Though she’s been gone for 17 years, the hometown French chef, Julia Child, proves more popular than ever. She was the topic of the movie “Julie & Julia,” which starred Meryl Streep as the strapping chef. She’s the subject of a recent documentary titled “Julia” and was the heroine in a best-selling book about her. She plays the ghostly mentor on a new cooking competition for the Food Network. And now HBO Max is serving up “Julia,” a drama about her extraordinary life on March 31. Back in 1963 when Child first appeared on the fuzzy black-and-white cathode tube, who would’ve guessed that America…