Behind the scenes of the Emmy-nominated collection Chef’s Desk, Danny O’Malley is sometimes called the “secret sauce” of the storytelling. He began on Chef’s Desk as a narrative producer and labored his approach as much as govt producer. Now he leads the analysis, manages the inventive and runs the inventive in publish to make sure the storytelling is unified throughout the season whereas additionally highlighting the distinctive story of every particular person episode — all whereas executive-producing three seasons per 12 months.
Chef’s Desk: Legends.
Outdoors of Chef’s Desk, O’Malley govt produces the podcast Jacob Reed and Me, which premiered on the Tribeca Movie Competition in 2025. In his characteristic debut, Canary, he took a crew up an 18,000-foot mountain to observe paleoclimatologist Lonnie Thompson, who’s on a mission to recuperate priceless historic information earlier than they disappear endlessly. The movie gained the Jackson Wild Media Award for Finest Characteristic and marked the launch of O’Malley’s firm, Finish of the Street Movies.
On this dialog, O’Malley talks about shaping the tales within the newest season and the super quantity of labor and cooperation it takes amongst division heads and stakeholders to supply so many seasons of Chef’s Desk every year. He additionally particulars how 10 years on Chef’s Desk has formed his understanding of the world.
Chef’s Desk is greater than a culinary present. How do you and your staff chase a narrative behind the story, corresponding to this season’s deal with cooks’ values?
We method each story kind of the identical approach, which is to ask the query “What does this story inform us?” Lots of people are aware of dramatization in screenwriting. The villain represents one philosophy, and the hero represents one other. You write the “battle” of their conduct, and the result’s a philosophical argument taking part in out via human drama. On Chef’s Desk, we do the alternative. We take heed to the elements of the story that basically resonate and stand out. That’s once you begin to decide up on patterns and relationships.
Within the episode with Norma [Listman] and Saqib [Keval], their story had all these apparent key moments. When their restaurant bought shut down, they didn’t pay a bribe. When their staff member Yamileth advised them they weren’t working towards what they preached, they listened and altered. The fabric that basically jumped out this season all revolved across the query “Can you reside your values in a system that doesn’t share them?” I don’t actually bear in mind after we noticed the via line with all of the tales being about dwelling their values. I’m fairly certain Brian [McGinn, EP and director] landed on that in casting. As we developed the tales, the theme cemented itself. Angel [Leon] needed a restaurant that would present the world the sweetness and the significance of the ocean, hoping to reserve it. Kwame [Onwuachi] needed to indicate folks from his neighborhood that there was hope. Nok [Suntaranon] needed to interrupt the cycle of abuse that generations of her household had gone via. These have been all tales about doing the arduous factor, and never due to the cash, the incentives or the algorithms, however as a result of it’s the fitting factor to do. In a world the place we’re inundated with folks doing horrible issues, I’m actually proud that this season highlights folks attempting to do good. I believe that’s one thing we might all use extra of.
How do you know you needed to direct the Norma and Saqib episode in Mexico?.
The will to direct got here from assembly the cooks and listening to their story. In our one-hour Zoom name, I used to be simply blown away by their story. They needed to uphold their values despite the system. It’s no secret that our medium is deeply intertwined with commerce as a result of it’s so expensive to make movies, and sometimes that places filmmakers in powerful positions, particularly once you’re telling actual folks’s tales.
The innovation that drives the trade is backed by the desires and the aspirations of inventive individuals who assume they’ve one thing completely different to supply. On this postpandemic contraction, everybody feels squeezed in any respect ranges of the trade. The concept of fixing the system within the midst of doing one thing as arduous as making a movie or opening a top-tier restaurant appears unimaginable, however that’s what Norma and Saqib did. So, I needed to grasp how that occurs, and now that the episode is out, I hope it will get extra folks asking how they’ll change the techniques they’re in for the higher.
Are you able to inform us somewhat bit extra concerning the different tales featured this season?
Angel Leon’s story is a particular one. A number of our cooks are attempting to reconnect us to an vital worth or a forgotten a part of our tradition that we’ve turn out to be disconnected from, however this episode factors us to probably the most basic elements of our existence. I don’t assume lots of people know that the meals chain that feeds us will depend on the ecosystem deep within the ocean. For instance, the fish within the deep ocean are an vital a part of that system, and deep-sea mining and microplastics are driving them into instability. Or that if the ocean didn’t soak up a lot of the carbon dioxide that comes from burning coal, oil and fuel, the planet can be unlivable already. That CO2 is contributing to the acidification of the ocean and threatening all life within the ocean… and subsequently, us! If you see the ocean via Angel’s eyes, you fall in love with the magic of the ocean and see it as a basic a part of our existence, and also you’re more likely to care that it’s below risk. That’s the magic of what he does.
