Giada De Laurentiis Is Leaving Food Network After 21 Years, Inks Overall Deal With Amazon Studios
Her final Food Network bow. Giada De Laurentiis is teaming up with Amazon Studios after more than 20 years as a Food Network personality.
The Giada at Home host, 52, celebrated her new gig via Instagram on Thursday, February 9, after her latest career move made headlines. "Big week! Super excited for what's to come! @amazonstudios," she captioned the announcement.
According to Deadline, who was first to report the news, the Italian-American chef signed a multiyear overall deal with Amazon to develop and executive produce unscripted programming for the streaming service. De Laurentiis will also eye new starring roles as part of her collaboration with the studio.
"With her charismatic passion for food, and commitment to making extraordinary culinary experiences accessible to the home chef, Giada De Laurentiis has remained at the forefront of her industry for nearly two decades," head of AVOD Original content and programming Lauren Anderson told Deadline in a statement. "We look forward to developing an exciting slate of projects with Giada, as she expands into new areas and we broaden our portfolio of cooking and lifestyle content."
The Daytime Emmy winner spent 21 years on the Food Network. She got her start on Everyday Italian, which premiered in 2002, and has since helmed shows including Giada's Weekend Getaways, Giada in Italy, Simply Giada and Giada's Holiday Handbook. Since 2010, the cookbook author has regularly appeared as a mentor to hopeful chefs on The Next Food Network Star.
"I'm looking forward to this next chapter," De Laurentiis noted in a statement. "I've been a fan of Amazon for a long time, and I'm excited for what we will accomplish together."
A spokesperson for the network addressed the Giadzy brand owner's exit in a statement to Us Weekly on Friday, February 10, saying: "Giada De Laurentiis is culinary royalty, someone who has taught audiences how to properly pronounce every cut of pasta imaginable for nearly two decades. Food Network will always be proud of the beautiful content we have created together, and our table will always have an open seat for Giada."
Fellow Food Network personalities sent well-wishes to the Handy Manny voice actress following her big reveal. "Congratulations ??," Alex Guarnaschelli wrote in an Instagram comment. The Kitchen's Katie Lee Biegel added, "Yessss congratulations ??."
While she's been a staple in food and lifestyle programming for decades, the Giada Catering founder confessed that she never saw TV in her future. "My family was in the movie business, so I was never interested in that world," she told Food & Wine in 2016, recalling how she got her big break after assisting on a Thanksgiving photo shoot for the magazine. "Well, an executive at the Food Network found the article and read the recipes, and called me up saying he was looking to do an Italian cooking show and asked if I had experience. ... I really thought I'd become a food stylist and then went in a completely different direction."
The Le Courdon Bleu alum is the daughter of late actress Veronica De Laurentiis and actor-producer Alex De Benedetti. Her maternal grandfather, film producer Dino De Laurentiis, was an icon of Italian cinema. When her first Food Network series debuted, Giada believed it was "different from all the other shows" on the channel at the time.
"Nothing was really shot on location, and all of them were in New York City. ... I don't have the personality to do a studio show," she explained. "So the Food Network said, 'OK, we've never done this before, but let's try it,' and they rented a house to shoot in. So we weren't in my own home, but it was close by, and it gave the show a warm, homey feeling, and I could bring my family and friends in and do fun entertaining on the show."
The Happy Cooking author shares daughter Jade, 14, with ex-husband Todd Thompson. The former couple were married from 2003 to 2015. She has since moved on with TV producer Shane Farley.
