Television
I’ve been the lead writer for several national cooking series, including seven critically acclaimed seasons of Mexico, One Plate at a Time with Rick Bayless, Food Network’s Mario Eats Italy, starring Mario Batali, and Yan Can Cook with Martin Yan. I also cowrote the documentary “Jacques Pépin: The Art of Craft” for “American Masters” on PBS.
PBS American Masters
Jacques Pépin: The Art of Craft
Cowriting this documentary with my friend Peter Stein was more than fun, and more than delicious. Jacques Pépin really is as generous, magical, funny and real as you would hope he would be. Besides the joy of spending time in his presence, highlights included: hours in the edit room working with Peter and genius editor, Dawn Logsdon; listening to the unforgettable Anthony Bourdain respond to interview questions in beautiful, fully formed paragraphs; getting to co-direct Stanley Tucci in the voiceover recording session; and making a cameo as the legs of Jacques in a flashback re-enactment sequence.
Producer: Susie Heller
Director: Peter L. Stein
Writers: Peter L. Stein and Steve Siegelman
Editor: Dawn Logsdon
"The Art of Craft is more than just one man's success story. Ultimately, it communicates, with the same breezy charm as its subject, the effect one person can have on a whole culture. This is the crucial idea that seems missing from today's America.” — KQED Food
Rick Bayless: Mexico One Plate at a Time
I helped create concept and was the writer for 7 seasons of this beloved PBS series shot in Mexico and Chicago.
“Not since Julia Child stepped in front of a camera, whisk in hand, has a cooking show been able to grab the attention of the general public.…Mexico One Plate at a Time, turns the now predictable genre on its ear, seducing the audience with the energy and verve of an MTV video. Bayless, completely deconstructing the cooking show form, re-invented it to allow him to fuse his two loves, cultural anthropology and cooking, into a fast-moving, information-packed entertainment.…Scriptwriter Steve Siegelman sat for 10 days, 10 hours a day and listened to Deann and Rick dump out everything they knew about food in Mexico…. Mexico One Plate at a Time not only raises the bar for all cooking shows but for television in general— just the way The Sopranos did on HBO.” — San Francisco Chronicle
Mario Batali: Mario Eats Italy
I wrote twenty-five half-hour episodes for this Food Network series shot on location throughout Italy.
“A perfect example of how a Food Network show benefits from solid production values, a convivial host and a proper estimation of the audience.” — Variety