Saying Au Revoir to Hancock Park

JOHN MALKOVICH, who plays Matt Damon’s Russian adversary in the movie “Rounders” and co-stars with Greta Scacchi in the upcoming film “Ladies’ Room,” has put his Hancock Park home of seven years on the market at just under $1.3 million.

“He has a house in the South of France and doesn’t come to Los Angeles enough to warrant holding onto his house here,” said listing agent Marti Harlow of Ramsey-Shilling’s Hollywood Hills/Hancock Park office. “He was here once in the past 4 1/2 years. He’s calling the South of France his residence now.”

Malkovich, 44, was a founding member of the Steppenwolf Theatre group in Chicago. He made his Broadway debut with Dustin Hoffman in “Death of a Salesman” (1984); he made his film debut the same year in “The Killing Fields.” Since then, he has co-starred in such movies as “Dangerous Liaisons” (1988), “In the Line of Fire” (1993), “The Portrait of a Lady” (1996), “Con Air” (1997) and “The Man in the Iron Mask” (1998).

Besides “Ladies’ Room,” filmed in spring and due to be released early next year, his upcoming projects include playing King Charles VII in Luc Besson’s “Joan of Arc,” which is being filmed now in France, and making his feature-film directing debut with “The Libertine,” starring Johnny Depp.

Built in 1919, Malkovich’s Hancock Park home is about 4,000 square feet and has three bedrooms, a workout room and a balcony off the master suite in the main house. There is also a guest house with hardwood floors, an antique stove and hand-painted glass tiles.

“He built the guest house with a Moroccan flair,” Harlow said. “He did a lot of the work by hand himself.”

The home has a minaret on top, a bath with a fountain and a Moroccan-style fireplace. The Spanish-style house also has an oval pool.

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BETH BRODERICK, who plays Aunt Zelda on the ABC series “Sabrina, the Teenage Witch,” has purchased a two-bedroom 1,500-square-foot house in the Los Feliz hills for about $700,000.

Broderick, 39, also starred as Delilah in the CBS comedy series “The Five Mrs. Buchanans” (1994-95), and she played the ditsy secretary in the CBS series “Hearts Afire” (1992-93). Earlier, she co-starred with Brad Pitt in the Fox series “Glory Days.” She also appeared in the movies “Bonfire of the Vanities” (1990) and “Stealing Home” (1988), starring Jodie Foster.

She is a founding director of Momentum, an organization that helps people with AIDS and HIV, and she was a founding member of the Celebrity Action Council of a Los Angeles Mission program that provides service to homeless women.

Broderick’s new home is gated and has a pool, courtyard and what was described as “an amazing city view.” The house was built in 1962 and was recently remodeled. It has a state-of-the-art kitchen.

Before buying her new home, Broderick had been renting an apartment in Hollywood.

Ryan Fitzgerald of Fred Sands Estates, Los Feliz, represented Broderick in her purchase.

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A 25,000-square-foot French chateau on a 2 1/2-acre Beverly Hills-area knoll, owned in the past by a succession of celebrities, will be auctioned by sealed bid. The last asking price was $13.9 million.

The home was completed in 1992 on the site of a 1920s Mediterranean-style house owned at one time by silent-screen star John Gilbert and then by producer David O. Selznick and his wife at the time, actress Jennifer Jones. Singer Elton John later bought the property and sold it in 1981 to businessman Mark Slotkin.

Slotkin planned to remodel but, because of structural problems, instead razed the house and built the chateau with its five bedroom suites, staff apartment, health spa and media room with leather ceiling. The chateau also has a tennis court, pool, pool pavilion and 10-car garage. An antiques dealer, Slotkin installed decorative features appropriate for an 18th century chateau.

The property is co-listed by Michael Eisenberg of Celebrity Properties and Kurt Rappaport of Stan Herman/Stephen Shapiro & Associates, both in Beverly Hills.

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Emmy-winning actress FINOLA HUHGES and her husband, director-photographer RUSSELL YOUNG, have purchased a La Can~ada Flintridge home for $650,000, and they have listed their former home in the same area at $495,000.

Hughes, 38, was one of the original cast members of “Cats” when it opened in London in 1981. She co-starred with John Travolta in the movie “Stayin’ Alive” (1983) and won a 1991 Emmy for her role, from 1985 to ‘92, as Anna Devane on ABC’s “General Hospital.”

She was a regular in 1994 and ’95 on the NBC sitcom “Blossom,” playing the title character’s stepmother, and she co-starred in the 1997 Fox prime-time soap “Pacific Palisades.” She appeared at the Pasadena Playhouse in July in Noel Coward’s “Present Laughter” and is the voice of Queen Anne in Disney’s recently released direct-to-video movie “Pocahontas II.”

Young, who has directed more than 70 music videos, is also a music-business portrait photographer, best known for his album cover for George Michael’s “Faith.”

The couple, originally from London, bought a 1950 post-and-beam contemporary, which they are restoring. The three-bedroom 3,000-square-foot home also has a guest house and a pool.

The home they are selling is 1,500 square feet and has a separate exercise room and a recording studio. Spanish in style, the two-story home features three mural-type windows that were antiques when the home was built in the 1930s.

Sam Buchanan of B&B; Properties in La Can~ada Flintridge represented the couple in buying their new home, listed by Bob Chersi of Podley Caughey & Doan Realtors, and Buchanan has the listing on the house where Hughes has lived for the last 10 years.

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JACK BENNY’s former Beverly Hills home of nearly 30 years has come on the market at $7.5 million. The Georgian colonial-style home was built for the late comedian in 1938. The current owner, a Beverly Hills businessman, has owned the home for more than 20 years.

The house has five bedrooms, including maid’s quarters, in about 10,000 square feet. There is also a guest apartment, a pool house and a five-car garage. The home has been updated.

It is listed with Loren Judd at Stan Herman/Stephen Shapiro & Associates.

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The former longtime Beverly Hills home of Hollywood’s best-known literary and talent agent, IRVING “SWIFTY” LAZAR, has been listed at just under $3.7 million.

Lazar, also famous for his three decades of Oscar-night parties, died in December 1993. His Beverly Hills home was sold in May 1994. The buyer, Don Robinson of Sotheby’s International Realty in Beverly Hills, completely refurbished the house, which Lazar had built in 1966.

Robinson is now ready to scale down. “The house is just too large for me,” he said. The 5,300-square-foot home has a master suite with dual baths, two guest suites, a staff quarters, a gym, a garden, a pool and city views. Robinson has the listing.