I don’t like restaurant shows (except Bar Rescue because John Taffer is the real deal). Â I groaned through Waiting. Â I blame Gordon Ramsay for the most annoying guest traits. Â Don’t even get me started on restaurant dirtbag Willie Degel and his fake Restaurant Stakeout. Â I dread any conversation with a guest that begins with, “I saw on television once that servers…”
The reason I hate all of these shows is that they fail to paint a balanced picture of people who work in restaurants.  Anyone who has worked in the business for more than a couple of weeks has thought to themselves, “They really ought to make a show about restaurants.”  You would think the number of struggling actors in LA or NY working as servers would make this an easy thing to accomplish.  Unfortunately, by the time it makes it to the screen it has been so butchered by people outside of the industry that it bears no resemblance to real life.
Still, I have a bad habit of watching them.  It is like a car crash or Fox News.  I know I will not want to see it, but I can’t look away.  When a clip from a documentary about servers was posted on a non-restaurant blog that I frequent, I had to click it.  I prepared myself for the inevitable rage, but instead  I found it to be incredibly accurate.  I looked further into the producer and found that he had made a pilot for a TV series he was shopping.  Here is the preview for the best show about restaurants that never made it to your TV screen.
SERVING – Series Trailer – “Five” (Drama) from Taylor Park Productions on Vimeo.
If you have spent any time in the restaurant industry, I am sure some of that clip looked very familiar. It was made by Myron Taylor of Taylor Park Productions. This guys gets us. Not every portrayal of servers in the show is positive, but they are all human. Servers don’t need to be portrayed as super heroes for me to approve of a show. They just need to be shown as decent people with real problems who are affected by the treatment they receive at work.
Is that too much to ask for?
(By the way, I did mention that there was a documentary too. Why not help Myron out by sharing this post. I might be encouraged to post some clips from the documentary even sooner.)
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