Kitchen Nightmares

Kitchen Nightmares, starring Gordon Ramsay, has become a must watch every week. If you are a sucker for justice and a happy ending, this show never fails to provide it week after week. Add to that the entertainment factor, and you have a show that you simply wouldn't want to leave even to go to the loo.

Chef Ramsay, as he has become know from his other successful television show Hell's Kitchen, is a straight shooting no holds barred guy who refuses to put up with any foolishness. This is a man who calls a spade a spade and makes no apologies.

His newest show, Kitchen Nightmares, visits local family owned failing restaurants and works miracles in a short length of time turning abysmal failure into shining success. Using honed teaching skills, creative new ideas, inspiration, and unabashed in you face criticism; Chef Ramsey is able to do wonders with each restaurant and even with the staff itself.

The show provides the restaurants with all that is lacking to create a sterling success. In the first episode, the show puts in a state of the art kitchen and double refrigerator into the horrid kitchen. In the second installment, Ramsay completely re-styles the dining room from drab to fab. These changes coupled with new and exciting menus, attitude adjustments, training and pep talks cause inevitable success for each establishment.

There is a lot of bleeping. Apparently, people on the show like to express themselves with curse words. If you can get past that, you will get to see the each fairy tale unfold before you and life changing moments take place. At times, there are touching scenes where the protagonist of each show turns over a new leaf - you even get to see them blubber a bit. The human relationship element adds a completely different dimension to the show. You are able to see a totally new side of this former soccer player/Michelin star chef/multi-restaurateur/author/television star Gordon Ramsay. In Kitchen Nightmares, he reveals a softer side as well as his passion for the success of others. It is clear that he cares about the people he is helping. Tough love never hurt so good!

There have been two separate lawsuits filled by former restaurants featured on the show alleging that Kitchen Nightmares fabricates the problems they film for the show. However in the first case involving Sue Ray, Gordon Ramsay won £75,000 plus costs. And in the second case involving the former general manager of a New York restaurant, the case was voluntarily dismissed and ordered into arbitration per their contract stipulations. 1

Lawsuits or not this show delivers entertainment, inspiration and a happily ever after ending which makes it highly addictive. KITCHEN NIGHTMARES is a co-production of Granada America and Optomen Television, in association with A. Smith & Co. Executive producers are Arthur Smith, Pat Llewellyn, Kent Weed, Gerry McKean and Curt Northrup.2