Tony Fortuna, restaurateur with a sympathetic flair, dies at the age of 76

Mr. Fortuna subsequently worked in the doors and dining rooms of a series of restaurants in Manhattan, including Tavern on the Green, Lespinasse (at the St. Regis hotel), Mad. 61 and the renovated Monkey Bar. In 1995, he finally had his own restaurant, the Lenox Room, on Third Avenue and East 73rd Street, in partnership with chef and restaurateur Charlie Palmer.

He took a personal interest in both customers and staff; it seemed to happen naturally. “The people in the restaurant were not customers to him,” Mr. Palmer said. “They were friends, and he couldn’t do enough for them.”

Five years later, Mr. Fortuna became the sole owner of the Lenox Room. The name was changed to TBar, a steakhouse with a varied menu, in 2007 after Mr. Fortuna was joined as a partner by Arthur Backal of Backal Hospitality Group. Several years ago, a satellite of TBar opened in Southampton, NY, so that Mr. Fortuna, usually in jeans, could welcome and feed his patrons in a summer setting.

Angelo Tony Fortuna was born on October 22, 1947 in Sant’Elia Fiumerapido, Italy, located between Rome and Naples. His father, Giuseppe Fortuna, a storekeeper, and his mother, Concetta (Melaragni) Fortuna, a homemaker, emigrated with Tony and his two siblings to the Detroit area in 1955. Tony was the second oldest. Two sisters and a brother were later born in the United States.

In the early 1960s, after his father moved the family to Marly-le-Roi, a suburb of Paris, where his brother owned a restaurant, Tony became a busboy, which launched his career. Eventually he became maître d’hôtel.