Gordon Ramsay on His Netflix Doc Series and Never Cooking for His Abusive, Alcoholic Father: ‘Maybe That’s a Good Thing’
Gordon Ramsay is showing his vulnerable side.
In his new Netflix docu series, “Being Gordon Ramsay,” the celebrity gets emotional, even tearing up several times while talking about his wife Tana and their six kids, as well as his strained relationship with his abusive father, Gordon Sr., an alcoholic who died of a heart attack in 1997. He was 53.
“I think it’s healthy to cry,” Ramsay tells me over Zoom just days ahead of the series’ premiere, adding, “I think it’s healthy to cry.”
“Being Gordon Ramsay” chronicles his most ambitious project in his almost 30-year career, a five-restaurant and culinary school complex at the top of London’s 22 Bishopsgate skyscraper.
In no uncertain terms, Ramsay makes it clear that his father never appreciated his culinary pursuits. His dad died just as Ramsay was on the verge of launching what would become his sprawling restaurant, hospitality and media empire.
The elder Ramsay was an aspiring musician. “I grew up watching my father follow a career in music that didn’t happen — that didn’t work for him,” Ramsay says. “My mates in the music business asked me, ‘How the fuck do you know so much about Gibson and Fender Strats and Telecasters? How do you know about synthesizers?'”
Those unfulfilled dreams led to an unstable childhood. “I was lugging that gear up in and out of bars, in and out of Glasgow where he’d play for 60, 70 bucks a night,” Ramsay recalls. “Then he’d disappear to Nashville. They would have all the collectors at the door and my mum in tears answering the door because people were chasing her for money that my dad owed them.”
He previously opened up about his father’s emotional and physical abuse towards him, his mom and his siblings in his 2006 memoir, “Humble Pie.”
“I don’t know if he was interested in what I did, I think,” Ramsay says. “I remember seeing him with a glass of red wine and he filled it up with Sprite because he tried to tell me it tasted better. I was like, oh, Jesus Christ. If my sommeliers saw this or any of my chefs heard my father talk like this, they’d think I was a fucking idiot. ‘OK, Dad, why?’ ’Well, it brings out the grape.’ I just sat there like that thinking, ‘Oh my God.’ My head was in my hands.”
He continues, “I never got to cook for him, and I think in many ways I got to live with that. Maybe that’s a good thing. I think things happened for a reason, and him not being sat at the table getting looked after and spoiled in my restaurant, I don’t know if he could handle that, if I’m honest.”
His mom Helen, on the other hand, “is one of the most important women in my life,” Ramsay notes.
“I’ve always been a mother’s boy,” he says, smiling. “I won my first Michelin Star years ago and I said to Tana, ‘Look, I’m embarrassed. Mom’s in a high-rise, in a tenement block, and she can barely afford to pay the rent. I’m going to take out this loan.’ Mom must have been 19 when she had me. She was in her late 40s and never ever owned a property.”
He bought her a three-bedroom bungalow. “That, for me, was more important than winning my first Michelin Star because mom always spoke about owning her own house, having her own bedroom, bathroom, back garden, having all the plants, the ornaments and everything,” Ramsay says.
Ramsay, who turns 60 in November, admits he feels guilt for putting career before spending time with his and Tana’s eldest kids, Megan, fraternal twins Holly and Jack, and Tilly. The series shows him doting on their young sons, Oscar, 7, and Jesse, 2.
“I want to be the father to my family that I never grew up with,” he says. “I’m the opposite. Everything I grew up with and witnessed, I’m the opposite. I’ve never to this day been wandering around the dining room with a glass of champagne, messing around, drinking with customers. I don’t do that.” (In one of the docu series’ most heartbreaking moments, Ramsay details his brother’s battle with heroin addiction.)
And just when viewers of the series think Bishopsgate could be his swan song, he tells Tana in the final episode – SPOILER ALERT! — that he’s thinking about opening a new place in New York City. “What the fuck would I do?” he says when I ask if he ever thinks of slowing down. “What am I going to do? Go and have matcha lattes and go to fucking yoga classes every day, and turn into a fat, lazy chef that wants to sit there and wallow on his boat? No. No. I have a responsibility to talent and I’ve made my bed, but I want to sleep in it comfortably and I do not want to retire.”
