NICKY BLAIR’S BASKS AGAIN IN SPOTLIGHT

Nicky Blair’s, 8730 Sunset Blvd. Open Monday-Saturday, 6 p.m. to 12:30 a.m.; Saturday, 6 to 11 p.m. All major cards accepted. Valet parking. Reservations advised: (213) 659-0929. Dinner for two: $50 to $100 (food only).

“This time,” said Nicky Blair, “I am going to have good food. People are going to come because of the food. Not because it is Nicky Blair. Not because of the stars. . . . “

Fat chance. There are stars to pale the Milky Way. Blair’s own shining galaxy. Also directors. Famous directors. Also fellow restaurateurs come to pay their respects in that nice custom they have. “My friends,” Blair says, including them all.

Actually, the food is good. Not up there with the great originals, clinging a little stubbornly to “the way my mother showed me,” not quite tuned to the siren call of the new. But it is respected food, given its dignity, not awkward or pudgy or out of place in the persnickety post-nouvelle restaurant world of Los Angeles, but probably not at all the reason for going. That is still Nicky Blair.

He describes himself as “the most well-known unknown.” He has made 70-80 movies, been in some 100 TV shows, “But no one ever saw the pictures. No one thinks of me as an actor. I am known as a restaurateur.” Fine with him.

That reputation was built when he first came to Hollywood--more or less accidentally--and made linguine and osso buco for his starving actor friends. In a somewhat familiar scenario, Henry Miller told him he was a natural for the restaurant business. So he started as a partner with Steve Crane at Stefanino’s in 1966, left to open the first Nicky Blair’s in 1971. It was the former La Rue, transformed to a sort of Chasen’s-gentleman’s-library look of crimson and polished woods. An immediate success, it ended abruptly with a disastrous fire in 1975.

Broke and broken-hearted, unable to find another location, Blair went off to London, discovered all his actor friends already there. So--why not a restaurant? He found a location in Berkeley Square, worked on it for nine months, was ready to open when the deal fell through.

Back to Hollywood a few months ago, and where he likes it best--on the Sunset Strip. He says he had no trouble at all in finding investors--”over-subscribed, really”--nor, it appears, an immediately loyal clientele.

In a former bank building, the restaurant is not restaurant-shaped, with a sort of entrance lobby, tables set on both sides of a long, narrow brass and glass bar, the dining room beyond, its form governed by bearing pillars. It is finished in neutral, background colors, hung with paintings by John Paul Brown and Henry Miller, a costume sketch from “Prizzi’s Honor” on one wall, W. C. Fields dominating another. It is comfortable, and rightfully unobtrusive. One does not look at the room. One looks at Suzanne Pleshette in the next booth.

I am not a star-gazer, and I have no intention of rolling through those sonorous names, but there is no doubt they pull a room taut, add a special kind of electricity. They know each other. They wander, and embrace and talk to each other. And, of course, we know them, too--in a way that is an odd sort of unreal reality. “It is like a club,” says Blair with satisfaction. In a way, it is their club; many are investors. And there we are, almost members.

With Le Dome next door and La Toque just down the street, Sunset Strip begins to remind of its old self, when Ciro’s and the Mocambo glittered and sparked above the city’s lights, and there seemed to be all sorts of reasons to laugh. Perhaps. . . .

Blair is serious about the food. He interviewed chefs from New York to San Francisco, has already let one go in favor of Raffaele Marsilio, who comes from Washington, D.C., but has been in Los Angeles at Romeo and Juliet, and at Verdi. Unfortunately for this review, he was in the kitchen for only the last of our meals. The direction of the menu--which will be completely changed every three months--is clear, however, and Marsilio’s particular talents are discernible.

He has a fine palate. I was impressed with the sauce for a seafood salad--mussels, scallops, shrimp, squid, more seafood than salad, and all very fresh and good--that started with a complexity of low tones--balsamic vinegar and olive oil, I think--then progressed to the higher, lighter tastes of blended herbs. Peppers and anchovies were as well prepared as I have ever had them, their strong flavors somehow allowing room for a quick flash of fresh basil. Seafood pasta ( linguine alla pescatora ) balanced tastes with similar dexterity, the pasta and the clams, shrimp, mussels, etc., given first place, but quickened by the sauce. No complaints for either the veal sauteed with mushrooms, or the fillet of beef with green peppercorns. Although neither had the distinction of the beginning courses, the meats were of good quality and nicely handled. Sauteed mushrooms and well prepared asparagus accompanied. Blair has no intention of scattering baby vegetables on his plates. One at a time, and enough so it can be tasted.

The menu is neither extensive nor innovative. These are familiar dishes for the most part, but considerably lightened since Nicky Blair’s I, if I remember correctly. Pastas are made with vegetables, fresh tomatoes, fresh herbs, etc. Radicchio , porcini , and carpaccio were unknown on that early menu. The heavy meat and tomato sauces have given way to rosemary, tarragon, basil, white wine, butter, peppercorns, etc. Blair defines it as “traditional but light.” But, he adds, there are some things you cannot change. And--there are some old friends worth keeping. On the whole, the prognosis is favorable.

Service is good at the restaurant, efficient without undue formality. Blair feels strongly about the importance of good service, and he wants it friendly. He has already fired a maitre d’ for accepting $20 for a good table. “I am the $20.” There are familiar faces about. Bob Fidler, who owned Cyrano’s, is advising and consulting. Roger Bourban, our long-distance runner, is ably managing the dining room. The wine list has a pleasant assortment of the standard good names at reasonable prices. The restaurant is open late for after-theater people, and lunch is promised in about six to eight weeks.