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Ron Ruggless
Landry’s Restaurants Inc. has received bankruptcy court approval to buy actress Eva Longoria’s troubled Las Vegas steakhouse Beso.
The $1 million deal, decided Monday, ensures that Longoria will continue to be involved in the restaurant, which is located in a high-profile spot in the Crystals shopping center, part of the MGM Resort International CityCenter complex on the Las Vegas Strip. Beso LLC filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy protection in January.
Longoria, who appears on the television program “Desperate Housewives,” will receive a 30-percent stake in the newly formed company, called Newco. Landry’s will own 50 percent, and another Beso investor will own 20 percent. The deal also sets $300,000 of the purchase price aside for the CityCenter landlord.
EARLIER: Landry's assumes control of Eva Longoria's Beso restaurant
Houston-based Landry’s has managed Beso since early August, when bankruptcy judge Mike K. Nakagawa approved a management agreement with the Houston company’s CHLN division. Court documents show that Beso’s operating losses since the January bankruptcy protection filing through June 30 had been $669,350.
In August, Landry’s owner and chief executive Tilman Fertitta told VegasInc.com that he was attracted to Beso because of the high volume of business, “nearly $14.6 million in gross revenue in 2010,” and was looking at re-opening Beso’s shuttered Eve nightclub.
Nakagawa approved the sale of Beso to Landry’s over the objections of some creditors, whom he said had not offered any alternative plans. In footnotes in his Monday ruling, Nakagawa noted that less than a year after Beso’s December 2009 opening the relationship among the initial Beso LLC investors “begun as symbiotic had literally deteriorated into the chaotic and is now toxic.”
Privately held Landry’s, which also operates the Rainforest Café and Chart House brands, has purchased other brands in bankruptcy court deals. Last year, it bought Claim Jumper and Oceanaire seafood restaurant brands in such deals.
Landry’s also owns the Golden Nugget Hotels & Casinos and other hospitality properties nationwide.
Contact Ron Ruggless at [email protected].
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