Short Film Shares Pandemic Journey Of G’s Southern Kitchen

SARASOTA, FL — Oxtail, collard greens, mac and cheese.

That’s what filmmaker Colin Reid ordered during his first visit to G’s Southern Kitchen in 2019 after the soul food restaurant opened at Bobby Jones Golf Club.

“It was delicious,” he said.

Reid was familiar with charismatic chef and restaurateur Gordon Gregory from his time at the popular Nancy’s Bar-B-Q restaurant.

It was Gregory's charisma and personality — coupled with the story of how the pandemic shut down the golf course and eventually caused the restaurant to lose its brick-and-mortar space — that led to Reid filming a short documentary about G's Southern Kitchen. The film, also called "G's Southern Kitchen," is part of this year's Sarasota Film Festival.

While working as a videographer for a local newspaper group, Reid and his coworkers frequented Nancy’s Bar-B-Q and got to know Gregory, who worked front of house and later as pit master at the restaurant.

“I remember my first interaction with him,” Reid said. “He asked if my friend and I were day traders, which I thought was really funny because I was making no money. He was always really funny, and he had this big energy to him.”

He was happy to see that Gregory launched his own restaurant and seemed to be doing well in the Bobby Jones clubhouse.

“It was great. We were on an uptick. The golfers were coming around to us and people were finally noticing us there,” Gregory said.

The Effects Of COVID-19

Reid, who grew up in Sarasota, moved to St. Petersburg not long after his first visit to G’s Southern Kitchen. He didn’t have a chance to return to the restaurant until February, nearly a year after the start of the COVID-19 pandemic.

By then, the city-owned golf course had been shut down. Sarasota closed Bobby Jones in March 2020 because of the pandemic. With a potential renovation of the property in the works, city commissioners decided it should remain closed while they determined the golf course’s future.

“The golf course was closed. The grass was dead. I guess they thought it was easier to stop maintaining it to save money and prepare the course for renovations,” Reid said. “G’s was struggling. That’s when I realized there was probably more of a story there.”

The restaurant — which catered to two different audiences, golfers and soul food fans — was drawing only a fraction of the business it enjoyed when it first launched. The golfers, ordering from a special quick-fire menu with items like burgers and hot dogs, and of course, beer, accounted for most of Gregory’s business when he opened. He was still building a customer base for his soul food menu when the golf course closed.

“We were considered essential workers providing nourishment and were allowed to remain open,” Gregory said. “But 60 percent of our business went away with the golfers. We were still able to do the takeout and we were able to coast along.”

Reid added, “Those golfers gave him the operating income he needed to focus on building his business.”

And with the golf course set to be demolished, G’s Southern Kitchen was eventually forced to move out of the clubhouse, leaving the restaurant without a home at the end of March.

Making The Documentary

After finishing his meal during that February visit, Reid asked Gregory to sit for an interview for a short documentary about how the pandemic affected G’s Southern Kitchen.

Through his production company, Waevy Films, Reid creates short films for corporations and nonprofits.

“Most of the time, you have to really, really dig to make magic happen, because it’s not always there, and you have to storyboard a lot,” Reid said. “But with (Gregory) it was just a very natural conversation, because he’s very conversational and he was willing to put everything out there.”

They filmed a three-hour interview March 1, and Reid condensed it into a short film just under 8 minutes long in time for the 2021 Sarasota Film Festival.

“G’s Southern Kitchen” will screen with other short films by Sarasota filmmakers Tuesday at CMX CineBistro in Siesta Key. It’s also available for virtual screenings through Sunday, the final day of the film festival.

The Push He Needed To Follow His Dreams

Expecting to focus mainly on the COVID-19 pandemic, Reid was surprised that the primary story to emerge in his film was the relationship between Gregory and his wife, Naquila.

She pushed him to open his own restaurant by threatening to walk away from their marriage, Gregory said. “She’s the reason for everything I’m doing.”

He started his culinary journey simply as a way to impress Naquila, then still his girlfriend when he first started cooking for her.

