Taste: The No.1 Sunday Times Bestseller

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I was surprised how many details from your memoir I recognized from “Big Night,” which is not an autobiographical film. Do you collect these moments as they come, or do they only coalesce when the story starts to come together?

There’s an inactive aspect to acting and there’s a very active aspect to cooking and researching food. That’s one of the reasons I wanted to do the CNN series.The series follows, in some ways, a very traditional food-travel-show format. Each episode has you in a different city or region, blending together the culinary and the cultural. How was it approaching the shoot as a host rather than an actor? Not only is this an autobiography but it’s a dip into history, cuisine of Italian-Americans and Italy, Stanley Tucci cooking, Stanley Tucci family and a glimpse into Stanley Tucci cookbook recipes. LOVED THIS! The answer is both. I’ve known for many years that food was something that I was gravitating toward. Certainly, after we made “ Big Night,” which was twenty-five years ago, and then, after I did “Julie & Julia,” I just became more and more interested in food. Whenever I went to restaurants, if it was a good restaurant, I would figure out a way to insinuate myself into the kitchen shamelessly, so that I could just sort of see the way they work, and what the setup was, and maybe ask how they made a certain dish. It was fascinating to me. It became all I could think about, even when I was acting. So I knew that that was who I was. But, as I started writing, I realized that it was even more of who I was, if that makes sense.

Over the years, I’ve enjoyed watching Stanley Tucci act in movies and in television programs, so I was happy when he published his memoir! Since a very young age as a boy growing up in a large and extended Italian family in upstate New York, Stanley was interested in food and its preparation. I cannot begin to explain how much I loved this book but put it this way, Taste was my starter, Stanley Tucci interview on The Travel Diaries was my main and I’m currently enjoying the desert through the TV series, Stanley Tucci: Searching For Italy. I can’t get enough. Wednesday: Eggplant parmigiana wedge. The eggplant parmigiana was not breaded. It was made in light tomato sauce, had very little cheese, and incorporated thinly sliced potatoes.My name is Larry and I love food. I mean, seriously. I love to read about it, I love to cook it, and I seriously love to eat it. Most of the memoirs I’ve read have been written by chefs or have been about people’s love of food, so when I saw Stanley Tucci (one of my favorite actors) had written this book, I jumped on it like I would a buffet. (Hey, #fatboysgottafat.)