BOBBY FLAY AND GIADA DE LAURENTIIS JOINED BY ALTON BROWN, EACH SERVING AS MENTOR/PRODUCER TO THEIR OWN HAND-SELECTED TEAM OF FINALISTS
Special Two-Hour Series Premiere Airs Sunday, May 13th at 9pm ET/PT; Preceded by Casting Special on Saturday, May 12th at 9pm ET/PT
Audience Vote Will Determine Winner, Announced in Season Finale Sunday, July 22nd at 9pm ET/PT
NEW YORK, April 2,
2012 -- Food Network's long-running hit primetime series
Food Network Star returns to New York City
this May with fifteen talented hopefuls and completely new twists for season
eight – this year, returning stars Bobby Flay
and Giada De Laurentiis move from behind
the judge's table to square off with culinary favorite Alton Brown for a three-way team competition to find
the next Food Network Star, beginning with a special two-hour premiere
episode on Sunday, May 13 th at
9pm ET/PT.
Bobby, Giada and Alton, all television producers in
addition to being culinary superstars, lead the charge to find and develop the
new talent by each hand-selecting a team of five finalists, who they will
produce and mentor through the 'Star' experience to find one winner who
possesses personality and kitchen chops. Viewers can also glance into the 'Star'
finalist selection process, with a casting special airing on May 12 th and in another turn to the series
plot, viewers will vote online before the July 22
nd finale to determine who will receive the ultimate prize: their own
Food Network show, to be produced by their 'Star' team leader.
"Having Bobby, Giada and Alton compete against each other to discover and
develop the next Food Network Star took this series to a whole new
level," said Bob Tuschman, General Manager and
Senior Vice President, Programming and Production, Food Network. "These three
iconic star/producers are ideal mentors for the talented hopefuls they found –
but it's hard to say if the competition was more intense among the finalists or
their three Star mentors."
Season eight finalists are: Philip "Ippy" Aiona (Kamuela, HI), Judson
Allen (Chicago), Martie Duncan (Birmingham,
Ala.), Emily Ellyn (Orlando, Fla.), Martita
Jara (San Diego), Eric Lee (Petaluma,
Calif.), Yvan Lemoine (Maspeth, N.Y.), Josh
Lyons (Jupiter, Fla.), Linkie
Marais (North Attleborough, Mass.), Nikki
Martin (West Hollywood, Calif.),
Malcolm Mitchell (Washington, D.C.), Michele
Ragussis (Brooklyn, N.Y.), Cristie Schoen (New
Orleans), Kara Sigle (Chicago) and Justin
Warner (Brooklyn, N.Y.).
In the premiere episode, the fifteen hopefuls arrive in the Food Network
Star kitchen in New York City to meet Bobby Flay, Giada De
Laurentiis and Alton Brown - the culinary
superstars who hand-selected them to compete on their teams. After meeting with
their team leader, special guest Robert Irvine
challenges the teams to their first "Star Challenge" - to create their own
pop-up restaurant from the ground up, with an extremely limited budget and very
little time. Each episode also features a "Producer's Challenge," where the
contestants up for elimination each shoot a segment with their 'Star'
mentor/producer to be presented to the selection committee in the "pitch room."
Returning judges Food Network executives Bob
Tuschman and Susie Fogelson
decide who stays and goes, along with a roster of guest judges scheduled to
join.
Upcoming episodes feature amped-up challenges to see who has true Star
quality, including a Chopped-style battle judged by Alex Guarnaschelli , Scott
Conant and Marc Murphy ; a
Ted Allen -hosted New York Fashion Week food
makeover challenge with a cash prize courtesy of Discover Card; holiday-themed
specials hosted by Guy Fieri ; and a Miami beachside competition where finalists shop at
Target to style a VIP event for Paula Deen .
Season guest stars also include Food Network's Sunny
Anderson, Anne Burrell , Melissa
d'Arabian, Jeff Mauro , Aaron Sanchez and Geoffrey
Zakarian , along with Entertainment Weekly's Jess Cagle and Jill
Bernstein , Entertainment Tonight's Christina McLarty and Serious Eats' Ed Levine .
For more Food Network Star, visit www.foodnetwork.com/star all season long for video recaps,
exclusive interviews and blogs, behind-the-scenes footage, photo galleries,
exclusive snapshots from the 'Star' house and the return of "Star Scrapbooks," a
look inside the pages of the finalists' personal journals. Viewers can also join
a season-long Food Network Star digital game, where players accumulate
points and earn badges by predicting the outcome of each episode and participate
in weekly fan votes. The series culminates with an unprecedented finale on
Sunday, July 22 nd at 9pm ET/PT, when an audience online vote will determine
which finalist will become the next Food Network Star.
Food Network Star is produced by CBS EYE Too Productions.
FOOD NETWORK (www.foodnetwork.com) is a unique lifestyle network, website
and magazine that connects viewers to the power and joy of food. The network
strives to be viewers' best friend in food and is committed to leading by
teaching, inspiring and empowering through its talent and expertise. Food
Network is distributed to more than 100 million U.S. households and averages
more than 9.9 million unique web users monthly. Since launching in 2009, Food
Network Magazine has tripled its rate base and delivers a circulation of 1.4
million. Headquartered in New York, Food Network
has a growing international presence with programming in more than 150
countries, including 24 hour networks in Great
Britain, India, Asia and Africa. Scripps
Networks Interactive (NYSE: SNI), which also owns and operates Cooking Channel
(www.cookingchanneltv.com), DIY Network (www.diynetwork.com), Great
American Country (www.gactv.com), HGTV (www.hgtv.com), and Travel Channel (www.travelchannel.com),
is the manager and general partner.
SOURCE Food Network
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