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We\xa0don't\xa0usually make a big deal about the Oscars on Special Sauce, but when I saw the\xa0brilliant Oscar-nominated documentary short\xa0Knife Skills,\xa0I knew I wanted to talk about\xa0it.\xa0The film\xa0shows\xa0what happens when Cleveland\xa0chef/restaurateur\xa0Brandon\xa0Chrostowski\xa0opens\xa0Edwins, a\xa0white-tablecloth\xa0French restaurant staffed almost entirely by recently released convicts\xa0who are reentering the workforce. As I\xa0previously\xa0wrote\xa0on Serious Eats,\xa0Knife Skills\xa0is funny, deeply moving, and brimming with humanity.\xa0So\xa0this week, in anticipation of this weekend's Oscars ceremony, I invited\xa0Brandon and\xa0the\xa0filmmaker behind the documentary,\xa0Tom Lennon, a longtime friend of mine, to come on Special Sauce to talk about their extraordinary collaboration.\xa0\xa0

For Brandon,\xa0a hardscrabble childhood that nearly ended in\xa0incarceration\xa0was saved by a demanding chef\xa0and\xa0mentor he worked for in Detroit when he was\xa018. "I finally found a place that would push back on whatever energy level I would exert.... There was always something to do, and there were so many personalities. It just fit with the way my body and mind are wired."\xa0While working\xa0for the late, great Charlie Trotter in Chicago, he learned that "you can do anything with what you have, no matter what the\xa0situation\xa0or how deep or how tough."\xa0 \xa0 With Edwins, and the Leadership Institute he created alongside it, Brandon\xa0set a\xa0lofty goal: "changing the face of reentry, and that's going to take a couple of lifetimes, but I knew that the right lens could accelerate that." That lens turned\xa0out\xa0to be Tom Lennon's, and\xa0Knife Skills\xa0was the result.\xa0 \xa0 Was the making of\xa0Knife Skills\xa0a political statement? Tom says no:\xa0"I didn't have any agenda. I just stumbled into this, it sounded like a good story,\xa0and I\xa0just\xa0filmed what I found. I think that that was an advantage. I'm not sitting here preaching to you about a political assertion I'm already confident in. That's\xa0not\xa0what it is.\xa0I'm just having you encounter a bunch of people in a very, very dramatic and difficult situation at a very difficult stage in their lives...really anxious, vulnerable, complex people who are yearning to not screw up again....\xa0Then you, the viewer, I'm asking you to think about what you saw." \xa0 Take Marley,\xa0who\xa0says\xa0in\xa0Knife Skills\xa0that,\xa0in the throes of her\xa0drug\xa0addiction, "I'd wake up and be so mad to be alive." Marley has her ups and downs in the film, but\xa0all\xa0Brandon can do is provide a path to forgiveness:\xa0"I can't tell someone to be ready for this opportunity. What I can do is always leave that door open."\xa0Thinking\xa0about the process,\xa0Brandon\xa0told me:\xa0"When you're demanding excellence,\xa0you understand that\xa0maybe\xa0someone's not going to be able to do that, but can they do that for a moment, and\xa0can we make that moment a little longer each day,\xa0so that they can do that for an entire shift?....\xa0If you get the right heart in there, that has the right energy and affection, that will breed hospitality. We'll work on the finer points, but just give me someone who cares and is going to work hard." \xa0 When you listen to this moving episode of Special Sauce, you can't help but notice how honest Tom and Brandon are, much like the film itself. You can watch the film\xa0here. And after you do, I bet you'll join me in rooting for\xa0Knife Skills\xa0when you watch the Oscars.\xa0 \xa0 .......................... The full transcript for this episode can be found on Serious Eats:\xa0https://www.seriouseats.com/2018/03/special-sauce-the-team-behind-knife-skills-the-oscar-nominated-documentary.html