“Being Gordon Ramsay” is available now on Netflix.
In his new Netflix docu series, “Being Gordon Ramsay,” the celebrity gets emotional, even tearing up several times while talking about his wife Tana and their six kids, as well as his strained relationship with his abusive father, Gordon Sr., an alcoholic who died of a heart attack in 1997. He was 53.
“I think it’s healthy to cry,” Ramsay tells me over Zoom just days ahead of the series’ premiere, adding, “I think it’s healthy to cry.”
“Being Gordon Ramsay” chronicles his most ambitious project in his almost 30-year career, a five-restaurant and culinary school complex at the top of London’s 22 Bishopsgate skyscraper.
In no uncertain terms, Ramsay makes it clear that his father never appreciated his culinary pursuits. His dad died just as Ramsay was on the verge of launching what would become his sprawling restaurant, hospitality and media empire.
The elder Ramsay was an aspiring musician. “I grew up watching my father follow a career in music that didn’t happen — that didn’t work for him,” Ramsay says. “My mates in the music business asked me, ‘How the fuck do you know so much about Gibson and Fender Strats and Telecasters? How do you know about synthesizers?'”
Those unfulfilled dreams led to an unstable childhood. “I was lugging that gear up in and out of bars, in and out of Glasgow where he’d play for 60, 70 bucks a night,” Ramsay recalls. “Then he’d disappear to Nashville. They would have all the collectors at the door and my mum in tears answering the door because people were chasing her for money that my dad owed them.”
He previously opened up about his father’s emotional and physical abuse towards him, his mom and his siblings in his 2006 memoir, “Humble Pie.”
“I don’t know if he was interested in what I did, I think,” Ramsay says. “I remember seeing him with a glass of red wine and he filled it up with Sprite because he tried to tell me it tasted better. I was like, oh, Jesus Christ. If my sommeliers saw this or any of my chefs heard my father talk like this, they’d think I was a fucking idiot. ‘OK, Dad, why?’ ’Well, it brings out the grape.’ I just sat there like that thinking, ‘Oh my God.’ My head was in my hands.”
He continues, “I never got to cook for him, and I think in many ways I got to live with that. Maybe that’s a good thing. I think things happened for a reason, and him not being sat at the table getting looked after and spoiled in my restaurant, I don’t know if he could handle that, if I’m honest.”
His mom Helen, on the other hand, “is one of the most important women in my life,” Ramsay notes.
“I’ve always been a mother’s boy,” he says, smiling. “I won my first Michelin Star years ago and I said to Tana, ‘Look, I’m embarrassed. Mom’s in a high-rise, in a tenement block, and she can barely afford to pay the rent. I’m going to take out this loan.’ Mom must have been 19 when she had me. She was in her late 40s and never ever owned a property.”
He bought her a three-bedroom bungalow. “That, for me, was more important than winning my first Michelin Star because mom always spoke about owning her own house, having her own bedroom, bathroom, back garden, having all the plants, the ornaments and everything,” Ramsay says.
Ramsay, who turns 60 in November, admits he feels guilt for putting career before spending time with his and Tana’s eldest kids, Megan, fraternal twins Holly and Jack, and Tilly. The series shows him doting on their young sons, Oscar, 7, and Jesse, 2.
“I want to be the father to my family that I never grew up with,” he says. “I’m the opposite. Everything I grew up with and witnessed, I’m the opposite. I’ve never to this day been wandering around the dining room with a glass of champagne, messing around, drinking with customers. I don’t do that.” (In one of the docu series’ most heartbreaking moments, Ramsay details his brother’s battle with heroin addiction.)
And just when viewers of the series think Bishopsgate could be his swan song, he tells Tana in the final episode – SPOILER ALERT! — that he’s thinking about opening a new place in New York City. “What the fuck would I do?” he says when I ask if he ever thinks of slowing down. “What am I going to do? Go and have matcha lattes and go to fucking yoga classes every day, and turn into a fat, lazy chef that wants to sit there and wallow on his boat? No. No. I have a responsibility to talent and I’ve made my bed, but I want to sleep in it comfortably and I do not want to retire.”
“Being Gordon Ramsay” is available now on Netflix.