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Bistro staff ‘abuse’
A French bistro on Restaurant Row should have stuck to its pommes frites and steak au poivre instead of serving its workers heaping helpings of insults and stiffing them on pay, a lawsuit filed by the employees claims.
The owners of Le Rivage, a stalwart on W. 46th St., failed to pay servers minimum wage and swiped some of their tips, it is alleged.
Plus, the owners reportedly told five employees they were “too old” to work at the eatery.
Marcel and Paul Denamiel, the father and son team that own the eatery, created a “hostile work environment” in which the five servers — all Polish women over the age of 40, who’d worked at Le Rivage for years — were called “morons” “stupid” and “retards” or publicly humiliated for wearing hearing aids, the suit claims.
The taunts were so meanspirited and humiliating that one employee lost her hair from the “daily harassment,” while another had panic attacks, the suit claims.
Reached by The Post, Paul Denamiel, who is also the chef, declined to address the allegations directly, but said he and his father have been trying to come up with “fresh ideas to rejuvenate the restaurant.”
“If you don’t change. you perish,” he said, adding that his former employees had been “stubborn to change” but that no one had been fired. One of the workers had even been given a goodbye party.
The Manhattan federal court lawsuit, filed by the Pechman Law Group, notes that all of the restaurant’s current employees are in their 20s and 30s, a point Paul confirmed.
“I’ve worked in a lot of restaurants, and it’s a crazy environment,” Paul said. “Customers are very demanding, and that’s just the work environment.”
The eatery, founded by Paul’s uncle, has been in the Denamiel family since 1984.
By Big Apple standards, the prix fixe menu is affordable, with a three-course lunch costing $27. A threecourse dinner costs $29.
But old-time eateries that have authoritarian owners are a dying breed in the city, said restaurant consultant Arlene Spiegel.
“The ... rude boss may not change his personality, but he has to play by the rules of the game,” Spiegel said. “There’s no hiding now with empowered workers, who should have their rights respected.”