Mary-Louise Parker Gives It Another Go in the Big Apple

SELLER: Mary-Louise Parker
LOCATION: New York City, NY
PRICE: $7,000,000
SIZE: 4-5 bedrooms, 4.5 bathrooms

YOUR MAMAS NOTES: Late last night Your Mama picked up a covert communique on our handy-dandy iPhone from our unofficial aide-de-camp Hot Chocolate who'd discovered that famously fearless, award-winning actress Mary-Louise Parker has her 12-into-10-room New York City duplex apartment (back) on the market with an asking price of $7,000,000.

Miz Parker—a single mother of two with an Emmy (Angels in America), a Tony (Proof) and and two Golden Globes (Weeds, Angels in America), not to mention numerous additional nominations—first put her updated and upgraded pre-war Greenwich Village co-operative crib up for grabs with little (or no) fanfare back in March 2012 with a $7,995,000 price tag. The asking price dropped to $7,250,000 before it was briefly taken off the market in early August.

Property records are a bit vague so Your Mama isn't sure exactly when Miz Parker purchased the two-floor, two-unit combination spread—it may or may not have been in June 2003 for an unknown amount of dinero—but we do find clear evidence online that in May 2005 she bought out her philandering ex-man-friend/baby daddy Billy Crudup's interest in the family-sized apartment for a few dollars less than $1,500,000.

Neither previous nor current marketing materials state the exact size of the two-unit combination but Your Mama's elementary school calculations suggest it's somewhere just under 3,000 square feet. What past and present listings do reveal is that Miz Parker's apartment has four (or five bedrooms, depending on how rooms get used), 4.5 bathrooms, 26 windows with four exposures, two wood-burning fireplaces and two private storage rooms. The not-inconsiderable $6,623 per month maintenance and common charges cover full-service building amenities such doorman and elevator attendants, a live-in super and access to a resident's only fitness facility.

The long, lower level entrance hall opens into a spacious, sparely-furnished but art-filled 560-plus square foot living/dining room with beamed ceiling, wood-burning fireplace and Old School parquet floors stained black (or maybe it's a dark chocolate) for a handsome touch of modernity. Half a dozen over-sized windows on two walls provide sweeping views of Washington Square Park and the Empire State Building. The adjacent, S-shaped kitchen may be compact but it's none-the-less impressively outfitted with a walk-in pantry, a built-in banquette and a full suite of top-grade appliances.

There are two potential bedrooms on the lower floor. The smaller, corner room is marked as an office on the floor plan included with current listing information and it appears that Miz Parker converted the larger, lower level bedroom into a fantasy-land playroom space with mural-painted walls that depict—among other things—the famous Cyclone roller coaster at Coney Island. The Parker children and their friends probably love the ginormous, twig-festooned playhouse/puppet theater in the corner but, honestly chickens, all those child-sized puppets give Your Mama the heebie-jeebies.

A chandelier-lit floating staircase climbs to the second floor where three bedrooms with private poopers—plus a newly refurbished and luxuriously windowed laundry room—spoke off an intimate sitting area with second wood-burning fireplace, shag rug, and a couple of deep, slip-covered sofa pieces perfect for bedtime stories and boob-toob viewing. Pocket doors separate the sitting area from the master bedroom, complete includes a custom-fitted walk-in closet/dressing room, hair and make-up nook, and a spa-style bathroom with two sinks and separate tub and shower.

Our brief and unscientific research shows Miz Parker does not own any other real estate—she's been known to lease homes in Los Angeles where Weeds tapes—and we have no idea if she plans to remain in New York City where she's lived since the late 1980s or if she plans to decamp to another, no-doubt upscale locale. Bueller? Bueller? Anyone? Bueller?

listing photos and floor plan: Brown Harris Stevens

Tinseltown Bigwig Barry Levinson Lists Luxurious Connecticut Compound

SELLERS: Barry and Diana Levinson
LOCATION: Redding, CT
PRICE: $12,900,000
SIZE: 10,000+ square feet, 7 bedrooms, 8 full and 2 half bathrooms

YOUR MAMAS NOTES: Listen children, our ongoing relocation has left us temporarily without immediate or reliable access to the interweb. That is unless we schlep our 47-pound laptop computer to some too-thronged cafe or, as we did today, a whisper-quiet and under-funded public library. We expect to be back solid in a day or two. If any of y'all feel the need to whine about it like a six year old having a temper tantrum, go on witcher bad selves. But before you exert any energy scolding Your Mama and calling us naughty names know it falls on deaf—not to mention dog-tired—ears.

