At a weekend rehearsal for “Thank You, Mr. Falker” at the Morgan-Wixson Theatre in Santa Monica, Professor Gary Gardner took direction from his students.

Its floors gleaming, windows shining and vast toppings bar extending forever into the horizon, Spudnick’s looks ready for world domination.

His hands flying from left to right, fingers constantly moving, Japanese pianist Nobuyuki Tsujii won the gold medal at the Van Cliburn International Piano Competition with his performances of Chopin and Rachmaninoff.

With America’s obsession with good food, restaurants and chefs have become the edible equivalents of runways and fashion designers. You say Gianni Versace? I say Mario Batali. You say New York Fashion Week? I say Los Angeles Restaurant Week.

Sunday marked the beginning of dineLA Restaurant Week, a two-week event during which restaurants across the city offer three-course meals for a reduced price. Depending on the restaurant, a meal of appetizer, entrée and dessert will cost between $16 and $28 for lunch and $26 and $44 for dinner.

Perhaps in conventional circumstances, when a princess goes to war against a general, we expect the one with the bow in her hair to lose.

And so it was easy to dismiss 2009 UCLA alumna Dorothy Tong, the self-proclaimed “Cupcake Princess,” when she competed on season two of Food Network’s “Cupcake Wars.” After all, the final competitor standing between her and victory was Bruce Zipes, a gruff New Yorker who wore camouflage and called himself “The General.”

Tong opened Cupcake and Cookie, an online bakery specializing in her trademark cookie-filled cupcakes and cupcake-filled cookies, only a month before appearing on the show.

Millions of years of evolution has led to the creation of herbivores, carnivores and omnivores.

Ask a Bruin to describe ramen noodles, and the answer will include Costco, 29-cent packages and orange powder.

Maybe in the year 2510, the sit-down restaurant is extinct and only food trucks remain.