It’s mom and pop business
Actors Angela Bassett and Courtney B. Vance have lived in their L.A. home for 10 years -- ever since they got married. But the recent parents have different needs these days, so they have listed their home in gated Fremont Place near Hancock Park at close to $6 million.
The compound they are selling has a 5,000-square-foot main house, built in 1940, with five bedrooms and six bathrooms. It has such features as a hair salon, a gourmet kitchen, an elegant foyer, a master-bedroom suite and parklike grounds. The couple added a detached 2,500-square-foot building that has an office, gym and guest quarters.
The house is rich in original details and is described in the Multiple Listing Service as “a perfect blend of traditional elegance and sophistication.”
It wasn’t size or style that prompted Bassett, 48, and Vance, 47, to list the house but schools. The couple last year became parents of twins through a surrogate. Many children who live in their gated community attend private schools, and the pair would like theirs to attend public schools when the time comes.
Bassett, whose breakthrough role was playing Tina Turner, starred opposite Laurence Fishburne in the movie “Akeelah and the Bee” (2006). She also appeared opposite Whoopi Goldberg in “How Stella Got Her Groove Back” (1998).
The Yale School of Drama graduate also has appeared on and off Broadway, as has her husband, who earned his master’s in fine arts at Yale after graduating from Harvard with a bachelor’s degree. Vance may be best known for his five-year run on the NBC series “Law & Order: Criminal Intent.”
The pair co-wrote a book about themselves called “Friends: A Love Story,” released this year.
Diana Knox and Betsy Malloy of Coldwell Banker Residential Brokerage, on Larchmont Boulevard, have the listing.
Hair today, back in London tomorrow
Hair-care mogul Vidal Sassoon has put his Bel-Air home on the market at just under $20 million.
Known as the Henry Singleton Residence, it was designed by Modernist architect Richard Neutra and built in 1959.
Sassoon, 79, and his wife, Rhonda, thought about keeping the house, which they expanded from 3,400 to 5,500 square feet, but they have been spending more time in their London home and so decided to sell it.
The Sassoons never lived in the Bel-Air house, but they held some parties there.
The Neutra sits on 5-plus acres off of Mulholland Drive and overlooks Stone Canyon Reservoir. The house has a screening room, an art gallery, two bedrooms, a master-bedroom wing and an office/gym.
There are two extra building pads on the site.
Barry Sloane of Sotheby’s International Realty, Beverly Hills, has the listing.
Capshaw makes way for Osbourne
The moving trucks are busy these days in the so-called bird streets of the Hollywood Hills with actress Jessica Capshaw, the 31-year-old daughter of actress Kate Capshaw, selling a home to Aimee Osbourne, 23-year-old daughter of Ozzy Osbourne, for close to its $1,995,000 asking price.
Osbourne bought a modern-style home with three bedrooms and three bathrooms, walls of glass, a spa-like bathroom with a steam shower, an outdoor gym and a long driveway. The house was built in 1961.
And it should be ideal for parties. The house has “great indoor-outdoor flow to the pool and BBQ area,” according to the Multiple Listing Service.
Jonah Wilson of Sotheby’s International Realty, Sunset Strip, represented Osbourne in buying, and Ann Eysenring of Worldwide Inc. had the listing.
Handing off his Los Feliz home
Celebrity hand model Rick Wagner has listed his 1927 Normandy-style home in Los Feliz Oaks at $1.78 million.
The house sits on two lots with two separate addresses and faces Griffith Park on a private street.
“It’s very quiet considering who some of the more popular neighbors are,” Wagner said. Among them he listed Mandy Moore, Vince Vaughn, Tim Curry, Kirstie Alley, Brad Pitt and Angelina Jolie.
The house has a great room with 23-foot cedar and beam ceilings, four bedrooms, 3 1/2 bathrooms, central heat and air conditioning, updated plumbing and a new roof.
Wagner has been the on-camera hands for John Travolta, Dennis Quaid, Sting, Ryan Seacrest, Tim Allen and Jeff Goldblum, to name a few. He has worked on hundreds of commercials, print ads and feature films. His hand held Ellen DeGeneres’ for the Academy Awards this year.
He is working on the documentary “A Day in the Life of a World Famous Hand Model” and said people recognize his hands before they recognize the rest of him.
The house is listed with Linda St. Martin and Anthony Papillo at Coldwell Banker Residential Brokerage, Sunset Strip.