Amid our scores of emails we came across a covert communique from a little east coast birdie we'll call Bonnie Blueblood who thoughtfully and informatively chirped in our ear that Oscar-winning veteran screenwriter, director, producer and occasional actor Barry Levinson and his long-time (second) wife Diana have hoisted their expansive compound in affluent and semi-rurual Redding, CT on the market with an asking price of $12,900,000.

Baltimore-born and -bred Mister Levinson's first Showbiz success came in 1974 when he won his first of two Emmy statuettes for his writing efforts on the outrageously funny The Carol Burnett Show. He picked up two more Emmys, the first in 1985 for producing American Playhouse: Displaced Person (#4.15) and the next one in 1993 for directing Homicide: Life on the Street. His two Emmys keep company with the Oscar Mister Levinson won in 1989 for his direction of Rain Man with Dustin Hoffman and Tom Cruise. He can also boast of five more Academy Award nominations for ...And Justice for All, Diner, Avalon and Bugsy, the latter of which earned him a pair of nods (Best Picture and Best Director).

Some of Mister Levinson's more recent work includes executive producing a variety of boob-toob programs (Oz, The Philanthropist, Copper), writing and/or directing a few screenplays for films, including the 2006 near-flop Man of the Year with Robin Williams and the upcoming biopic Gotti: In the Shadow of My Father with Al Pacino and John Travolta

The bulk of the Levinson's 40+ acre estate was purchased in August 2000 for $10,500,000, according to the property records we peeped. The seller, if anyone cares, appears to have been Joe Montgomery one of the founders of the Cannondale Bicycle Corporation, based in nearby Bethel, CT. Our little birdie told us it was Mister Montgomery who custom built the 10,000+ square foot cedar-shingled main mansion in the mid- late-1990s. Property records also indicate Mister and Missus Levinson snatched up a second, 6.21 acre adjacent parcel a couple years later, in February 2002, for $725,000.

Current listing information shows the 17-room, tri-winged mansion has seven bedrooms, 10 bathrooms, half a dozen wood burning fireplaces and half a dozen garage bays that Your Mama would bet both our long-bodied bitches, Linda and Beverly, are heated and cooled for summer- and winter-time automobile convenience. Annual taxes are a mere $110,458.

An airy central stair leads to the various entertaining and family areas of the residence that include generous formal living and dining rooms, both with fireplaces, a year-round screened porch, also with fireplace and a colossal, eat-in country kitchen with two, Suburu-sized center islands, white Shaker-style cabinets, slab stone counter tops, yet another  fireplace and—natch—top-grade commercial-style appliances.

Listing information goes on to state the main mansion also includes a library, screening room and a a film production suite on the lower level.

Upstairs, we gleaned from marketing materials, there's a spacious master suite with dual walk-in closets and bathrooms plus a handicap-accessible suite with elevator.

In addition to the tremendously-scaled but somehow still cozy and kick-up-your-feet comfy main manse the sprawling, mostly flat compound includes, as per current listing information, a fully updated, 2,500 square foot antique guest cottage with three bedrooms (above, top left and right); separate bedroom suite with private terrace; separate in-law suite with living room and kitchen; and heated barn/artist's studio with massive stone fireplace (above, bottom).

Additional recreation amenities include an outdoor kitchen for summertime grillin' and chillin'; sizable swimming pool, semi-circular spa and vine-draped pool cabana (above, center); pristine, two-ish acre fish-stocked pond with dock and boathouse (above, bottom); tennis court set far enough away from the main house that a mildly lazy racket-swinger might consider getting to it by car or golf cart; equestrian facilities that include four horse stalls, three fence-girdled paddocks and more than a mile of private horse riding trails.

