Comedian Has Street Smarts

Comedian JONATHAN WINTERS, who plays the father of a high school principal in the new ABC comedy “Davis Rules,” and his wife of 41 years, Eileen, have bought a house on the same Montecito street where they’ve owned a house for more than a decade, and they are remodeling.

Winters--known for his improvisations, surrealist paintings, movies (“It’s a Mad Mad Mad Mad World,” “The Loved One”), best-selling book (“Winters’ Tales”) and his own NBC show during the ‘50s and ‘60s--will be a nominee for a recent comedy recording at the Grammy Awards on Wednesday.

The Montecito home that the couple just bought was listed at $4.2 million but sold for about $2.5 million, said local real estate sources not involved in the deal.

The 6,000-square-foot, French Normandy-style home has an ocean view and a guest house on three acres, landscaped with oak trees and gardens filled with wildflowers.

In January, Winters was quoted as saying, “I’m 65, and my stepfather used to say, ‘Take time out to smell the flowers, because you can’t smell them through a box.’ And you can’t.”

Winters and his wife plan to leave the gardens as they are, sources say, but the couple is redesigning the home, built 12 years ago. Walls are being knocked down and built, but no square footage will be added, a source said.

While remodeling, the Winterses are living in their one-acre pied-a-terre, down the street. Their primary residence is in Toluca Lake.

The home they are remodeling had been listed with Linda Taylor Fareed of Fred Sands’ Montecito office. Fareed was unavailable for comment.

High-profile businessman PETE ELLIS--whose three money-losing car dealerships in South Gate were shut down earlier this month--is asking $2.75 million for his home in Bel-Air, fully furnished.

Until the shutdown, Ellis, who still operates a Ford dealership in Bellflower, was known for his radio jingles directing car buyers to “Long Beach Freeway, Firestone Exit, South Gate.” Chrysler Credit Corp. closed the South Gate dealerships and assumed control of the unsold cars.

Citing the recession and the Persian Gulf war as reasons for plummeting car sales, Ellis has estimated that his business liabilities were $2 million to $3 million greater than his dealership assets.

He has owned the Bel-Air home since March, 1989. Built in 1979 but gutted and remodeled by a former owner, the French country-style house has five bedrooms and maid’s quarters in about 5,000 square feet. It also has a sauna, swimming pool and spa.

The home is on a cul-de-sac one block from the Bel-Air Hotel, said Cecelia Waeschle, who shares the listing with Joyce Rey, both of Prudential Rodeo Realty.

A 42-room mansion is replacing a 26-room house on a 4.5-acre Pasadena property once owned by DOVIE BEAMS DE VILLAGRAN, who claimed to have been a lover of the late Philippine PRESIDENT FERDINAND MARCOS.

The smaller, 1914-era house caught fire in 1988 and burned beyond repair.

The new house will have seven bedrooms in its 25,000 square feet and will be classic traditional in style. The old house was considered a Greek Neoclassic. Much of the landscaping, with its ornate pool and statuary installed by de Villagran, will remain intact.

William McWhorter’s interior design firm was remodeling the old house just before the fire. After the blaze, McWhorter interviewed 27 architects before the Santa Barbara firm of Warner & Gray was selected to design the new house.

Now the framing is up, and the house is expected to be ready for occupancy early next year, after McWhorter’s company has completed the gold leaf, silver, marble and wood interiors. Construction costs were estimated at $10 million to $20 million.

The owner was identified as Ken Yokeno, owner of the Japan-based Nansay Corp., international hotel builders.

He bought the property for about $3.9 million in 1987, after de Villagran, who had lived there for eight years, sold it through bankruptcy proceedings.

DANNY PINTAURO--the 15-year-old who plays the young son, Jonathan, in the ABC sitcom “Who’s the Boss”--and his real-life parents, John and Margaret Pintauro, have bought a three-bedroom house with a pool in Tarzana for $500,000, sources say.

Built in 1968, the 2,500-square-foot house is being remodeled and re-landscaped to create more room for the family’s three dogs, the sources added.

Danny, who is also national youth chairman for the April 7 Multiple Sclerosis Super Cities Walk, and his folks moved from a smaller home in Van Nuys.

Claudia Zankan of Fred Sands’ Tarzana office represented the Pintauros.