‘Cheers’ Star Buys ‘Bad Boy’s’ House
SHELLEY LONG, who co-starred in the hit NBC sitcom “Cheers” and is now co-starring with Steve Guttenberg in the upcoming movie “The Boyfriend School,” and her husband, Bruce Tyson, are buying a Pacific Palisades home for about $3 million from Santa Monica architect Brian A. Murphy.
Murphy, sometimes referred to as “the bad boy of architecture,” is known for what has been described as “his calculated outrageousness, employing familiar materials in unfamiliar ways.”
“Brian doesn’t do work in a particular style, though there are traces of Spanish or Mediterranean architecture in this house,” a spokesman for Murphy elaborated. “It is a contemporary home, but it has a flavor of the Third World.”
The house has some walls made of firewood and awnings created from thatched eucalyptus branches and grape stakes from an old fence that was around the property, he said. Walkways, steps, counters and floors are covered with broken pieces of old tile set in concrete to look like patchwork quilts.
The two-story home has four bedrooms and seven baths, with his-and-her steam showers in the master suite; a paddle tennis court, 40-foot lap pool, spa, fountain and views of the beach.
Murphy bought the half-acre property in 1987 and lived in the house, built in 1963, while expanding it from 3,968 to about 7,000 square feet, sources say.
Jodi Fine with Fred Sands Estates had the listing but was unavailable for comment.
DAVID GEFFEN, who just sold his record company for $545 million in MCA stock, has offered $47.5 million in cash for movie mogul JACK L. WARNER’s 9-acre Beverly Hills estate, real estate sources say.
The property, which has belonged to the Warner family since the 1920s, hasn’t been officially listed for sale, though it had been expected to come on the market with the death in March of Ann Warner, the producer’s widow.
Brokers fiercely competing with each other for the listing said last week that they were told that they could not show the home for 10 days while, they surmised, the deal with Geffen was cinched.
“They’re trying to do it without a broker and without going to probate court, but I think that’s a great disservice to the estate,” a Beverly Hills realtor said. “If it went to open bid in court, it probably would go for $65 million to $75 million.”
Even at $47.5 million, the sale would be by far the largest in Beverly Hills history. MARVIN DAVIS’ $20.25-million purchase, of singer KENNY ROGERS’ home a few years ago is the highest to date.
JOAN KROC, owner of the McDonald’s hamburger chain, has sold her Rancho Mirage home for $2.8 million, with proceeds going to charities, documents show.
The Desert Living Preserve got $200,000, and the balance went to Design Alliance to Combat AIDS (DACA), in Los Angeles, and Community Counseling and Consultation, also known as The Desert AIDS Project, in Palm Springs.
The seller was actually the Joan Kroc Trust of San Diego, according to public records, and the buyer is REINHOLD WEEGE, creator of the NBC sitcom “Night Court.”
The house that Kroc sold was designed, built and decorated by Steve Chase, whose own home across the street is listed at $5.9 million. Chase created a six-bedroom, eight-bath home for Kroc with 7,500 square feet, including staff quarters, a guest house, lagoon-shaped pool and spa. Interiors are off-white and dusty English rose with touches of sea foam.
Kroc bought the home new seven years ago but hardly used it, which is apparently why she put it on the market. Kroc’s main residence is in Fairbanks Ranch in San Diego County.
The Kroc transaction was handled by West World Properties of Palm Springs, sources said, with Katrina Heinrich representing the seller, John Walker representing the buyer.
Actor DANA ANDREWS, 81, and his actress wife of 50 years, MARY TODD ANDREWS, 74, have put their Studio City home on the market at $599,000.
“He has had a series of small strokes and is in the John Douglas French Center (for Alzheimer’s Disease in Los Alamitos),” said listing agent Therese Marcus of Prudential California Realty in Sherman Oaks. “The home is too big for Mrs. Andrews, so she’s moving to an apartment in Hollywood to be near her son.”
The Andrewses’ 2,885-square-foot home has a two-bedroom, 1 1/2-bath main house and a one-bedroom, one-bath guest cottage. The Dutch Colonial-style farmhouse was built in 1937, and the couple lived there for 22 years.
Columbia Pictures co-chairman JON PETERS isn’t buying the San Ysidro Ranch in Montecito after all.
Although the producer was expected to close escrow last week on the 540-acre resort at $22 million to $23 million, the deal was canceled.
Said Gene O’Hagan, the Jon Douglas Co. broker who had put together the transaction:
“For Jon and Peter (Guber, the other Columbia co-chairman) to take on something as big as a hotel resort at this time is like a conflict of interest, because Sony (which owns Columbia) has a major responsibility going, and being involved with a hotel is very time consuming.”
Sony executives reportedly have been displeased with Peters’ high profile, which wasn’t helping the Tokyo-based firm quell the Japan bashing that resulted from its purchase of Columbia last fall, according to a published account.
Now the ranch owners will “go back to their original plans,” he noted. “They weren’t interested in selling anyway. They’re planning on remodeling.” The Moana Corp. has owned the ranch since 1987.
Builder RICHARD A. LEWIS, president of Lewis Homes of California, has acquired a $4-million oceanfront house at Emerald Bay, said a real estate source who described the area as “the Beverly Hills of Laguna Beach.” The house has three bedrooms and 4 1/2 baths in 3,262 square feet.
Lewis’ permanent residence is in Upland, headquarters of the family company, which builds homes in California and Nevada.
Lewis also just sold a home in Laguna for slightly under $2 million, which he bought two years ago for a bit more than $1 million, the source added.