When the time comes that Mister and Missus Levinson sell their impressive spread in Connecticut—and no doubt there are plenty or Richie Riches ready, willing and able to drop a bundle on this bucolic beauty—they'll hardly be homeless. Your Mama's brief and unscientific research indicates Mister and Missus Levinsons' property portfolio currently includes (but may not be limited to) a modest 1,887 square foot house in the Westwood area of Los Angeles purchased in June 2001 for $804,545 and a three-story, creek-front residence in Annapolis, MD purchased, according to one online database we consulted, in February 2002 for $2,262,500.

Once upon a time Mister and Missus Levinson owned a nearly two-acre estate in the affluent Northern California enclave of Ross that they bought in September 1993 for $2,300,000 and sold in May 2001. We're not quite sure how much they sold the nearly 12,000 square foot house for but we did find some evidence on the interweb the property was on the market in mid-July 2000 for $18,000,000, a number that had plummeted to around $16,000,000 by the end of the year.

listing photos: Halstead Property

Megan Mullally and Nick Offerman Buy in Bel Air

BUYER: Megan Mullally and Nick Offerman
LOCATION: Los Angeles, CA (Bel Air)
PRICE: $4,150,000
SIZE: 5,168 square feet, 4 bedrooms, 3.5 bathrooms

YOUR MAMAS NOTES: Earlier this week Your Mama and just about every other celebrity property gossip dissed and discussed the Los Angeles, CA residence comedic sitcom stars Megan Mullally (Will & Grace, Children's Hospital) and Nick Offerman (Parks and Recreation, Children's Hospital) recently pushed on the (open) market with a tumescent (and possibly sanguine) $12,650,000 price tag.

Naturally, being the nosy beotch we are, Your Mama wondered where the child-free couple planned to decamp. Well, dontcha know, before we could have a proper scour though the various property records databases we make us of to facilitate our—ahem—reportage, we heard from a beaver busy real estate lady we know, let's call her Della Catesen, who managed to balance a Brobdingnagian bowl of borscht and a petite Limoges platter stacked with deep fried cheese blintzes while she laboriously dialed her Old School Princess phone and conspiratorially snitched to Your Mama that Miz Mullally and Mister Offerman already purchased another, less expensive property in the Bel Air area.

Property records for the Bel Air residence in question are, we confess, a smidgen vague; Ownership of the new home is through an eccentrically-named trust managed, it's worth nothing, by the same fella whose name appears on the deeds and documents for the couple's up-for-sale nest in the celebrity-packed Bird Streets area high above L.A.'s world-famous Sunset Strip. Howevuh, butter beans, Missus Catesen swore to Your Mama on her ever-present Boar's Head ham chub that she has it on unimpeachable authority that the new owners of a very contemporary house tucked privately into the tail end of a quiet cul-de-sac above the Stone Canyon Reservoir and bought in late days of 2011 for $4,150,000 are none other than Miz Mullally and Mister Offerman.

Listing information easily teased up out of the murky depths of the interweb, shows the two story contemporary residence—a sort of post-modern meets minimalist sort of pastiche—was built in 1992 and has 4 bedrooms and 3.5 bathrooms in an undeniably spacious but hardly huge 5,168 square feet.

The boxy, mostly grey massing at the front of the house strikes hard with a formidable and—from some angles—unfriendly and even forbidding street presence. While some of the children will surely whine about how this house looks like a parking garage or an architect-designed prison facility—and it sort of does—Your Mama happens to be unapologetically fond of residential buildings that present a private and sometimes unfriendly face to the world.

The front doors give way to an unexpectedly long and voluminous foyer that cuts a wide, traffic-managing swath through the middle of the multi-winged mini-mansion. The open tread floating staircase that (melo)dramatically bisects the space and injects the room with a goose-pimply soupçon of possible peril, and the barely there frame-less glass wall that opens to the reflecting pool-sized swimming pool, are absolutely impressive architectural conceits but alas it also looks to Your Mama a tetch too much like the lobby of a self-important talent agency.

