally.
Janette (45:01):
And you don't even listen when.
Rachel (45:03):
I replay and edit this.
I'll write those down.
Yeah, I don't know.
Janette (45:07):
Well, thank you so much for joining us on Lost in
Jersey.
Laurie Woolever (45:10):
Thank you both so much.
Rachel (45:15):
This podcast was produced by Rachel Martens and
Jeanette Afsharian.
You can find us on Spotify,iTunes and Buzzsprout.
Thanks for listening.
See you next week.
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