Review: The Recipe, a New Play About Julia Child, Feels Like Leftovers

Julia Child’s charismatic personality is explored in Claudia Shear’s new play The Recipe, a comedy with too few laughs and too few fresh insights into the life of the iconic chef. Lisa Peterson helms a breezy production that keeps the action moving, but her direction of its lead ultimately sinks it.

Gawky, loveable Julia (Christina Kirk) finds work with the OSS (Office of Strategic Services) during World War II and discovers the love of her life, Paul Child (two-time Tony winner Norbert Leo Butz), while working in Ceylon.

After their marriage, Paul is reassigned to Paris, and the city’s vibrant culture—and especially its food—opens a new world to her. As she begins to explore cooking, her skills develop slowly but steadily. A chance encounter with cookbook writer Simone “Simca” Beck (Jill Abramovitz) introduces her to a new and transformative culinary community, one that ultimately benefits not only her but countless home cooks who never imagined they could master French cuisine.

Claudia Shear, responsible for writing the saucy Mae West play Dirty Blonde, plots a rather dry progression of Child’s life, without flavoring it with what made Child so vibrant and relatable. As written, Child reads as uncomfortably narcissistic. Not that Child’s life needed to be a knee-slapper, but Shear’s script isn’t as nearly funny as it could have been.

Kirk’s performance is unmodulated, pitched at the same high level throughout, with frequent arm flailing to emphasize nearly every line. Kirk makes no attempt to show us Child’s effervescence; instead we get a weightless flibbertigibbet.

Butz is excellent as Paul, the devoted husband and steadying presence for a wife forging a new path. Butz shows us a husband who supports his wife while she makes mistakes along the way. Abramovitz is also wonderful as the persnickety but loving business partner.

Rami Margron is especially good in the two roles of Child’s lackadaisical OSS colleague in Ceylon and the condescending head of Le Cordon Bleu who cannot recognize Child’s innate talent. Michael Park, as Julia’s right-wing, old-money father, lends a dashing but patronizing presence, unsuccessfully attempting to mold his daughter into his perception of a proper mid-century lady.

Peterson’s choreography sends Rachel Hauck’s rolling set pieces gliding around the stage along with the ever‑moving cast. The constant movement creates a sustained, kinetic energy. Linda Cho’s costumes are authentic and thoughtfully track Child’s evolution—gangly and awkward in the early scenes, then increasingly elegant, including a striking green dress later in the show that reflects her growing confidence.

Child was ahead of her time during the Eisenhower era, a female leader in the evolution of culinary literature and television. Her remarkable life and marriage to Paul was lovingly captured in film in Nora Ephron’s Julie and Julia and on the HBO series Julia. It would have benefited this play to find a fresh ingredient of her life to explore, but The Recipe in the end tastes generic and bland.