When the big stars come to town, Chef's Restaurant is where they go. You will see proof of that when you check out the gallery of greats that grace the walls. Owner Lou Billittier says he never planned it.
"It started as a joke. We said, 'Yeah, we'll do it.'"
The photographs cover many of the walls inside the iconic eatery. Here you see local legends like Irv, Rick and Tom of Eyewitness News fame as well as Keith Radford. There are really big names pictured here like Bill and Hillary Clinton. Lou says the President wouldn't let him buy lunch. "He said he couldn't take anything for free so he wound up buying his own lunch."
Pictures of Ali McGraw and Ryan O'Neil will be going up soon. They were in town recently performing "Love Letters." Both stars posed for photographs holding a jar of Chef's famous sauce, but Lou admits that Ali was especially nice saying, "She's a really warm person."
The first picture that went up was in 1997 when Jerry Springer stopped in, had lunch and then offered to have his picture taken with a jar of sauce. Over the years Lou has acquired some great photos of stars like Keanu Reeves, sports legends like Rob Ray and Bruce Smith and famous faces including Regis Philbin and James Woods.
More information about Chef's at their website.
