‘Doubts’ D.A. Heads for Hills
MARLEE MATLIN, who co-stars with Mark Harmon in the NBC series “Reasonable Doubts,” has bought and redecorated a Hollywood Hills home.
Matlin was the youngest recipient of the Best Actress Oscar and the only hearing-impaired Oscar winner when she was honored at the age of 21 for her first screen role in the 1987 movie “Children of a Lesser God.”
She played herself in the 1992 film “The Player” and appeared in “The Linguini Incident” (1991), “The Man in the Golden Mask” (1990) and “Walker” (1987). She made her TV debut in the 1989 CBS movie “Bridge to Silence,” co-starring the late Lee Remick.
Now in production for the second season of “Reasonable Doubts,” in which she plays the Chicago-based assistant Dist. Atty. Tess Kaufman, Matlin co-stars with Martin Sheen and D. B. Sweeney in the upcoming movie “Danger Sign,” filmed last summer.
Matlin bought a gated, country English-style house on a knoll, with city views, for just under $1 million. The home has three bedrooms, maid’s quarters and a screening or media room in about 2,500 square feet.
The home was built in the early 1950s but was remodeled by the seller, an antique dealer. Matlin put her own touches on the interiors, making them lighter and brighter with what was described as “a country, airy look.”
She had previously been living in a duplex in West Hollywood, where she had also maintained offices. She has her own company, Solo One Productions, now based in Burbank.
Don Robinson of Douglas Properties had the listing, and Brett Lawyer of Myra Nourmand & Associates, Beverly Hills, represented Matlin. Lawyer also represented the seller of the Hollywood castle that Madonna recently purchased.
Multimillionaire industrialist/art collector NORTON SIMON and his wife, JENNIFER JONES--who won a Best Actress Academy Award in 1943 for her role in “The Song of Bernadette”--are among the handful of so-called “permanent guests” who have moved from the Beverly Hills Hotel in anticipation of its Dec. 30 closing.
The 80-year-old hotel will be closed for two years while undergoing a $60-million to $100-million renovation, said Charles Cartier, the hotel’s director of sales.
“But it’s not a corporate situation with a budget. It will be evaluated from phase to phase, and it will be well handled. Whatever it takes to do it is what it will cost,” he said.
The Sultan of Brunei, who owns the hotel, spent an estimated $115 million on a complete renovation, begun in 1988, of the Dorchester in London, which has 197 rooms and 55 suites. When the Beverly Hills Hotel reopens in December, 1994, it is expected to have 210 rooms. There are 261 now; the refurbished rooms will be larger.
“The Polo Lounge, pool, coffee shop and banana leaf motif will stay the same, but there will be a new electronic system with state-of-the-art everything, including fax machines in all of the guest rooms,” Cartier said.
All rooms also will be capable of having private phone lines and will have new decor, he added, “and there will be 60% more parking without giving away any of the grounds.”
The bungalows, though reconditioned, will stay basically the same, Cartier said. The 21 bungalows, which rent from $545 to $2,700 a night, have been a favorite hideaway of many famous people. All of the bungalows have fireplaces, most have kitchens, and one has a private pool and spa.
Publishing magnate Walter Annenberg, who lives in a sprawling estate in Rancho Mirage, likes the one with the pool, and he has regularly stayed there for two months during the summer. Howard Hughes once hibernated for weeks in one of the bungalows while parking tickets piled up on his car, which he had parked on the street. And lovebirds Elizabeth Taylor and Richard Burton once stayed in their bungalow for days, ordering all of their meals by room service.
“To show what full service we’ve had, some of our staff even helped the Simons to move to their new house,” Cartier said. Simon, 85, and his wife, 73, bought a Bel-Air house for $2.2 million in cash, other sources said.
The Simons, who had been living in one of the bungalows, bought a one-story house, built in the 1950s. It has four bedrooms and less than 4,000 square feet.
Among the other “permanent guests” who are moving from the hotel are game-show impresario Mark Goodson and Dave Tebet, an executive for 18 years with Johnny Carson Productions until Carson retired earlier this year and the man “responsible for moving Johnny’s show from New York,” Cartier said.
The Simons had lived at the Beverly Hills Hotel since about 1989, but Goodson and Tebet had each maintained quarters there for close to 20 years.
Legendary baseball Manager LEO DUROCHER’S former Trousdale Estates home has come on the market, says Beverly Hills real estate broker Mike Silverman, who--incidentally--owes much of his early success to the Beverly Hills Hotel.
“The hotel is where I met Lauren Bacall and Joan Crawford, and (where) I took Judy Garland to lunch several times,” he said. “The hotel pool was my home away from home.” When starting his company in the early 1960s, Silverman often took business calls, when he was paged, at the pool.
The former Durocher home, built in the early 1960s for the late manager, has three bedrooms, maid’s quarters, 10-foot ceilings, walls of glass and city views. Valerie Placidi in Silverman’s office has the $2.2-million listing.
