For many, the whole point of the wildly successful restaurant is to see and be seen in a place where wiseguys can be spotted picking out a Tony Bennett tune on the jukebox while Tony Bennett is dining two tables away.

"Rao's is a unique dining experience," says Bennett. "The atmosphere gives you the impression of a good Humphrey Bogart movie. I don't know of a restaurant that has more down-home personality, intrigue and sheer fun. And by the way, the best Italian food you can find."

"One of the lures of Rao's is its speakeasy past, the suspicion that every other diner is the Godfather of something or other," wrote author Dick Schaap in a preface to "Rao's Cookbook" by owner Frank Pellegrino.

The latest dispute over table rights at the exclusive restaurant that prepares dishes the old

On wiretaps placed by organized crime cops and the Manhattan District Attorney Robert Morgenthau, acting Luchese boss Steve Crea (left) was heard discussing a major beef (so to speak) with another family bigwig over "the table" at Rao's.

And from the tone of Crea's remarks to soldier Dominick Truscello, (right) he's a longtime patron and has no intention of giving up the table he has reserved the last weekend of every month, according to an affidavit by Detective Robert Callus. Crea, 54, and Truscello, 67, were indicted on state labor racketeering charges last year and are awaiting trial.

Crea's feud, according to Callus, is with former acting boss Anthony (Bowat) Baratta, an imprisoned drug dealer who apparently wanted Crea to give the rights to his table to Baratta's son.

Truscello received a message from Baratta's "off the wall" son and "blasted him" over the request, Truscello said in a Jan. 27, 1999 cell call Crea made to Truscello's home in Wayne, New Jersey.

"To tell you the truth," said Crea, agreeing to meet Truscello later to discuss it

But Baratta's son kept at it. The next month, Truscello met him again and reported to Crea that the "off the wall kid" was acting like a "little prick" and a "fucking mother fucker" after visiting his dad in a federal prison in Otisville.

In addition, said Truscello, Baratta (right) had the ear of former acting boss Joseph (Little Joe) Defede, (left) an inmate at the same prison, and the two former acting bosses were plotting together to take the table away from Crea.

"What the fuck is it they want?" said a thoroughly exasperated Crea. "Over what, and for what? That's what I don't understand. What is it they want?"

"They want the table," said Truscello.

After moving on to other things, Crea must have recalled a favorite dish --

"Meanwhile, like I said, with the table, why didn't you tell him ...."

"I did tell him," said Truscello. "I told him he was going to have nothing."

Gang Land couldn't reach owner Pellegrino last night. An accomplished actor who engages regulars and once-in-a-while patrons with song and pleasant conversation, Pellegrino plays FBI Agent Cubitoso in HBO's "The Sopranos." (In the interest of full disclosure, Gang Land has dined at Rao's a few times.)

Wiseguys like Crea, who has owned restaurants in the past, know dozens of joints that serve excellent food, places where they don't have to worry about bumping into a top elected official or a reporter in the men's room.

But dinner at Rao's is the ultimate way to impress business associates. And that goes whether your business is putting up buildings or putting people under them.