(Brigitte Stelzer)
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Brooklyn’s brick-oven pizza titans are set to go dough-to-dough today in a courtroom showdown over their rival joints.
The battle for pizza supremacy by the Brooklyn Bridge pits the man who bought the naming rights to the world-famous Grimaldi’s Pizza against the eatery’s original owner, who wants to open a new shop nearby.
Coal-oven legend Patsy Grimaldi is preparing to come out of retirement to flip thin-crust pies again under a different business name at his former storefront on Old Fulton Street in DUMBO, where he helped launch the brick-oven pizza craze.
But his successor, Frank Ciolli, who was forced to relocate down the block late last year after a rent dispute, wants to halt the 81-year-old pizza king’s return.
Ciolli filed a lawsuit in Queens Supreme Court on Sept. 10 seeking an injunction against Grimaldi and his wife, Carol, to prevent them from lighting up the fabled coal-fired oven again at Grimaldi’s former 19 Old Fulton St. address, saying the new pizzeria would create “unfair competition.”
Ciolli’s suit was filed in Queens because both he and the Grimaldis live there.
Darryl Vernon, a lawyer for the Grimaldis, said Ciolli’s suit is baseless because the non-compete clause that his clients signed when selling Ciolli the business in 1998 expired three years ago.
The Grimaldis are naming their new joint Juliana’s, after Patsy’s late mother, and hope to open later this year.
“They were hit hard by the recession and want an opportunity to work again,’’ Vernon said.
But Ciolli’s suit claims that if the Grimaldis are allowed to return, they “would recapture the many customers who have been longtime clientele of” his Grimaldi’s pizzeria, because of “confusion’’ over the name.
Ciolli insisted that his lawsuit is not about being afraid of “competition.” He said it’s over the fact that the Grimaldis legally violated his “good will” by trying to move back into their original location.
Ciolli was forced to relocate to a larger space at 1 Front St. after racking up more than $60,000 in back rent at the Old Fulton Street site and being evicted by its landlord, Mark Waxman.
The move opened the door to Grimaldi’s return, but Ciolli was able to get city approval to install another coal-fired brick oven at his new site.
The city rarely issues new permits on such ovens because of environmental concerns, making existing ones virtual gold mines.
Patsy Grimaldi worked at his uncle Patsy Lancieri’s famous East Harlem pizzeria as a boy, then opened his own place, Patsy’s, in DUMBO in 1990.
But he had to change the name to Grimaldi’s in 1995 when he was sued after his uncle died and his aunt sold the Patsy’s name.
Over the years, Grimaldi’s became a favorite in the shadow of the Brooklyn Bridge overpass, often attracting hour-long lines of tourists and locals alike and celebrity patrons from Frank Sinatra to Lady Gaga.