“When we were friends and started dating, I was always trying to do something a little different to stand out from everybody else,” he said. “Every day I wanted to come up with something different. It drove me to learn how to get those flavors and learn how to create something with whatever we have in the pantry or leftovers. You can’t be a one-trick pony. You need to constantly reinvent yourself. I’ve got to outdo the day before, anything I’ve cooked for her before. I’m always trying to one-up myself.

His first restaurant jobs were at McDonald’s and Arby’s. Even in these roles, Gregory was known for playing around in the kitchen, “coming up with my own things and doing different things than what was supposed to be done,” he said.

He went on to complete Keiser University’s intensive culinary program and found work as a sous chef at the Palm Aire Country Club and, eventually, as pit master at Nancy’s Bar-B-Que, where he discovered a love for smoked meats.

Eventually, he also launched G’s Southern Kitchen as a catering business on the side, which built a following. He and Naquila, who have been together for 19 years, married and grew their family, as well.

“We were at a place in our life where things were comfortable. We weren’t ok, but we were getting by,” Gregory said. “We always talked about opening a restaurant and getting a food truck, but were always bogged down by life, taking care of the kids, taking care of other family members, just life in general. But something had to change, because the kids were getting older, we were getting more bills and we were living paycheck to paycheck while working two or three jobs just to get by.”

He added, “I don’t want to say we were at each other’s throats, but when finances are pretty strict and tough, some days are harder than others.”

Naquila often urged him to focus on G’s Southern Kitchen full time, but Gregory always hesitated.

“I saw it as additional income and she saw it as a way of life,” he said.

Then, Nancy’s decided to open a second location in Lakewood Ranch. Gregory was offered the manager’s position for this new restaurant. In addition to a company car and pay increase, he was also given permission to curate the menu.

“The only stipulation was that I had to put everything aside. I could only focus on (Nancy’s). I could not do anything with G’s Southern Kitchen,” he said. “That was the straw that broke the camel’s back. After building up to where we were after five years, (Naquila) wasn’t going to accept that.”

She gave him an ultimatum: focus on G’s Southern Kitchen and building his own business or she was done with their marriage.

“It was hurting her seeing me not push up to my full potential,” he said. “She was willing to walk away from a 20-year relationship because her partner is giving less of himself to himself and more to other people.”

It was the push he needed to take a chance on G’s Southern Kitchen.

“He put in his two weeks notice right after that conversation,” Reid said. “It was amazing to hear this story from him. She wanted him to have the confidence in himself to open his own restaurant and to invest in himself. He was willing to put it all out there when talking to me.”

It was interesting to screen the short film, once it was completed, with the couple, he added.

“When we got to the part where she gave him this ultimatum, ‘You’re getting this restaurant or I’m leaving,’ she was just nodding her head as if saying, ‘That’s right,’” he said.

Gregory said he was “astonished” by the film.

“I didn’t really know what to expect. I was like, ‘Oh my god, that’s us,’” he said. “Then I thought, ‘Oh my god, you went through all that s***.”

The Future Of G's Southern Kitchen

The film doesn’t highlight every twist and turn of Gregory’s culinary career. Instead, Reid considers it “more of an emotionally based portrait of someone.”

And though G’s Southern Kitchen was forced to leave Bobby Jones and no longer has a brick-and-mortar location, the story ends on a note of optimism, he said. “It’s a hopeful ending. He’s not done.”

Gregory plans to launch G’s Southern Kitchen as a food trailer by mid-May. In the meantime, as he finalizes the details, he continues to build the restaurant’s social media presence, connecting with fans of his soul food.

“We’re getting inboxed daily. When are you open? Are you doing a pop-up? Where can I get some egg rolls? Where can I get some of those chicken wings? We’re appreciative of all the support we’re getting and excited for the future,” he said. “We can’t wait to get back at it. We want people to know we haven’t stopped. We didn’t quit. We didn’t allow the pandemic to stop us from getting to the spot that we’re trying to get to. And we’re not letting it keep us down. We’re going to be slinging them wings again soon.”

“G’s Southern Kitchen” was selected for the 2021 Sarasota Film Festival. It will be screened Tuesday, 4:30 p.m., at CMX CineBistro in Siesta Key as part of Sarasota Shorts, a collection of new short films by Sarasota filmmakers, and can be watched virtually.