For Nok, her ambitions are rather more private however simply as vital. She exhibits us that it’s not the place you begin or what occurs to you, but it surely’s the way you react to it. Her perspective is infectious, and arguably, it’s her secret weapon. That boldness allowed her to interrupt her household’s cycle of abuse and poverty, and I’m glad the present supplies a street map for folks in these conditions.
Lastly, Kwame’s story exhibits the facility of illustration. There’s presently a number of backlash towards affirmative motion and DEI insurance policies, which I discover harmful. As we see on this episode, simply seeing Barack Obama elected president gave Kwame the motivation to show his life round. Now, he’s paying that ahead by showcasing his tradition’s meals on the highest degree. I hope the episode conjures up extra youngsters to wager on themselves and chase their desires. Each individual has the potential to alter the world, and if we spark that in a single one who watches the present, it’s a hit.
Inform us extra concerning the means of bringing three seasons per 12 months of Chef’s Desk to the display screen.
I’m truly writing a Substack about all of these completely different phases of the method as a result of there’s quite a bit I wish to share with different filmmakers to steal from us! Within the meantime, I’ll attempt to give a quick model. With analysis, we begin by on the lookout for something we are able to discover on-line concerning the chef, and we compile our personal Wikipedia concerning the restaurant and a timeline of the chef’s (or cooks’) life in a doc. Then, as soon as we’ve taken all of the publicly obtainable info, we speak about what we predict the story is, and we both dig deeper by speaking to different folks within the meals world or by speaking on to the chef. We add that new info, and we begin planning our shoot and schedule based mostly on that information. When administrators are within the subject, I keep in communication with them, and I usually get transcripts and audio recordsdata of the interviews they do. I are likely to take heed to the interview as a result of transcripts may be deceptive once you don’t know the tone through which issues are mentioned. That normally includes me happening lengthy walks whereas I soak up it. Then I take notes and speak to the director about what’s lacking earlier than they full the ultimate interview. With publish manufacturing, every episode has its personal staff working, and I hover between them, guiding the method and dealing with the staff to attract out the most effective materials. That’s my absolute favourite half.
Chef’s Desk: Legends. José Andrés
How concerned are you in publish manufacturing?
That’s like asking how concerned in Danny O’Malley I’m. [Laughs.] After I’m completed with a season, I usually have an identification disaster, the place I rediscover what it’s prefer to dwell and not using a publish schedule. I prepare our new hires till they’re tuned to the method, which includes working with them at each part of their episode. I work with the director, editor and story producer to unravel story and inventive issues as they come up, which occupies most of my day. I supervise each staff and turn out to be no matter they want me to be to make the episode nice and to align them with the voice of the present. I even work carefully with the composers, like Duncan Thum, and within the combine with William McGuigan. I’ve even performed guitar on a soundtrack and wrote lyrics for the present. So I suppose the reply may be very concerned.
Do you could have any tales about collaborating with creatives, like Emmy-nominated DP Adam Bricker?
With Adam, I normally sit again and watch the footage are available in. He’s miles forward of me by way of the visuals and is commonly teamed up with Brian McGinn, who doesn’t want me a lot as a result of the 2 of us have internalized most of one another’s ideas at this level. I do bear in mind being shocked seeing the primary pictures from the meals magnificence footage from the Angel Leon episode. It’s so good it nearly makes you mad that you simply didn’t consider it. However truthfully, I by no means would have in 100 years. The opposite humorous factor is that I didn’t meet Adam till we have been engaged on Season 3. I used to be in publish and he was within the subject, however I had labored together with his footage very intensely on a number of episodes. Actually, with each episode he works on, I see one thing I haven’t seen earlier than. He’s probably the most bold DPs you can work with, and his style is basically distinctive. It by no means seems like ambition for ambition’s sake. It at all times serves the story. He’s additionally nominated for Hacks, which is the best-looking comedy I’ve seen on TV. Give the man the Emmy already!
