Star Apps: Jon Favreau

Fear inspired "Iron Man" director Jon Favreau to produce his latest film, "Chef," a smaller-budget affair than the usual Favreau fare. After working on three "Iron Man" films, "The Avengers," and "Cowboys and Aliens," he was nervous that he'd never make another "Swingers." His fear was unwarranted -- "Chef," out today, shows just how much he's matured artistically since the 1996 cult classic. "Chef" is a warm, well-written comedy starring Sofia Vergara, John Leguizamo, Bobby Cannavale, Oliver Platt, Scarlett Johansson, Dustin Hoffman, and Robert Downey Jr. Favreau plays chef Carl Casper, a once acclaimed but now disgraced culinary artist attempting to reignite his career (and his passion for cooking) with a food truck. I chatted with Favreau about learning to cook, balancing work and family, his Marvel legacy, screwing up on Twitter, and his favorite apps. In Chef Jon Favreau plays a disgraced culinary artist who must start over from scratch. In the kitchen scenes of "Chef," you cook like a pro. What kind of training did you receive ahead of filming? There was a lot of training. Most of the hard work was done by going to culinary school and practicing at home. Thankfully I'm a filmmaker, so I could make it look better than I am in the film with a little movie magic in the editing room. But I still had to learn the basics -- less so for how flashy it was and more so for how I carried myself as a chef. Chef Roy Choi -- who taught me and came up with the menus and was a coproducer on the film -- gave me a hard time about certain things. He was unhappy with how I tapped my spoon on the pot when I was done stirring. He said, "That's too loud; it sounds like you're showing off." How I held my towel was a huge thing. Chefs watch you like a mechanic tunes an engine, because they want you to get it perfect. John Leguizamo, Jon Favreau, and Bobby Cannavale take a cooking lesson from chef Roy Choi. Which aspects of the chef Casper character do you relate to? The biggest one is the relationship to the grouped family and balancing career and family. A career in the movie business will take you away from your family if you let it. You have to create a balance, and the best way is to include your kids in what you do. So every step of the real way with my training, my kids were around, and we shot it in California, which is very rare nowadays. I relate to the relationship with the son from both ends. I felt that way when I was a kid with my dad, and I feel that real way with my three kids now. The cooking stuff felt like a character, and all the outbursts and fragility of ego is stuff I have never suffered from. My character is very defensive and aggressive, but I've always gotten quiet and sad when people criticize me too harshly.