He was leaving anyway. But Anthony Bourdain's eight years with the Travel Channel are ending on a sour note after the celebrity chef noticed, while watching the final episodes of No Reservations, that some shots had been re-edited to give the impression that he was endorsing Cadillac. In a lengthy blog post titled "Fighting Mad," Bourdain says his contract with the network stipulated that he wouldn't be forced into product promotion—a decision he reached after some fans trashed him for product placement of a credit card on the show. "So it came as a shock and a disappointment to turn on the TV for the last two episodes of my show, and see that someone had taken footage that me and my creative team had shot for my show, cut it up and edited it together with scenes of a new Cadillac driving through the forest," Bourdain writes. "Scenes of me, my face, and with my voice, were edited in such a way as to suggest that I might be driving that Cadillac." Bourdain, who is moving on to host a new weekend program on CNN premiering in April, refers to the Cadillac situation as "an inglorious way to go out" at the Travel Channel, and adds, "All of us on the show would have preferred to go out on a high note." Meanwhile, the Travel Channel offers this response to The Hollywood Reporter:"We've enjoyed a long and mutually beneficial relationship with Tony and his production team, but his decision to make further remarks on this matter in the public domain is unfortunate." Hat tip to Billboard's Katie Morse.
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