Locanda Veneta Duo Look West

Antonio Tomassi and Jean-Louis DeMori own Ca’Brea on La Brea and Locanda Veneta on 3rd Street. Michael Ovitz likes Locanda’s food so much, sources say, that he occasionally asks the chefs to come to his Creative Artists Agency kitchen to cook him lunch. Now we hear Tomassi and DeMori have negotiated a lease to open a third place in the Executive Life Insurance Building on Olympic in West Los Angeles, just west of the 405 Freeway. The restaurant will be called Il Moro. DeMori is out of the country, and Tomassi did not return calls.

THE REVOLVING KITCHEN DOOR I: Chef Jeanette Holley, who opened Georgia (see First Impressions), has already left the Melrose Avenue restaurant. The owners felt they needed a chef with more experience in the Southern style of cooking. “Southern food is what I grew up on,” Holley says. “My father taught me how to cook it.”

“We just went as far as we could go with Jeanette,” says Georgia’s Brad Johnson. “When Edna Lewis (the legendary New York chef and Southern cookbook author) couldn’t come here to consult on the menu, we had to rearrange our plans.” Richard Hughes, who has Southern cooking experience, has taken over as executive chef at Georgia.

THE REVOLVING KITCHEN DOOR II: Joe D. Cochran Jr. has left the Surf & Sand Hotel in Laguna Beach, where he cooked since he left Loews Santa Monica Beach Hotel last September. . . . In February, Vaughn Allen walked away from Tatou restaurant/nightclub in Beverly Hills to cook at the Hollywood Canteen (before that he cooked at Restaurant Muse, Asylum, Melrose Place). Now he’s left Hollywood Canteen, to cook at the Broadway Deli in Santa Monica.

OPENINGS: Yet another McCormick & Schmick’s will open on May 4. This one’s in Pasadena; the seafood chain’s two other Southern California locations are in downtown Los Angeles and Irvine. . . . The first full-service Salud! restaurant will open May 1 in Agoura. The healthy, lard-free Mexican chain features everything from whole-wheat tortillas to shrimp taquitos to skinless char-grilled chicken. . . .

Ciao Trattoria will open downtown on Tuesday in the old Seventh Street Bistro space. . . . Chaco, a Japanese restaurant from former Katsu chef Mitsuro Ojima, has opened on Camden in Beverly Hills. . . . And a 35-seat Pizza Hut, which just opened in the Anaheim Marriott, features an all-you-can-drink beverage bar, and room service pizza delivery for hotel guests.