The elevated, mountain-side siting of the house reveals itself in the roomy, just-about-square living room where vast panels of glass that flank the monolithic concrete chimney breast serve up far-reaching views over the jagged, mansion-dotted canyons and sparkling reservoir to the (mostly) untamed mountain tops that stand between the blinged-out Platinum Triangle from her mousier—and some might say one-eyed—real estate cousin, the San Fernando Valley.

We can't confirm it but Della Catesen told us her people told her Miz Mullally and Mister Offerman have embarked on some renovations to their newly scooped residence in Bel Air. If true—and why wouldn't it be?—there's really no telling what the place looks like now, but at the time of their acquisition the eat-in kitchen orbited around a large, L-shaped center island and was outfitted with snow white, hardware-less cabinetry, high-gloss jet black counter tops and the expected collection of top-grade stainless steel appliances frequently found in multi-million dollar contemporary homes around the globe. A long wall of floor-to-ceiling glass connects to a dining and entertaining terrace with sweeping views over the surrounding roof tops to the the reservoir and mountains beyond.

A family room/den (with what appears to be polished concrete floors) has a towering wall of glass next to which curls a spiral staircase that leads up to a clerestory-windowed loft area with more long and spectacular views over the canyons, mountains and reservoir. The by-now-proverbial vistas get even more panoramic in the second floor master bedroom where two complete walls of glass provide the thrilling illusion that the room hovers recklessly over the tree tops towards the reservoir.

Some of the downstairs rooms have entire walls of glass that look into an interior courtyard planted with a small stand of bamboo and other rooms on the lower level have long expanses of floor-to-ceiling windows, some with glass doors that conveniently connect to the numerous patios and terraces that surround the house. The children may recall that the backyard swimming pool at Miz Mullally and Mister Offerman's home in The Birds is confoundedly puny even for Your Mama who can really get behind the notion of plunge pool. Maybe the Mullally-Offermans just don't like to swim much? As it turns out the swimming pool at their new house in Bel Air is also on the too-small side, a situation somewhat mitigated, maybe, by it's interesting if unnecessary and rather intimate co-mingling with the house.

Given that Miz Mullally and Mister Offerman paid just under four million bucks for their house in The Birds, should they get anywhere even in the ballpark of their $12,650,000 asking price they ought to have plenty of Benjamin Franklins left over to cover the entire purchase price of their new nest in Bel Air as well as any improvements or renovations they may choose to undertake.

listing photos: Sotheby's International Realty

Buckle Your Real Estate Safety Belts...

Did y'all hear the executors of the estate for late Saudi royal fat cat Sultan bin Abdulaziz—otherwise known as the deceased Crown Prince of Saudi Arabia and the 12th son of long ago deceased King Abdulaziz—have made his behemoth, 45-bedroom pied-à-terre in London available, according to the Financial Times, to "a select list of wealthy international buyers" with a whispered and rumored, sky-high asking price of £300,000,000.

No, chicken livers, Your Mama did not mistakenly or drunkenly add an extra zero. The palatial, palace-sized residence, situated directly across the road from Hyde Park in the high-nosed South Kensington 'hood, actually has a price tag of three hundred million pounds. A quick consultation with our currency conversion contraption shows that amounts to n pocketbook pillaging $482,670,000 (U.S.).

Half a billion dollars for a 60,000 square foot single family residence with 45 bedrooms? That's not a house, children, it's a gawdamn boo-teek hotel.

The seven-story house, originally built as four separate townhouse-style residences, was previously owned by Rafiq Hariri, a Lebanese multi-billionaire and former Prime Minister of Lebanon, who was assassinated in Beirut in 2005. At some point after Mister Hariri's murder, the house was given—that's given to and not purchased by—the late Crown Prince of Saudi Arabia, who went to meet the great oil man in the sky last October and with whom Mister Hariri had close (and lucrative) business connections.

