Traveling with a Happy, Hungry Man

Photo by Rebe Adelaida on Unsplash

Lately, before I fall asleep, my wife Amy and I have been watching Somebody Feed Phil.

The show isn’t new, of course. The seventh season is now available on Netflix (an earlier iteration ran on PBS as I’ll Have What Phil’s Having). But it’s new to us. And since we are captivated by the idea of travel without, you know, traveling, it’s our kind of show!

The premise is the host, Phil Rosenthal, a comedy writer, actor, and producer whose greatest career success was creating the sitcom Everybody Loves Raymond, travels to various locations to eat the food, see the sights, and meet the people.

While U.S. destinations have been featured (e.g., New Orleans, New York, Chicago, Philadelphia), most are in other countries: Bangkok, Venice, Cape Town, Mexico City, Montreal, Dubai, and Dublin, to name just a few.

Phil and his crew spend a week at each location. He visits standout restaurants, samples local delicacies, and sits down with renowned chefs. He sometimes will also have a meal with a local family in their home.

Forgoing most tourist-trap destinations, Phil seeks out parks, bike trails, local landmarks, and breathtaking countryside.

The result is a stunningly beautiful show to look at.

He likes everything?

Phil has accumulated only a modest résumé of acting roles, but he’s a natural in front of the camera. He has an exemplary ability to emote real pleasure and joy upon biting into something he likes. And he seems to like everything. Though, he has admitted, he likes everything he is shown eating on the show. (The gagging, grimacing, and spit-takes are mercifully edited out.)

He also has a great sense of humor that is a big part of his charm (see his understated but irreverently funny reaction in the Cape Town episode to a street sign that reads, “Labia”).

But it’s not so much Phil’s skills as a host that make the show a winner as his manners as a guest. Phil tries every dish set in front of him. He also is given to conversing with everyone he encounters. And it’s not just that he strikes up idle conversations. He strives to engage with them and make real connections.

On camera, at least, he talks to everyone pretty much the same way. Whether a James Beard award-finalist chef or food writer, or a random person he runs into on the street, everybody gets the same Phil.

He’s especially great with kids, understanding that they find the same things fun and funny no matter where they are on the globe.

We should all more readily recognize this. And not just about kids.

Family and old jokes                

Another endearing trait of Somebody Feed Phil is that the show is a family affair. Phil’s brother, Richard Rosenthal, an Emmy award-winning producer, is always just off camera. His wife, the actress Monica Horan who played Amy on Everybody Loves Raymond, and his adult children sometimes accompany him on his trips. They all seem to share Phil’s love of travel and new experiences.

And then there were his parents. A highlight of each episode during the show’s first few seasons was a Zoom call with Helen and Max Rosenthal, who, unlike Phil, never seemed to leave their home.

The senior Rosenthals would be, by turns, confounded by the video call technology, clueless about Phil’s references, concerned that Phil and Richard were getting along on their trip, or annoyed in the way that parents can sometimes be with their adult children.

Max, a former actor and comic, usually shared a well-worn joke (“Did you hear about the streetwalker in Venice? She drowned.”). Sadly, Helen died in 2019 and Max in 2021.

I would be remiss if I didn’t mention the show’s catchy, soulful theme song, performed by the group Lake Street Dive. Once you hear it twice, you’ll find it impossible to not sing along!

I don’t sing along. Then again, I’m not you.

An overplayed strength

Somebody Feed Phil isn’t perfect. Its biggest flaw is an overplayed strength. Phil is a vocal advocate of travel and repeatedly encourages viewers to go to the exotic locales he visits and seek out the same experiences.

But viewers don’t have Phil’s considerable net worth, a popular TV show, or the late Anthony Bourdain’s worldly-wise and resourceful production company at their disposal to scout out quirky restaurants or arrange intimate sit-downs with great chefs and local families.

If you like a food, Phil is fond of saying, you need to go to the source. Few of us can. And millions, like me, are content to settle for ordering in Americanized versions of Chinese or Mexican and sitting on the couch to vicariously join Phil as he wades through knee-deep mud, plunges into frigid ocean water, or eats bugs or “head meat” at restaurant tables in faraway places.

Still, it all feels a little like traveling with a good friend.

An evening with Phil

Amy and I did get off our couch recently to go see Phil live. The theater, just outside Pittsburgh, was nearly sold out and the large, enthusiastic crowd was much what I expected.

Imagine NPR as an auditorium full of people; that was the crowd.

The show kicked off with an extended video montage of clips from Somebody Feel Phil interspersed with people (presumably) in different locations around the world sitting on their couches and offering entertaining commentary (not entirely unlike Beavis and Butthead) as Phil ate and cracked wise on their televisions.

When Phil finally appeared on stage, it was to thunderous applause. While his appreciative reaction to this warm welcome was palpable, I sensed this crowd was no more adoring than those he had encountered everywhere on the tour.

He talked about having just tried the best-known Pittsburgh food item, the Primanti Bros. sandwich, and said he wasn’t prepared for the sandwich to contain such a generous helping of French fries.

Phil also expressed an interest in doing an episode in Pittsburgh, a suggestion met with wild enthusiasm.

And if he thought there were too many fries on his sandwich, just wait until he experiences a Pittsburgh steak salad.

Too much of a good thing

Phil then sat down for a carefully planned if not wholly canned interview. He shared anecdotes from his career, told jokes, and took the audience behind the scenes of Somebody Feed Phil.

Afterward, there was an extended audience Q&A, during which a succession of superfans prefaced their questions with long expressions of gratitude for what Phil and his show have meant to them.

It was heartfelt and sweet. But it became a bit much after the second female audience member barely stopped short of publicly offering to have Phil’s baby.

By this point, it began to feel like an enjoyable dinner with strangers that had dragged on too long. Even so, when it was over, we headed home to our couch with a good taste in our mouths.

But—sorry, Phil—we have no immediate plans to walk the streets of Venice.