Los Angeles Times Staff Writer - Rick Nicita, a veteran Hollywood agent whose longtime clients include Tom Cruise and Nicole Kidman, is leaving the agency business after 42 years to become a movie executive.

A partner at Creative Artists Agency, where he spent nearly three decades, Nicita has been named co-chairman and chief operating officer of Morgan Creek Productions, a movie company founded by James Robinson that in recent years has struggled to produce hits.

In his new job, Nicita too will be under pressure to turn around Morgan Creek, which in the late 1980s and early '90s was behind such hits as the "Ace Ventura" comedies starring