Besides the 45 bedrooms—just enough for Prince Sultan, his 12 wives and their 32 children to each have their own private sleeping chamber—the civic center-sized mega-mansion is reported to include millions of dollars worth of gold leafing, a large indoor swimming pool, an industrial-sized catering kitchen, underground parking facilities, several elevators and more than 120 (allegedly) bullet-proof windows, 68 of which face Hyde Park.

Other than the gated motor court in front, there does not seem to be much—if any—other outdoor space and we can't speak for the children but for almost half a billion dollars we would really require at least a wee terrace and patch of grass on which our long-bodied bitches, Linda and Beverly, can sun and relieve themselves in the privacy of their own property. Half a billion bucks and you gotta have a full-time handler to exercise and toilet the dogs 4-6 times a day? Pleeze.

Even with the still snappin' and cracklin' ultra high-end global real estate market in London (and elsewhere) it's difficult for Your Mama to imagine anyone would actually pay half a billion dollars for a private home even if it does, as Your Mama's elementary school mathematics reveal, encompass a gut-twisting 1.38 acres of interior space.

It boggles and betwixts Your Mama's booze-addled brain just to consider the Herculean effort and monumental amount of money required to staff and maintain this house in the manner befitting a bajillionaire Saudi Arabian royal. Just imagine the monthly heating electric bills for this 60,000 square foot house in damp and often chilly London. They easily and alone probably run many times more than a full-time minimum wage domestic worker in U.K. (and/or America) earns in an entire month. Maybe you do or do not want to think about that next time you pay $4.59 for a gallon of gas in Los Angeles or $8.50 for  3.8(ish) liters of petrol in London, an amount about equal to a gallon of gas.

exterior photo: Google

Sarah Jessica Parker and Matthew Broderick Flipping Out in Greenwich Village

 SELLERS: Sarah Jessica Parker and Matthew Broderick
LOCATION: New York City, NY
PRICE: $24,995,000
SIZE: 6,800+- square feet, 5-6 bedrooms, 5 full and 3 half bathrooms

YOUR MAMAS NOTES: Your Mama awoke at the crack of dawn this foggy but clearing morning to a covert communique from a kindly tattletale—let's call him Benjamin Bigapple—who kindly let us know the 25-foot wide New York City townhouse Sarah Jessica Parker and Matthew Broderick (allegedly) snatched up last year for $18,995,000 is back on the market with a new and significantly higher asking price of $24,995,000.

Property records Your Mama peeped show the deed last transferred in March 2011 to a obliquely-named trust handled by Frank Selvaggi, a fella well known amongst all us nosy property gossips as the business manager of Miz Parker and, we presume, any number of other notable and/or high net worth individuals. The townhouse sellers, as per property records and reports from the time of the March 2011 sale, were Malaysian media mogul Clive Ng and fashion model Farrah Summerford who themselves picked up the 165-year old red brick townhouse in the busy heart of Greenwich Village in June 2000 for $5,034,000.

The selling couple—we assume they are (or were then) romantically linked—converted the property back to a 6,800-ish square foot single family house in the early Aughts, according to listing information from 2009 that we dug up on the interweb. Current listing information and marketing materials indicate the elevator-less townhouse has five bedrooms, five full and three half bathrooms, and seven working fireplaces. Listing information from 2009 indicated the townhouse is also equipped with a bunch of other fancy stuff like a five-zone HVAC system, a phone system with 11 (and up to 250) active lines, and state-of-the-art security that includes a video intercom and five cameras with 24-hour time lapse recordings and on-demand accessibility from any computer from anywhere in the world.

A terrific stoop—and who doesn't love a New York City stoop?—rises to the parlor floor foyer that connects to both the formal living and dining rooms that can be separated by pocket doors but that together stretch forty-plus feet from the front clear through to the back of the house. A powder pooper for guests was well placed for privacy at the far end of the foyer/stair hall and a wonderful wet bar was advantageously nestled into an alcove in the dining room. A glass-paned door in the booze nook opens to a finely- and no-doubt expensively-engineered floating staircase that descends to the lower level and completely landscaped rear garden.

