Morph Dork

Vue is in the throes of perpetual face-lifting. Face-lift one: Vue (French for "view"), the Addison restaurant and its lounge Nine 7 Two, was changed from Veuve (French for "widow") named in honor of Veuve Clicquot Champagne. Veuve parent Louis Vuitton Moet Hennessy threw a wrench in that party with lawyer letters having something to do with trademark dilution. Face-lift two: Opening chef Tony Gardizi is replaced by chef Christophe Strattman. Cuisine shifts from global to a species called coastal. Face-lift three: Vue becomes a wine, pizza and tapas lounge—a mini face-lift that will be unveiled June 7. Vue will have VIP seating. Vue will have live musical acts and dancing. Vue will have a selection of 25 tapas and 10 gourmet pizzas.

Vue will have two private areas cut off from public vue; areas such as "The Library," a 12-person cranny with a three-bottle/$250 minimum. The Library also includes a dedicated waitress. Then there's the 30-person Cigar Lounge with a three-bottle/$500 minimum and state-of-the-art ventilation. The Cigar Lounge comes equipped with a dedicated waitress and a beck-and-call butler. These VIP spaces were added to accommodate Vue's plethora of local celebrities. Which plethora is that? Anyway, we're standing by for the next face-lift: fouillis—French for "muddle."

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Guess we pissed off N9NE Group, progenitors of Ghostbar, N9NE Steak House and Nove Italiano plus the upcoming lounge Liquid Sky. Nove's chef refused to give us details on some of the preparations for the Nove review in this issue. They won't let us take pictures of the Nove salami. Seems it's all because of the cover story detailing the great beneficence of Ghostbar atop the W Hotel by Andrea Grimes ("What a VIP Off," March 22) plus "additional remarks and mentions throughout the course of a year by various writers" at the Dallas Observer. More succinctly: "In response to the negative coverage published by [the] Dallas Observer, The N9NE Group has decided not to advertise in or assist [the] Observer in additional reporting of its venues." Hence, we give you another view of Nove's buxom topiaries on the extended Nove-N9NE patio... Susie Priore's grand neighborhood restaurant Iris, shuttered April Fools' weekend, has been taken over by a chain. Come September, Iris will become Campisi's No. 4, or the new home of Campsi's Inwood Village. Meanwhile, Priore is working to gin up buzz for The Cape off Worthington and Howell, the seafood restaurant in the old Johnny Orleans Pasta location. "Good concept, cute interior, needs some tweaking," she says of it. Part of the tweaking is in the kitchen: Opening chef Truett Bishop has been replaced by Israel Fearon, an alum of Roy's, Bice, Sambuca and Hotel St. Germain.