By Richard L. Eldredge

The Atlanta Journal-Constitution

Twenty years ago, Melissa Libby was a young public relations director woefully behind schedule on a day-long media tour with the world’s most famous TV chef.

Julia Child, in town for an American Institute of Wine and Food event, had thrown Libby’s itinerary hopelessly out of whack with an unscheduled detour to Carter-Barnes Hair Artisans for a quick wash and set.

There was no time left for lunch.

Libby was on the verge of panic until Child cooed from the backseat: “Is there a McDonald’s nearby? I like McDonald’s. It’s always consistent. Plus, we can eat in the car.”

“I was horrified!” recalls Libby, who is now one of Atlanta’s leading restaurant and food and wine public relations experts.

Minutes later, Libby’s Honda Civic was idling in the drive-thru of the Mickey D’s on Roswell Road near Wieuca Road with Child’s “newly coiffed hair grazing the roof.”

“The French Chef” ordered a very American cheeseburger, fries and a shake and insisted on paying for Libby’s lunch.

With Friday’s release of the much-anticipated foodie flick “Julie & Julia,” countless Atlantans are fondly recalling their close encounters with the vertically blessed late TV icon who made numerous trips to Atlanta through the years.

In 1999, the PBS pioneer was in town for a public television fund-raiser at Georgia Public Television. Child and co-host Burt Wolf were to preside over a live three-hour, five-course progressive dinner via satellite with PBS chefs Martin Yan, Jacques Pepin, Nathalie Dupree, Lidia Matticchio Bastianich and Paul Prudhomme cooking in various cities with Child sampling the finished courses in Atlanta.

Even then, at the advanced age of 87, Child, clad in a bright red jacket and matching lipstick, was eagerly anticipating the feast.

She was so enthusiastic that she momentarily panicked the scurrying GPTV crew when she began snacking on Yan’s lobster pot stickers before the broadcast was beamed back to her.

As technicians yelled, “Julia’s eating, Julia’s eating!” in the broadcast booth, Child’s cool-headed longtime producer Geoffrey Drummond shrugged and explained: “Julia once told me that in France, as soon as you’re served, you eat.”

Between bites, Child trilled to the camera: “Your support is nice, but we need your money!”

Marcia Killingsworth helped to oversee the broadcast.

Later, at a post-show cocktail party in Child’s honor, Killingsworth somewhat sheepishly approached the author with a copy of her latest book, “Julia & Jacques: Cooking at Home.”

The book had inspired Killingsworth to get back into the kitchen, preparing many of the dishes the two chefs playfully argued about throughout the tome.

“She was delighted to see all the spilled stuff all over it,” Killingsworth remembers. “It was a mess, but she said that was the highest compliment I could pay her.”

Author and former CNN reporter Carolyn O’Neil, who took in an early screening of the Meryl Streep movie, marvels at director Nora Ephron’s attention to detail.

“The moment that brought nostalgic tears was the scene filmed outside Julia’s home on Irving Street in Cambridge [Mass.],” O’Neil says. “I stood on that porch and in her kitchen and had lunch in that back garden. Ephron did an excellent job with the details, down to all those [Julia-like] jaunty broaches!”

Shortly before her death in 2004 at age 91, O’Neil received a blue Tiffany & Co. box from Child in the mail as she was moving from Cambridge to California. Inside were original yellowed, hand-written, ingredient-splattered cocktail recipes by Julia’s late husband Paul Child (memorably portrayed in “Julie & Julia” by Stanley Tucci). Enclosed was a note from Julia: “Carolyn Dear, You figure out what to do with these.” Might her beloved International Association of Culinary Professionals Foundation use these as a fund-raising auction item?

Recalled O’Neil at the time: “Tiffany’s couldn’t have put a better treasure inside.”