With our composer, Duncan Thum, I might say that he taught me the worth of getting a 100% authentic rating. Once we began, I might decide needle-drop songs of classical music on a number of the episodes I labored with, and we’d all get hooked up to them. The indie motion pictures I liked from the ’90s and 2000s all had these MTV-style needle drops, and it was enjoyable to lastly get to try this with composers I liked, like Shostakovich and Beethoven. Working with Duncan on season 1, he mentioned one thing alongside the strains of “Beethoven’s nice, however folks have their very own experiences with that music.” His level was that we are able to’t management folks’s baggage with music they’ve heard earlier than, however we are able to current new music with no baggage and have extra management over the viewers’s expertise. I began seeing it in movies in every single place, the place a music would pop up, and the movie’s intention competed with my expertise of the music. That’s not the place you need your viewers to be, and as soon as that clicked, I grew to become an enormous proponent of creating one thing completely authentic in your movie.
Chef’s Desk goes all over the world. What stood out for you about every location this season?
Philadelphia/Thailand — The areas are charismatic on this episode, and seeing the chef eat a Philly cheesesteak and interacting with old-school Philly guys is nice. However I’m fairly certain Chef Nok is the situation on this episode.
Mexico Metropolis — This can be a stunning metropolis filled with unbelievable folks doing extremely inspiring issues. I’m actually proud that this episode centered on the traditions of politics and revolution in Mexico. The media offers us a very restricted view of Mexico. All the things is tinted yellow, and it’s cartels, medicine and kidnappings. There’s a spirit there that I hope we captured, and I hope it opens folks’s minds to the complexity of Mexico.
NYC — The well-known line from “New York, New York” is “If I could make it there, I’ll make it anyplace.” That’s the facility of that episode. Kwame comes from the Bronx, the place nobody expects you to turn out to be one thing, and he primarily finally ends up being the king of New York eating places. The dimensions of that success is barely emphasised by the depth and the excessive stakes of NYC.
Spain/the ocean — As a lot as this can be a Spanish episode, the ocean is the factor, and I’m so in love with the work Brian and Adam did to deliver that to life.
This season includes consuming corn tortillas in the midst of the cornfield they’re created from. Every other tales or areas from the previous 10 years that have been particular for you?
To start with, I wasn’t at all times within the subject, however I’ve been fortunate sufficient to journey and meet some extraordinary folks on these journeys. Clearly, once you go to a subject the place they’re rising corn the normal approach, and also you’re welcomed into the sector by the household of farmers who put together the meals for the scene you’re capturing, that’s fairly particular. Then, for the crew to hitch the meal and to eat after the scene… it’s a once-in-a-lifetime expertise. The crew at all times has nice questions concerning the farming, the meals and the traditions. It will get actually pretty actually quick. When these issues occur, you actually know in the meanwhile how fortunate you’re. Greater than the one-of-a-kind meals tourism that’s constructed into the present, assembly the groups that run these eating places is basically the most effective half. You present up with a staff of people who find themselves the most effective at what they do, and also you’re strolling into a totally completely different world filled with people who find themselves the most effective at what they do. Over the course of the subsequent two weeks, the groups turn out to be one, and we work out logistically find out how to do actually troublesome and spectacular issues for the present. It’s actually inventive, it’s actually inspiring, and I actually really feel fortunate to be part of it.
In a world of cancellation, what’s the secret that makes Chef’s Desk so well-liked 10 years in?
What it comes all the way down to is that a number of the codecs that unscripted tv runs on have been inbuilt a distinct time, when that was the most effective that you can do. Most individuals didn’t have the funds, time or know-how to inform a complete story with folks’s personal voices. So folks developed methods like hosts or visiting a number of eating places to fill the time. That grew to become the format for lots of nonfiction tv. Lots of people caught with it as a result of it labored. To me, that’s like attending to base camp and pondering you climbed to the summit. If you write a scripted film, you’d by no means say “EXT. – MASALA Y MAIZ – DAY” then write “HOST stands with a microphone speaking to digicam.” That will be a horrible solution to open a film, however as a result of we set all these items into stone years in the past, that’s how most individuals perceive unscripted tv. So, whereas many individuals see our format on Chef’s Desk as a danger, in my thoughts, telling tales of characters and their private struggles is utilizing the rocket gas that Hollywood was constructed with. It’s the most secure wager on the town. It’s additionally a format constructed utterly for streaming. We have been simply fortunate sufficient to be a gaggle of people that thought documentaries could possibly be handled the way in which we deal with different movies, and we have been fortunate that Netflix gave us a platform to attempt it. I believe that rocket gas was crucial half, after which from there, we’ve been very considerate about find out how to maintain pushing the bounds — and ourselves — whereas honoring the elements of the present that basically make it work.