The garden floor, Boffi brand center island kitchen may be an annoyingly long schlep from the parlor floor formal dining room but it is something to behold, lavishly finished with bone-colored hardwood floors and giant slabs of marble and comfortably endowed with a kitchen-sized pantry and the full complement of top-notch and/or commercial-grade appliances. An adjoining breakfast area links to the thickly-planted, bi-level backyard.

The front of the garden level has a convenient under-the-stoop service entrance, an exceptionally generous storage closet, a small but agreeably located half bathroom, and a petite but hardly minuscule bedroom (with fireplace and private pooper) most likely to be occupied by a live-in domestic worker or possibly pressed into use as, we can easily imagine, a home office, Pilates studio, fetish suite, recording studio and/or etc.

There are two, small and window-free bathrooms on the third floor that service three guest/family bedrooms, two of which are, to say the least, awkwardly shaped. The full-floor master suite on the fourth floor offers two walk-in closets/dressing rooms plus additional closets space, full-width private terrace with garden view, and a bedroom-sized bathroom outfitted with a free-standing soaking tub, separate shower, two sinks, and a discrete cubby for the crapper.

The uppermost floor contains an voluminous, forty-plus foot long sky-lit family room with wood floors (that may or may not be antique) and a long wall of almost floor-to-ceiling magazine racks, bookcases and display shelves. A half bathroom saves time and energy climbing stairs and a small, separate office could be converted to a bedroom in a pinch. The basement level has a laundry room, lots of storage space, a couple of flexi-use rooms, and a three-quarter bathroom.

Back in March (2012) when all us celebrity property gossips were punch drunk with rumors and reports about the Parker-Brodericks picking up a pair of side-by-side townhouses on a leafy street in Brooklyn's Brooklyn Heights 'hood, there were more rumors and reports—kick-started by the celeb sleuths at the New York Daily News—about the (allegedly) itchy-footed couple "quietly shopping" their newly acquired Greenwich Village townhouse "after remodeling" but "having never moved in."

The thing is, as the more eagle-eyed children have probably already noted, current listing photos show the spacious interior spaces all done up with the nearly exact same day-core as was seen in the listing photos from September 2009. The sameness isn't just with the choice and configuration of the furniture but it goes right down to the art on the walls and the collection of perfume bottles on the slender mantel in the bedroom-sized bathroom in the fourth floor master suite. There are some very subtle differences—i.e. the earlier, 2009 listing photos don't show blue-grey bath mats on either side of the bathtub in the master bathroom—but they're so as to be inconsequential to the overall identicalness.

So, what's happening here, children? Were the current photos regurgitated from the previous listing in order to protect the privacy of the Parker-Brodericks? Did Matt and Sarah Jessie purchase the urban mansion fully furnished and decorated down to the wood-framed mirrors over the parlor floor mantels, the seal grey, tufted velvet wing back chairs in the living room that look to Your Mama like they probably cost more than our BMW, and the pair of abutted, matching, marble-topped round tables in the dining room? We'll let y'all chaw on and hash out that dilemma for yourselves.

In addition to the up-for-grabs Greenwich Village townhouse and the two red brick townhouses in Brooklyn they may (or may not) have acquired earlier this year, the Broderick-Parkers' property portfolio currently contains, according to our sources and resources, a 4,000+ square foot townhouse in the West Village bought way back in April 2000 for $2,995,000 as well as a couple of small houses in the Hamptons—one of which is ocean front—purchased in two separate transactions in the summer of 2005 for a total of $6,600,000.

Due to the three hour time difference between the east and west coasts, their apparent sleeplessness, and our molasses-like abilities, the ever-industrious kids at Curbed got their discussion of the matter up before we did.

interior listing photos: Sotheby's International Realty
exterior photo: Nicholas Strini for Property Shark

Actor Esai Morales Lists Hollywood Hills House

SELLER: Esai Morales
LOCATION: Los Angeles, CA
PRICE: $1,097,000
SIZE: 2,480 square feet, 4 bedrooms, 3 bathrooms

YOUR MAMAS NOTES: We received an unexpected and brief communique yesterday from Birdie Chirper who kindly and thoughtfully let Your Mama know that Brooklyn-born and bred Puerto Rican actor Esai Morales pushed his modest (if not exactly cheap) long-time residence in Los Angeles, CA on the market with a $1,097,000 asking price.

