Another Ramsay TV chef suicide
By LORENA MONGELLI, JEANE MacINTOSH and DAN MANGAN
Last Updated: 2:24 PM, September 28, 2010
Posted: 2:25 AM, September 28, 2010
A New Jersey restaurateur once featured on Gordon Ramsay's "Kitchen Nightmares" -- and told by the TV chef that his debt-ridden eatery was "about to swim down the Hudson" -- was eerily found floating in the river after jumping off the George Washington Bridge.
Joseph Cerniglia, the 39-year-old owner of Campania in Fair Lawn, is the second chef to commit suicide after appearing on one of Ramsay's high-heat, reality-cooking series.
Cerniglia -- once the executive chef at Manhattan's famed Gallagher's Steak House -- had been deeply in debt when his Italian eatery was featured in the first season of "Kitchen Nightmares" in 2007.
CAN'T STAND HEAT: Joseph Cerniglia (above left), talking to Gordon Ramsay about his troubled restaurant, Campania, committed suicide, just as Rachel Brown, another Ramsay TV chef, did.
Fox photos
CAN'T STAND HEAT: Joseph Cerniglia (above left), talking to Gordon Ramsay about his troubled restaurant, Campania, committed suicide, just as Rachel Brown, another Ramsay TV chef, did.
During the series, foul-mouthed celebrity foodie Ramsay would verbally bash down-on-their-luck restaurateurs in hopes of getting them back on track.
"Your business is about to f - - king swim down the Hudson," the brash Brit berated Cerniglia, a married dad of three who lived in Pompton Lakes.
Ramsay fumed about the eatery's huge portions, lousy food quality, poor service and the sophomoric antics of the kitchen staff.
"Why did you become a chef-owner if you haven't a clue how to run a business?" Ramsay railed at Cerniglia.
Cerniglia conceded that "Campania definitely has its share of problems, big problems."
He noted that the once-popular restaurant had fallen into desperate straits.
"I'm financially in trouble -- the debt of the restaurant alone is overwhelming. My personal debt -- wife, kids mortgage -- that's a lot of debt," he moaned on the show.
"I owe my purveyors about $80,000 right now in cold, hard cash . . . I can't see us going on another year."
Cerniglia's wife, Melissa, sobbed during the show, "People like us put everything on the line for a dream, and I just want to see him have the time to succeed.
"If this business fails, we will lose everything."
Cerniglia's business managed to survive after Ramsay made a series of changes and held a grand reopening.
In fact, patrons yesterday said the eatery had been thriving.
"The place is really doing well -- the parking lot is packed on weekends," said a woman who works at the tanning salon next door.
Another salon worker, Evelina Grzymala, 22, said Cerniglia was grateful to Ramsey for helping him turn his business around.
"[Cerniglia] said Ramsey was intense but that he turned out to be a nice guy, that in the end, he helped him out," Grzymala recalled.
"I don't believe Joe's gone," she said sadly. "I saw him here last week, and he was on his cellphone, waving and walking by, like he always did."
Cerniglia killed himself Friday afternoon. Authorities said a motorist called 911 after seeing a man standing on the George Washington Bridge just before 1 p.m. His body was later recovered from the river.
Cerniglia's family posted a message on his Facebook page saying they wanted "to thank all of the friends that have sent their condolences" -- and asked that financial donations be sent in lieu of flowers to support his widow and their three sons, Evan, Michael and Nicholas.
In a statement issued this morning, Ramsay said, "I was fortunate to spend time with Joe during the first season of 'Kitchen Nightmares.' Joe was a brilliant chef, and our thoughts go out to his family, friends and staff."
The first person to star in a Ramsay show and then kill herself was chef Rachel Brown.
Brown, 41, competed on Ramsay's "Hell's Kitchen" -- a series pitting aspiring chefs against each other -- in 2006.
She had been eliminated on the fifth episode, but returned to the series for the finale to help chef Heather West nab the top prize.
Brown shot herself to death in her family's Dallas home a year later.
