Unfortunately, our first visit to Gjelina only got worse from there.

At least the restaurant itself was nice to look at.

The main room had black walls with flowery engravements, offset by rich, warm wood.

They used wine bottles as decoration in another back room, with empty bottles comprising a dramatic chandelier.

The outside area was a mix of luxe and laid back, with a dramatic opening to the sky, offset by the architecture's clean lines and softened by billowing trees.

A fireplace burned in the center.

The bathroom's were even nice—old timey white tiles with dark wood touches. And you turned on the faucet with a giant wheel.

The kitchen was viewable through a long rectangular window. From our vantage point we could see a number of very hot blond surfer/skater type men working diligently away. We made a mental note to sit at the table underneath the window next time.

That is, if there was a next time.

The buffalo mozzarella appetizer finally arrived 45 minutes after we ordered it and, surprisingly, it didn't disappoint. But as my companion said, "You can't fuck up fresh buffalo mozzarella." However, they would have several other opportunities to screw up. First, the fries: they were overly salty and very small. It was as if we got the last bits at the bottom of the batch. Fail. The artichokes arrived and they also tasted like they had been doused in a bucket of salt. (Side note — don't drink wine and eat artichokes at the same time. It creates a very bad chemical reaction in your mouth and makes the wine taste like crap.)

The plate that was to be the pièce de résistance—the pork belly— was lukewarm and not as crispy as advertised and, shocker (!), too salty. My friend and I realized that this was the last of our dishes. She looked over at me, and said, "Is this the kind of place where we spend $100 and are still so hungry we have to go to the taco truck afterwards?" Yes. sadly, it seemed it was.

But because I am nothing if not fair (and nice!), I went back a second time with a different friend. Our ditzy blonde waitress was replaced by a flirty, dark-haired hunk (major improvement!), who, when we asked him about dessert, said, lustily, "Oooooooh, yes, they are allllll verrrrryyyyyy gooood." We made him talk about the desserts at least three times. We were seated closer to the Window of Hot Chefs and next to the fire pit, which had distinct advantages (it caused our waiter, during his second recital of the dessert menu to say, "Oooh my ass is on fire!" which was amusing), and disadvantages (one side of our face was burning up.) This time, the food and service was better; the asparagus came with egg and parmesan cheese, a surprisingly good combination.

And, I should note, this time it wasn't too salty. The albacore tuna carpaccio-concoction was just right, and the margarita pizza was light and crisp; it was almost like eating a fancy, well-made cracker.

And the dessert? Soooo gooood. Some sort of butterscotch pecan goodness with a lime-like infusion in the whip cream. I left substantially fuller than the first time. Of course, this could be because I ate an entire plate of fettucine alfredo before leaving my house. So, verdict: Though it's improving in quality and service, Gjelina is still a place where you will spend $100 and leave hungry. But at least it's pretty!

But that's small change compared with the tactical maneuvers required for eating lunch. Imagine, if you will, Armani-uniformed agents standing in line with soccer moms at the Westfield mall's food court or balancing plastic trays loaded up with beer-battered chicken or Fuddruckers fries. "With all the suits and sunglasses, it feels like "The Matrix: The Food Court," joked manager-producer J.C. Spink ("A History of Violence").

And with such brazenly public dining come perils. "You can't really talk business because you've got CAA right there. And they've got us," said an ICM agent, who spoke on condition of anonymity (silence is the agency policy when dealing with the press). "I've heard people at CAA having their conversations — you can hear everything." [...]

"It's gotten worse in the last three weeks," said a retired banker waiting in a long line at Barenaked Yogurt.

Around him, people — many of them in suits — were balancing trays, looking desperately for a free table. One young man grunted, "This sucks!" as he wheeled around and continued his search in another direction.

With tensions running dangerously high on both sides from the uncomfortable, privacy-hampering proximity forced upon them by the cramped accommodations, it shouldn't be long before things escalate to actual violence. We predict that by the end of the month (see above for proof of our prescience in this matter), there will be daily skirmishes in which phalanxes of expendable assistants, armed with plastic tray shields and fistfuls of disposable cutlery, assemble at high noon at opposite ends of their casual-dining battlefield, poised to join in fierce hand-to-hand combat upon their bosses's orders to "Unleash hell, you little pee-ons!," with the agency left with the greatest number of uninjured, spork-wielding call-rollers awarded the prime tables next to the California Crisp.

[Photo: LAT]

• Power plays — for a food court table [LAT]
• Previously: CAA's Century City Invasion: So It Begins [Defamer]
• Talent Agency Exodus To Change The Face Of Power-Eating [Defamer]

With its baby-preparation facilities crippled by last week's kitchen explosion (quickly: do you remember exactly where you were when the Creative Artists Death Star nearly blew up?), nearby Century City eateries find themselves increasingly responsible for the feeding of swarms of hungry agents unwilling to gobble down their brown-bagged infants while sitting at their desks. The Knife looks at Century City bistro La Cachette, which has seen a healthy increase in business since CAA moved to the neighborhood:

At La Cachette, I don't think anyone has installed a Kevin Huvane mugshot at the hostess stand... yet. For now, they're treating everyone well. [...]