Mister Morales's big Showbiz break—if it can be called that—came in 1987 when he was cast in the Richie Valens biopic La Bamba with Lou Diamond Phillips. He went on to appear in dozens of films and television shows (i.e. Naked Tango, Rapa Nui, L.A. Doctors, American Virgin), most of which Your Mama has never heard of before. Since the turn of the century Mister Morales has made a living and a name for himself primarily (but not solely) on boob-toob police procedurals and sci-fi thrillers like NYPD Blue, Vanished, 24: Day Six-Debrief, Jericho and Caprica. Most recently he was seen on the easily digestible cable program Fairly Legal and appears to have a shy handful of movies coming down the pike.

Property records reveal Mister Morales bought his house house in the Hollywood Hills near the top of Nichols Canyon way back in May 2000 for $749,000. Current listing information shows the single story residence—an architecturally unholy hybrid between a classic, William Mellenthin-esque California ranch and a gawddam barn—was built in 1957, measures 2,480 square feet and includes a total of four bedrooms and three reasonably well maintained but woefully outdated-looking bathrooms.

We really can't say why after a dozen year Mister Morales has decided to sell his house in the Hollywood Hills but people often sell (and/or buy) homes due to death, divorce and diapers, otherwise (unofficially) known by most professional property purveyors as The Three Ds of Real Estate. As it turns out, salt and pepper-haired Mister Morales and his lady-friend Elvimar Silva made a baby together in late 2010 so, according to the accepted (but entirely unofficial) rules of celebrity real estate, that may (or may not) have something to do with it.

Anyhoo, once a person gets past the mousy front yard and the proto suburban-style front door, things get a teensy bit better in the living and dining rooms, divided by a massive, room-defining double-sided stone fireplace. Both have a vaulted and sky-lit wood beamed ceiling and wide banks of multi-paned sliding glass doors that link to the backyard and swimming pool.

The day-core, if it can be called that, consists of little more than a geometrically arranged capiz shell chandelier, a couple of this and thats hanging on the walls, and slim collection of sad, mostly beige and brown furnishings. Maybe Mister Morales isn't much for day-core or maybe Staging Lady in a Pink Toyota has been up in there removing any furnishings, artwork and/or other personal items that might actually give the house a little personality but, right now, this is not a house that looks to Your Mama like it would make a very interesting dinner companion. You know what we're saying? It's not offensive, it's just so plain, quotidian.

There are unassuming medium-brown wood floors in the living room that switch to polished paver tiles in the dining room that extend right on into the galley-style eat-in kitchen outfitted with faux-rustic pine paneling on the ceiling, lackluster wood cabinetry, and ecru-grouted cornflower blue tiles on the counter tops. Some of the upper cabinets have glass fronts for dish- and glassware display and the appliances are, at best, a ho-hum, medium-grade mix of black and stainless steel. Again, it's not an entirely offensive situation, it's just, well, there. Quite frankly, a little paint and elbow grease would do this kitchen a real damn decorative and design solid without having to go to the extreme expense of gutting it, which is what most of the children will undoubtedly think needs to be done to salvage the situation. We do appreciate the adjacent laundry room but think there's an awful lot of doors in there for such a small space.

A long, dim and narrow Y-shaped corridor connects the main living areas to the bedroom wing where the master bedroom has a vaulted wood-beamed ceiling, pillow-lined bay window seat with view of the Chinese slate and red brick surrounded swimming pool, and sliding glass doors that lead to a more private part of the yard with a spa. Listing photos indicate—but we can't confirm—a dressing area/closet-lined hallway joins the master bedroom to a dated and perfectly ordinary master bathroom.

