Marc and Lisa Cara Donna from Kitchen Nightmares’ Barefoot Bob’s restaurant are not divorced, but they have moved on from the restaurant.
The “Barefoot Bob’s” episode of Kitchen Nightmares has become infamous, not only for the restaurant’s poor business practices, but also because of the owners’ strained relationship.
However, the rumors that Marc and Lisa got divorced after the Barefoot Bob’s episode aired are simply not true.
The “Barefoot Bob’s” Kitchen Nightmares episode
The acclaimed celebrity chef, Gordon Ramsay visited all kinds of restaurants over the course of his show, Kitchen Nightmares’ initial seven-season run. But only a few of these episodes are still spoken about to this day.
Barefoot Bob’s is a small seaside restaurant, located in the town of Hull, Massachusetts, which was featured on the sixth season of the reality series. This restaurant has kept fans talking years down the road for many different reasons.
The truth behind the rumored divorce at Kitchen Nightmares’ Barefoot Bob’s
The “Barefoot Bob’s” episode of Kitchen Nightmares first aired back in December 2012 and followed Ramsay as he attempted to save this restaurant from financial ruin.
It was evident from the very start of the episode that Barefoot Bob’s two owners, Marc Cara Donna and Lisa Cara Donna, were to blame for many of the issues which were plaguing the restaurant before Ramsay arrived.
Marc had taken on too much trying to balance being the restaurant’s owner and its inexperienced head Chef. Moreover, Lisa was constantly shirking her responsibility for managing the front-of-house and disappearing on vacations.
And although it is common for the owners of the restaurants that appear on Kitchen Nightmares to have just as much drama going on in their personal lives as they do in their businesses, the Cara Donnas’ marriage and business had become so intertwined that they could no longer separate personal- and work-related issues.
Even though Ramsay eventually ended up helping the Cara Donnas to see the error of their ways by the end of the episode, fans could not help but speculate about their lives later on.
In fact, some fans even went as far as to speculate that Lisa may have been cheating on her husband and that the Cara Donnas had gotten a divorce after their episode aired on Kitchen Nightmares.
However, it seems as though the fears which Marc uttered on the episode about his marriage not being able to survive if Barefoot Bob’s were to ever close down, did not, in fact, realise.
Both Marc and Lisa’s Facebook profiles confirm that they are still married, even though they have since moved on from the restaurant.
Is Barefoot Bob’s still open?
By the end of the 2012, the “Barefoot Bob’s” episode, Ramsay had managed to update the restaurant’s interior and menu.
He also brought in a business consultant to get the business’s budget back on track, and he had helped improve the communication between Marc, Lisa and the rest of their restaurant staff.
However, it seems like all of these changes were simply not enough to keep the doors open. And Barefoot Bob’s closed down only a few years later in 2016, without so much as a social media announcement.
What happened to Marc and Lisa after the Barefoot Bob’s episode aired?
Although Marc and Lisa have never given the public an official reason for why Barefoot Bob’s eventually closed down, many fans have speculated that the couple did revert back to their old menu and décor after the publicity of the show closed down, and that this may have caused their business to decline again.
Either way, it seems like Marc and Lisa have since moved on with their lives, and have even moved away from Hull, Massachusetts, where the restaurant was located.
Where to watch Kitchen Nightmares
If delving deeper into the personal lives of Barefoot Bob’s ex-owners has reignited your love for Kitchen Nightmares, or you simply want to judge for yourself what was transpiring beneath the surface of Marc and Lisa’s marriage in this episode, there are plenty of places where you can watch Kitchen Nightmares online.
The first six seasons of Kitchen Nightmares are available to stream on a range of streaming platforms, like Hulu, Tubi and fubo TV, and a select few seasons are on Discovery+ and Crackle.
However, if you want to avoid adding yet another subscription-based streaming service to your monthly list of expenses, you may be better off purchasing the show on platforms like Amazon Prime Video, Google Play.
Of course, you can also access the series for free on platforms like Freevee, Pluto TV or the Peacock free subscription plan.
