Phil Rosenthal serves up comfort food and memories at Max and Helen’s

After eight seasons traveling the world for his Netflix series “Somebody Feed Phil,” Phil Rosenthal’s next food adventure is keeping him much closer to home. The 65-year-old producer is opening a neighborhood spot in Los Angeles called Max and Helen’s.

“This is a hundred-year-old neighborhood,” Rosenthal said. “I want it to look like we found a hundred-year-old diner and it’s been here for a hundred years.”

The diner, set to open later this month in Larchmont, is named for Rosenthal’s late parents, who were regulars on his travel show and inspired characters in “Everybody Loves Raymond,” the CBS sitcom he created nearly 30 years ago.

The menu will lean on comfort food: Powdered donut holes, sourdough waffles with maple butter and fluffy scrambled eggs, a nod to his father’s favorite dish.

“My dad loved fluffy eggs so much on his tombstone, it says, ‘Are my eggs fluffy?'” Rosenthal said. “The lesson for me is, if you can find a simple joy in your life, maybe you’ll be happy every day.”

Rosenthal grew reflective when speaking about his father’s absence. 

“I’m getting a little emotional that he can’t be here for this perfect rendition of the thing he loved the most,” he said.

Building the world of “Everybody Loves Raymond”

Simplicity, Rosenthal said, has always been key to his work. “Everybody Loves Raymond” ran for nine years by avoiding topical humor. 

“You don’t put in Bill Clinton jokes in the ’90s,” he said. “You do the things that seem to be everlasting.”

After struggling to find a follow-up to the sitcom, Rosenthal pitched his Netflix show with one line: “I’m exactly like Anthony Bourdain if he was afraid of everything.” The food-and-travel series grew into a surprise hit, even drawing sold-out crowds when Rosenthal spoke about it on tour. “Ray [Romano] came out on stage with me and couldn’t believe the size of the crowd,” he said. 

Rosenthal has enlisted acclaimed chef Nancy Silverton as executive chef, while his soon-to-be son-in-law Mason Royal will run the kitchen. Beyond the food, he hopes the diner will anchor his neighborhood.

“Diners are disappearing from America,” he said. “These become centers of communities…. If the center of the community disappears, maybe you lose the sense of community and then maybe you lose the country. So I’m gonna fix everything with my diner.”

His production company is called Lucky Bastards, a label that still fits as he finds new joy in simple pleasures and fresh projects at 65.

But Rosenthal brushed off any suggestion of retirement. 

“I could. That’s not fun,” he said. “If you think you’ve got something to say or a point to make, or feel like your work is impacting on one guy or one little kid even, who wants to stop?”