At lunch on Monday, the 100-seat dining room was about 50% filled. "We've definitely seen an increase since CAA moved to Century City," the hostess told me, smiling. "It's really nice."

While restaurants like La Cachette are enjoying the boost that being convenient to CAA brings, if they don't quickly tailor their culinary offerings to appeal to the baby-craving palates of their new customers, they'll inevitably lose the lucrative lunchtime business to casual eateries like the Fuddruckers at the Westfield Century City food court, which is already wooing time-conscious agency diners by offering a delicious menu of speciality burgers like the one pictured, available in an impressive variety of pre-cooking birth weights.

[Photo via BoingBoing]

• Public Service Announcement: La Cachette [The Knife]

I'd like to tell you all about my experience at the Century City Mall today.

I went to have lunch with a friend, excited for a fish taco or two. Upon entering the food court I suddenly found myself unable to speak freely about... Well.. Anything. Everywhere you look there is another anxious bulky CAA agent in a three piece suit. Kevin Huvane walked in with a pack of eager wannabees and literally held a conference by the sushi counter before leading the charge to Panda Express. It was a nightmare. My once innocent Century City hideaway has now been taken over!

Indeed, it's all unfolding exactly as we pictured it back in June; those who once enjoyed the mall's food court should just concede CAA's culinary Anschluss and save themselves a lot of pain. In the end, Kevin Huvane and company will strategically dominate all the best tables by the Panda Express (or the sushi joint, or that Brazilian place, should a Bryan Lourd feel kicky and demand churrascaria), even if it means assigning an around-the-clock detail of assistants to permanent seat-saving duty and polluting the dining area air with the constant chatter of calls being remotely rolled from their newest agency outpost.

"You feel as if you've been sucker punched, like the wind's knocked out of you," says former Warners production chief Bill Gerber, now a producer, who has survived stinkers like "The In-Laws." "It's agonizing. As a producer, you can be working on a movie for 10 years and then by Friday night, it's over. And it's a very public humiliation. It's tough walking into the Grill on Monday, feeling the pain." [...]

After a fall, some people flee the city, seeking refuge. Others stay inside, the doors closed and lights dim. When I had lunch with producer Brian Grazer after one of his movies fizzled, we stayed in his office instead of heading over to the Grill. "Going out is just too awkward," he explains. "Nobody knows what to say. And if I don't know what they mean when they say 'congratulations' after I've had a hit, how do I know what they mean when they say, 'Oh, I'm so sorry?' " [...]

Producer Steve Tisch hasn't forgotten the lonely feeling of having to put on a brave public face after making "The Postman," a costly 1997 Kevin Costner dud. "When you go to the Grill for your Monday lunch after you've had a $100-million movie that flops, you have the feeling as you're walking by everyone is whispering, 'There's the poor guy who produced "The Postman." ' It can be very humbling."

Since no one besides notorious iconoclast Grazer seems capable of simply not eating [SFX: audible gasp] at that particular restaurant on the day following a career setback, we offer a less practical, but perhaps more effective, solution than canceling one's lunch plans: Once one discovers that the weekend box office numbers are underwhelming enough to merit a day of nasty whispers and false expressions of consolation, one should immediately dispatch an assistant to burn The Grill to the ground. With the industry's Thunderdome of Schadenfraude gone, a suffering executive will be forced to seek out a more private lunchtime ritualistic humiliation, like trying to eat take-out in his office while wearing nothing but an adult diaper and a ball-gag.

• Flop Goes the Movie, in Hiding Goes the Exec [LAT]

I was waiting to eat at my favorite Silver Lake Vietnamese restaurant (Gingergrass) last night when I noticed that Kelly Lynch was in the restaurant and she was talking with the hostess. This restaurant is notorious for its super-long waits, but they are very fair with their first-come-first-serve seating. I decided to go have a listen to what they were talking about to make sure that Ms. Lynch wasn't pulling any shenanigans.

She actually told the hostess: "I'm Kelly Lynch. I'm not used to waiting. This is ridiculous."

The hostess responded by saying: "You are going to have to wait your turn like everyone else."

So props to the hostess for not bending in the face of marginal celebrity, and a big 'booo!' to Kelly Lynch for not leaving her pretensions west of Western where they belong.

Indeed, props to the hostess for at least temporarily popping the starfucking bubble, even in a part of town where they aren't as regularly challenged by waiting-averse celebs. Of course, Lynch hardly provides a sufficient test case for probing the limits of a restaurant's commitment to wait-list egalitarianism; should anyone witness another instance of celebrity smackdown (even Houston's in Century City draws the line somewhere) involving someone a hostess might reasonably be expected to recognize without the conspicuous self-identification of the desperate, let us know, and we'll keep a running tally.

[Photo: Getty Images]

• Houston’s Hierarchy Of Star Treatment [Defamer]
• Defamer PSA: Why Don't You Just Wait Your Turn, Owen Wilson? [Defamer]