{"id":13177,"date":"2016-10-28T12:24:00","date_gmt":"2016-10-28T16:24:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/alexprudhomme.com\/?p=13177"},"modified":"2016-10-28T12:24:00","modified_gmt":"2016-10-28T16:24:00","slug":"chat-julias-second-act-little-bird","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/alexprudhomme.com\/2016\/10\/28\/chat-julias-second-act-little-bird\/","title":{"rendered":"A Chat About Julia’s Second Act with ‘My Little Bird’"},"content":{"rendered":"

I am in Washington DC for the second annual Julia Child Award (this year’s recipient is Rick Bayless), and will present The FCiA at the Smithsonian on Sat 10\/29 (3:30 pm). Nancy McKeon and I had a nice chat about Julia in the 1970s for her blog My Little Bird. Here’s an excerpt and the link:
\n 
\nA DECADE AGO\u00a0Alex Prud\u2019homme helped his Grand-Aunt Julia write a\u00a0memoir of the years she and husband Paul spent in France. In that book,\u00a0My Life in France<\/em>, we readers watch as\u00a0Julia Child learns to cook, then begins teaching cooking and then, with French friends Simca and Louisette Bertholle, embarks on the decade-long writing of the canonical\u00a0Mastering the Art of French Cooking<\/em>.
\nCapturing Julia\u2019s memories wasn\u2019t an easy task, Alex says: Julia didn\u2019t like to talk about herself, always steering the<\/p>\n

\"Alex<\/p>\n

Alex Prud\u2019homme and his grand-aunt, Julia Child, in her Montecito, California, garden a few days before her death in 2004. \/ Photo by Sarah B. Prud\u2019homme.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

conversation back to the other person.\u00a0\u201cI would ask about her house in the South of France and she would say, \u2018Oh, it was a lovely little place . . . How are your children?\u201d
\nAlex found his way in by reading aloud some of the letters Julia and Paul had written to, and received from, Alex\u2019s grandfather Charles, who was Paul\u2019s twin brother. \u201cThat triggered stories,\u201d he says. \u201cAnd soon she was talking,\u201d especially when Alex would get her to describe the Paris apartment, the markets, some of the meals they had. It also didn\u2019t hurt, he suggests, that he looks a bit like the young Paul.
\nThis second\u00a0book,\u00a0The French Chef in America,<\/em>\u00a0is \u201ca slightly different beast,\u201d Alex explains, a work of research and reporting. It essentially picks up the story in the mid-1960s, when Julia and Paul have come back to the States and moved to Cambridge, Massachusetts. With Paul working with her every step of the way, she becomes public television\u2019s French chef, sharing her skills while wooing her audiences.
\nJulia\u2019s\u00a0second act really took place in the 1970s. \u201cIt\u2019s a period that most people don\u2019t really know about,\u201d Alex says. \u201cI didn\u2019t, really.\u201d After\u00a0MyLife in France,\u00a0<\/em>published after Julia died, two days\u00a0short of age 92, Alex went back\u00a0to his other subjects, mostly\u00a0energy and the environment. But questions he had while working on the first book made him think\u00a0perhaps he could\u00a0circle back to Julia.
\nIn his reporting, Alex discerned the \u201chidden\u201d history of Julia in the 1970s, how in mid-life and mid-career she got away from the French canon and explored other cultures, other tastes. \u201cShe reinvents herself and takes off like a rocket in her 60s.\u201d
\nFor the rest of the story, please follow the link …
\nhttps:\/\/mylittlebird.com\/2016\/10\/alex-prudhomme-julia-child\/
\n <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

I am in Washington DC for the second annual Julia Child Award (this year’s recipient is Rick Bayless), and will present The FCiA at the Smithsonian on Sat 10\/29 (3:30 pm). Nancy McKeon and I had a nice chat about Julia in the 1970s for her blog My Little Bird. Here’s an excerpt and the…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[2,17,13,14,4],"tags":[],"acf":[],"yoast_head":"\nA Chat About Julia's Second Act with 'My Little Bird' - Alex Prud'homme<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/alexprudhomme.com\/2016\/10\/28\/chat-julias-second-act-little-bird\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"A Chat About Julia's Second Act with 'My Little Bird' - Alex Prud'homme\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"I am in Washington DC for the second annual Julia Child Award (this year’s recipient is Rick Bayless), and will present The FCiA at the Smithsonian on Sat 10\/29 (3:30 pm). 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