Beverly Hills Rejects Plans for Huge Estate : Building: Council votes 4 to 1 to deny application for 18-bedroom house after protests by celebrity residents.

Ending one battle in a war between the rich and the rich, the Beverly Hills City Council has turned down a wealthy London financier’s bid to build an 18-bedroom hilltop estate with 21 bathrooms.

The council, after a four-hour public hearing and 45 minutes of debate, voted 4 to 1 late Tuesday to deny Robert Manoukian’s application for a permit for the luxurious house.

Actor Jack Lemmon and “Tonight Show” host Jay Leno appeared at the meeting to oppose the project.

Manoukian made a rare appearance at the behest of the council. He sat quietly in the overflow audience of about 300 during Tuesday’s hearing, weathering a barrage of testimony from opponents who attacked the size of the 46,000-square-foot project and criticized him for not considering the wishes of his Tower Road neighbors.

Leno, who arrived after taping his show, midway through the nearly five-hour hearing, urged Manoukian to avoid antagonizing neighbors.

A Tower Road resident, Leno said he spent about $40,000 on landscaping and plans before abandoning his application to build a garage for his antique automobiles. Leno said he bought property in Burbank to house the cars after neighbors told him they were worried about the noise of motors.

In Beverly Hills, it’s a case of “millionaires fighting billionaires,” Leno quipped, but the concept of being a good neighbor still applies.

Earlier in the evening, Lemmon headlined a protest rally on the lawn of the City Hall. While he spoke, supporters donned “Preserve Beverly Hills” caps, ate cookies and drank coffee and bottled water provided by one of the city’s restaurants.

But once the public hearing began, the gentility turned to anger. Lemmon berated one of Manoukian’s attorneys for allegedly suggesting that opponents were xenophobic. Manoukian is of Armenian descent.

“Don’t ever make an allegation that I’m racist again or you’ll regret it for the rest of your life!” Lemmon said.

The battle began last year when Manoukian proposed a 25-bedroom retreat with five kitchens, a guest villa, two pools and a ballroom. The classically styled mansion with a copper roof and columns was to be built as a part-time residence for his extended family and for servants on the nearly four-acre property purchased in 1988.

Despite scaling back the project to 46,000 square feet, promising to shield the estate from public view with dense landscaping and agreeing to 81 restrictions on construction and use, Manoukian was unable to surmount the tide of opposition.

Lemmon, along with MCA President Sidney Sheinberg, Ticketmaster Chairman Fred Rosen and developer Stuart Ketchum, transformed their campaign against the project into a citywide revolt over large homes.

Since Manoukian’s project won the Planning Commission’s approval in April, Lemmon and his group worked to galvanize residents under the banner Citizens for the Preservation of Beverly Hills. Since then, the group hired a campaign consultant, gathered more than 12,000 signatures on petitions and sent out mailers to registered voters.

Their efforts paid off. Tuesday night, Mayor Maxwell Salter was the only council member to vote for the project.

Salter said Wednesday that the only thing the city should have been concerned with is the project’s construction traffic, which could have been alleviated with flagmen and other measures.

“Nobody likes construction,” Salter added. “It’s dirty and noisy, but people have a right to build.”

Salter said the main stumbling block to the project was opposition by a few neighbors to construction of any kind on the property. Manoukian’s representatives tried repeatedly to find out from neighbors what size estate would be acceptable but never got an answer, Salter said.

One of Manoukian’s attorneys, Murray Fischer, said Wednesday that he was surprised by the swiftness of the council’s decision. He planned to meet with Manoukian to discuss what to do next.