Mister Morales's house may be hard up on one of the more heavily trafficked streets in the (admittedly not very heavily trafficked) 'hood but it's also surrounded by some prime Tinseltown real estate. Some of the nearby homes and estates are owned by beau-hunk actor Jake Gyllenhaal, quintessentially L.A. artist David Hockney, former sitcom star Justine Bateman, bandleader Ricky Minor (who bought his house last year from sitcom star Katey Sagal), and filmmaker Quentin Tarantino who had big ol' beef last year about obtrusive bird noise that emanates from next door neighbor screenwriter Alan Ball's aviary.

listing photos: Coldwell Banker

Vince Vaughn Takes It Down A Notch in Chicago

SELLER: Vince Vaughn
LOCATION: Chicago. IL
PRICE: $16,750,000
SIZE: 12,000 square feet, 5 bedrooms, 4 full and 4 half bathrooms

YOUR MAMAS NOTES: Everyone who pays even a speck of guilty-pleasured attention to the celebrity real estate scene already knows by now that People's Choice and Teen Choice award-winning actor Vince Vaughn quietly (and allegedly) had his titanic, 12,000(ish) square foot Chicago, IL triplex penthouse shopped around last year with a sky-high $24,700,000 asking price and that in June (2012) the 19-room perch atop the Palmolive Building on swanky Michigan Avenue popped up on the open market with a substantially lower $18,400,000 asking price.

Well, dontcha know little darlings, just like the earlier (and alleged) $24,700,000 price tag, the $18,400,000 price tag also appears to be a little more rose-tinted than the upper end Windy City real estate market will currently bear and the price tag has been reset for less at $16,750,000.

A few quick clickety-clacks on Your Mama's bejeweled abacus indicates that amounts to almost eight million clams less than Mister Vaughn originally (and allegedly) wanted for his Lindbergh Beacon-topped behemoth and just about nine percent less than its first official, open-market asking price.

The three-floor aerie, acquired by Mister Vaughn in September 2006 for $12,000,000, devotes the entire middle floor to formal entertaining (with 28-foot long living and dining rooms and eat-in kitchen), the lower floors to intimate family quarters, and the uppermost floor to the pursuit of millionaire-style home-based amusements and diversions, according to listing information.

In addition to a gorgeously-restored, paneled office once occupied by Playboy founder Hugh Hefner back in the day when the publication's corporate offices were in the building, the top level entertainment spaces allows Mister Vaughn and his guests to watch movies in the screening room; play pool and put puzzles together (or whatever) in the games room; fix a snack (or whatever) in a seven-foot by seven-foot second kitchen; grab a beer or mix a cocktail in the separate bar; laze and lounge around in a den/family room; crash in the penthouse's fifth bedroom, step out for a smoke or toke on the good-sized terrace surrounded by city and lake views and the perfect spot, as per marketing materials, for taking in Chicago's annual Air & Water Show.

Mister Vaughn currently owns a much more modest but still pretty big by middle-class standards 4,008 square foot townhouse just north of The Loop in Chicago acquired in summer 2005 for $1,425,500 and currently used as a rental, according to top-notch property gossip Bob Goldsborough at the Chicago Tribune.

The children can make what they will of this snippet of (previously leaked) rumor and gossip but no fewer than two of Your Mama's Platinum Triangle inside operators recently snitched that Mister Vaughn might be willing to shell out eight figures for the right, movie star-style residence in Los Angeles. Regardless of whether that particular celebrity property gossip nugget is fact or fiction, Mister Vaughn has already, at least once before rode the bull at the Tinseltown real estate rodeo. From 1999 until 2005, when he unloaded it for $4,050,000, Mister Vaughn owned a gated and privately situated, 1930s Mediterranean mini-estate in in L.A.'s celeb-friendly Los Feliz area that's now owned, as per the public property records we peeped, by Emmy-nominated sci-fi television writer/producer René Echevarria (Star Trek: Deep Space Nine, Dark Angel, Medium, Castle, Terra Nova).

exterior photo: City of Chicago via American Architecture