Uploaded January 2026 | Updated September 2026, 3 weeks ago
Wey revisits early-career footage as past choices and present tensions collide. A Cannes premiere begins in triumph, then unravels when accusations overshadow the celebration. Power shifts, alliances strain and the filmmaking itself is challenged. What starts as victory becomes reckoning, pointing toward an unavoidable second season.
Chef Wey catches up with a vendor from the St. Roch Market, whose successful juice stand blossomed into several locations. But before Wey can finish his lecture on racial disparity to the well-meaning white man, he interrupts himself from the editing suite, visibly frustrated by his own line of questioning. Benjamin Friedman, who documented much of Wey’s early career, joins Tunde and Theo in the editing suite to watch his footage of Tunde's first tour a decade prior. Wey reminisces about the nerve-wrecking moments and crucial conversations that Ben miraculously captured during that pivotal time. An unexpected invitation makes the final test screening a celebration, setting up a dramatic finale centering on an allegation of racism at the show’s world premiere in Cannes. A week of extravagant dinners and dizzying photoshoots against the lush views of the French Riviera culminate in the red carpet premiere. The festivities continue into the premiere afterparty where things turn sour when members of the HARD TO SWALLOW team are accosted. The fallout from the incident is intense, tedious, and thoroughly documented, but the understanding of the story is up for debate. Noone is safe in this project, as Theo’s motivations come into question and Tunde’s evolving perspective begins to contradict his prior statements. In the end, the only answer is a second season.
A poetic food show chronicling the life and perspective of Nigerian chef / writer Tunde Wey. The edgy series recounts Wey’s explosive career while building a critique of the social structures that disenfranchise Black peoples globally.
A food show not about food - following Nigerian chef/writer Tunde Wey across America as he investigates the ways food culture and power are shaped by race and class. With unsparing interviews, poetic narration and a self-reflexive storyline, Tunde reveals his own hypocrisies while calling out others, prompting viewers to rethink their own position in systems of power. Unlike any food show before, and despite the chef’s exceptional taste, this show may be… Hard To Swallow.
A film by Tunde Wey & Theo Schear
2025 © Licensed by First Hand Films
Wey revisits early-career footage as past choices and present tensions collide. A Cannes premiere begins in triumph, then unravels when accusations overshadow the celebration. Power shifts, alliances strain and the filmmaking itself is challenged. What starts as victory becomes reckoning, pointing toward an unavoidable second season.
Chef Wey catches up with a vendor from the St. Roch Market, whose successful juice stand blossomed into several locations. But before Wey can finish his lecture on racial disparity to the well-meaning white man, he interrupts himself from the editing suite, visibly frustrated by his own line of questioning. Benjamin Friedman, who documented much of Wey’s early career, joins Tunde and Theo in the editing suite to watch his footage of Tunde's first tour a decade prior. Wey reminisces about the nerve-wrecking moments and crucial conversations that Ben miraculously captured during that pivotal time. An unexpected invitation makes the final test screening a celebration, setting up a dramatic finale centering on an allegation of racism at the show’s world premiere in Cannes. A week of extravagant dinners and dizzying photoshoots against the lush views of the French Riviera culminate in the red carpet premiere. The festivities continue into the premiere afterparty where things turn sour when members of the HARD TO SWALLOW team are accosted. The fallout from the incident is intense, tedious, and thoroughly documented, but the understanding of the story is up for debate. Noone is safe in this project, as Theo’s motivations come into question and Tunde’s evolving perspective begins to contradict his prior statements. In the end, the only answer is a second season.
A poetic food show chronicling the life and perspective of Nigerian chef / writer Tunde Wey. The edgy series recounts Wey’s explosive career while building a critique of the social structures that disenfranchise Black peoples globally.
A food show not about food - following Nigerian chef/writer Tunde Wey across America as he investigates the ways food culture and power are shaped by race and class. With unsparing interviews, poetic narration and a self-reflexive storyline, Tunde reveals his own hypocrisies while calling out others, prompting viewers to rethink their own position in systems of power. Unlike any food show before, and despite the chef’s exceptional taste, this show may be… Hard To Swallow.
A film by Tunde Wey & Theo Schear
2025 © Licensed by First Hand Films
