The show’s almost over

Christine Carrillo

A gray cloud hovered over Birraporetti’s on Sunday as customers

and employees entered the restaurant for the last time.

During a so-long salute to the Italian restaurant and Irish bar,

people within the restaurant expressed their bewilderment at the fact

that, as of today, its doors will no longer welcome them inside.

For 15 years, Birraporetti’s has been a central part of the Orange

County performing arts scene as a before-and after-show place to head

at South Coast Plaza. But rising rental costs finally were too much,

and as a result owners decided to close the doors, said restaurant

manager Bonny Rago.

Representatives of South Coast Plaza’s owner, C.J. Segerstrom and

Sons, could not be reached for comment.

“I think that it’s very sad,” said Signe Dunn, a Newport Beach

resident who has been going to the restaurant since it opened. “It’s

sad that commercial interests are taking an Orange County-style

restaurant and pushing it out.”

However, the restaurant may be out for now but not for good.

Restaurant owners have plans to reopen the restaurant in the

Newport-Mesa area in the near future, said Rago, who has worked at

the restaurant for nearly seven years.

And even without an exact location or time frame established,

customers and employees alike are just waiting for word of the

reopening.

“If they reopen it, we’ll be there,” said Dunn, who equates her

feelings on Birraporetti’s closure to those she felt during the

closure of Bob Burns at Fashion Island years ago. “But there’s really

no place like it in South Coast Plaza.”

And in the beginning, there was nothing even close.

“When we first opened, we were the first restaurant in town and

now they’re all over,” Rago said. “People have been coming here for

years before going to performances [at the Orange County Performing

Arts Center]. We’re in that target spot.”

It’s just that reason, among many others, that Russell Dicey said

he became a regular customer.

“I’m very nostalgic,” said Dicey, who plays the French horn with

the Pacific Symphony Orchestra. “I think I’ve been here longer than

anyone.”

Like many other customers, Dicey would go over to the restaurant

after performances at the Center, a trek that became even more

accessible after a bridge was built across Bristol Street, landing

pedestrians right at the restaurants’ doorstep.

While fondly remembering past cast parties and various

entertainment acts, Dicey, like many other regulars, has not yet

decided on where he’ll have to go next.

“I’ve always been extremely found of their Alfredo sauce,” he

said, referring to one of the many things he’ll miss about the

restaurant. “The thing that everybody will miss is the appetizer

pizzas. Where else can you get a Portobello Seafood Saute Pizza for

$3.99?”

Dunn, who found out about the restaurant’s closure when she went

to have lunch, said it will be difficult to find a place that does as

good a job providing food without a big production.

For restaurant workers, hearing regrets from customers was the

hardest part of the final day.

“I feel really bad for the customers that have been coming her for

years,” said Josh Walter, a two-year server at the restaurant. “I

think that seeing the reaction on their faces is really one of the

sadder parts.”

Still, while the workers will have to seek new employment and the

customers will have to find another refuge, the hope that

Birraporetti’s would soon be cooking again seemed to offer solace to

many of its customers and employees.

* CHRISTINE CARRILLO is the news assistant. She may be reached at

(949) 574-4298 or by e-mail at christine.carrillo@latimes.com.