Voted by People Magazine in 1987 as the “Sexiest Man Alive,” actor, author, and entrepreneur Harry Hamlin has been working in TV, film, and on stage for over four decades. He is presently the star of a new 30-minute AMC show, In the Kitchen with Harry Hamlin, which will be available on AMC+ in July. The five-episode show is a combination of cooking, dinner party, and documentary complete with VIP guests, humor, and real recipes. Hamlin is also shooting the second season of Anne Rice’s Mayfair Witches, in which he plays Cortland Mayfair.
Originally known for his role in the TV series, L.A. Law (for which he received three Golden Globe nominations), Hamlin also earned a Primetime Emmy nomination for Mad Men. Among his countless other roles, he starred as Perseus in the fantasy film, Clash of the Titans.
A Yale University graduate, Hamlin next earned a Master of Fine Arts from the American Conservatory Theater. He is also the author of Full Frontal Nudity: The Making of an Accidental Actor, a memoir of his early years. In addition, Hamlin is an advocate for fusion power and is co-founder of TAE Technologies (formerly known as Tri Alpha Energy), a company developing a clean, non-radioactive fusion power generator.
He and his actress wife, Lisa Rinna (The Real Housewives of Beverly Hills), have two adult daughters and Hamlin has an older son with actress Ursula Andress. We caught up with the sexiest man alive at his home in Los Angeles.
Food & Travel Magazine Exclusive Interview
Let’s talk about cooking. Did your mother or father cook?
Yes. I was raised right after World War II, so they were used to rationing. My father would cook exotic things like beef tongue, then the next week, pickled beef tongue, then oxtails, which is just a cow’s tail, then the next week, pickled ox tails. We had lots of interesting food when I was growing up.
If you’ve ever read Ulysses by James Joyce, Leopold Bloom is described for the first time as a man who “ate with relish the inner organs of beasts and fowl.” My father was the same way, in that he liked inner organs. So, he was always picking up kidneys or beef hearts or brains. For example, every Christmas morning, before we could open the presents, you had to eat his brains with burned butter; that was a Christmas tradition. Over the years, we had to develop a taste for his brains.
When did you become interested in cooking?
We have a cabin in Canada that’s been in my family for 102 years. Back in the day, it was very remote. There were no restaurants, so if you wanted to eat, you had to cook. And that’s when I started to cook,