Every self-respecting television show has an online extension these days - webisodes, behind-the-scenes clips, comic Q&A's with the stars. But no one has integrated TV and Internet offerings as completely as the producers of Bravo's “Top Chef.†For the second season in a row they are offering the Web series “Top Chef: Last Chance Kitchen†as an essential part of their menu - the starch to the TV show's protein.
“Last Chance Kitchen,†whose new season began Wednesday night on bravotv.com, is sort of like a repechage bracket in a judo competition or the national college baseball tournament. Chefs who have been eliminated on television meet in a stripped-down version of the main show for a chance to stay alive in the competition. On Wednesday night the four contestants cut so far in the current “Top Chef: Seattle†faced off in a single challenge, making a dish in two minutes using the same ingredients that had been their downfall on TV.
Unlike most athletic repechages, however, “Top Chef: Last Chance Kitchen†- following the more sentimental dictates of reality TV - offers the losers the opportunity not just to come back, but to win the whole shebang. That chance is even stronger this season, when the winner of “Last Chance Kitchen†gets an automatic bye into the “Top Chef†finale. (Last year's “Last Chance†winner was re-inserted into the TV show three episodes from the end and didn't make it to the finale.)
Some viewers may find that they prefer the online show to its television parent. It's “Top Chef†distilled into one claustrophobic, jittery, 10-minute scene, with no shopping trip or backstage posturing - just cooking with an even greater edge of desperation. And instead of a panel of judges, there's just the stone-faced Tom Colicchio, doling out praise as if it were sips of Romanée-Co nti and grudgingly choosing one chef to move on.
The Web series could even challenge “Top Chef†on its own turf, the Emmys, where the TV show has won twice (for picture editing and, in 2010, for outstanding reality competition). The first season of “Last Chance Kitchen†was actually nominated for an Emmy in a category called Outstanding Special Class - Short-Format Nonfiction Program. Perhaps demonstrating the television academy's true feelings about the role of online content, however, the award went to the Directors Guild of America for a series of old-fashioned, hilariously self-congratulatory online shorts called “DGA Moments in Time.â€
