IN EXCESS : Bette Davis Slept Here

You live out of town but just landed an extended film gig in Hollywood. Or you’re doing a little post-earthquake remodeling at your Mulholland Drive estate. You need a place to stay that reflects your “player” status, but you don’t want to fork out $6,600 a month for a Chateau Marmont suite.

So have your people call L.A.

Residence, which supplies classy digs to frugal Industry hipsters. For about $2,500 to $5,000 a month, Kathy Small, whose day job is selling real estate, will set you up in one of the six historic, furnished pieds-a-terre that can link old Hollywood with new. You might, for example, end up in an apartment formerly owned by Bette Davis or occupied by Marlene Dietrich. And you’ll be joining the ranks of past L.A. Residence tenants like Winona Ryder and Julia Roberts.

Small, who lives in the same West Hollywood building as the Bette Davis suite, became landlady to the stars quite by accident. While planning a vacation in 1991, she tried to sublet her condo. Just as her trip fell through, her broker called with a potential renter. It was still-engaged-to-Kiefer Sutherland Julia Roberts, who was willing to pay plenty for a secret hideaway. “She gave me a deal I couldn’t refuse,” says Small, who gave up her place and stayed with a friend until the media caught up with Roberts.

Small, realized she could fulfill a Hollywood need, and, with business partner Mark Matusak, began to specialize in celebrity shelter. “A lot of these stars want places where they can get out of the public eye,” she says. Of course, they want to do it in style, with antique linens and sterling silver.

Small doesn’t usually mingle with her tenants--she conducted business with Roberts through the closed door of the apartment. But she does enjoy working with celebrities. “I’ve never had a bad experience with anyone I’ve rented to,” she says. “At this level, they’re fine.”

In other words, they don’t steal the towels.