Anthony Bourdain Wears the Perfect Chef's Watch in 'Tony'

If you want to be a successful chef, timing is essential. It explains why Anthony Bourdain—and every other famous chef is rarely spotted without a watch. Real-life Tony had a great collection, Gordon Ramsay loves a high-priced ticker, and if you can filter through the stress of it all, you might have noticed that watches (and clocks) played a big part in every season of The Bear.For this month’s dose of stressful kitchen entertainment, we have Tony, the much-anticipated Anthony Bourdain biopic starring Dominic Sessa. Tony captures only a snapshot of the chef's life, focusing on his time working in a kitchen in Provincetown, Massachusetts, as a 19-year-old. In his memoir Kitchen Confidential, Bourdain described himself at this age as, “a spoiled, miserable, narcissistic, self-destructive and thoughtless young lout, badly in need of a good ass-kicking”.Throughout the film, what most stood out to me—barring Sessa’s brilliance in portraying how beautifully complicated an individual Bourdain was—was the ever-present fixture on Sessa’s wrist.As confirmed by the film’s costume designer, Chloe Karmin (who worked closely with the prop master Pete Dancy), they chose an original Timex Vietnam Camper for young Bourdain to wear. And while Dancy was not available to comment on why this watch was selected, I have my suspicions. Firstly, it’s a widely known fact that Bourdain favored wearing a Timex in later life when he was filming his shows in places where one of his Rolexes might put him at risk of being the victim of watch theft.A24 and TimexAs a teenager starting out in the big bad world of life, you literally cannot go wrong with a Timex watch. In addition to being nice and affordable (you can get a Vietnam Camper on eBay for under $100), they are very easy to read and use quartz movements. That means for Tony, as a chef, he'd never have to worry about winding it and that it will remain supremely accurate until the battery runs out. It really is the entry level of all entry-level watches.Tony got the brand right, as well as a chef's loyalty to their timepiece. I recall Max Coen of Notting Hill’s Dorian telling me that after knives, a watch (his was a MoonSwatch) is one of the most-used pieces of equipment in the kitchen. So it needs to be reliable, which is precisely what you get from any Timex model. It also needs to be comfortable like a second skin, which is why a khaki nylon strap is a better choice over a metal bracelet or leather strap. More breathable and more low-key, too. It didn't matter what clothes he was wearing; without fail, his trusty Timex was always on.When a young Bourdain was getting started, you can imagine these were the criteria he was looking for in a watch, which is why this Timex is such a spot-on selection for Tony. The font, the size, the back dial, and clear Arabic numerals provide everything you need with a bit of personality too. So when you leave the cinema inspired to be the next Anthony Bourdain, you now know what your first port of call is—bag yourself a cheap Timex and go from there.This story originally appeared on British GQ.