BUYER: Dan Castellaneta and Deb LacustaLOCATION: Pacific Palisades, CA
PRICE: $5,700,000
SIZE: 5 bedrooms, 4.5 bathrooms
YOUR MAMAS NOTES: We were first alerted to the Castellaneta-Lacusta's latest real estate acquisition by The Bizzy Boys at Celebrity Address Aerial. We next consulted a wise oracle in the chit-chatty celebrity real estate gossip grapevine, let's call her Chatty Cathy, who whispered to Your Mama that Mister Castellaneta and Miz Lacusta found their new home, a glassy contemporary just a few blocks away from their Colcord crib, by attending an open house.
Property records show the couple closed on the property in late April 2011, paying $5,700,000 for the multi-winged single-story sprawler that includes a 4 bedroom main house plus a 1 bedroom guest house and a total of 4.5 bathrooms.
Like many of the large homes in the hoity-toity 'hood, the Castellanetta-Lacusta's new digs are hidden behind thick foliage and electronically-controlled gates. The double-gated circular driveway rises to a cramped-looking motor court with three car garage points the way to the front entry. A wide stone stair and walkway connects the motor court to the front door. Inside smooth wood floors–they look like white oak to Your Mama but may very well be some other type of wood–spread out through the main living spaces that include a casual "formal" living room with sky-lit ceiling and flat-screen tee-vee built into a wood wall panel. The formal dining room, separated from the entry by a trio of floating panels fitted with opaque ribbed glass, has a wall of floor to ceiling windows and another full wall of sleek cabinetry with both open and closed storage and display areas.
Another trio of floating panels fitted with opaque ribbed glass separate the dining room from the L-shaped open plan family area of the house that includes a high-ceilinged family/dining area with stone and stainless steel fireplace flanked by a massive built-in entertainment cabinet with open and closet storage and display space. We could do without the stainless steel detail above the fireplace. We'd much prefer to set all that crisp and clean modernism with a heavily saturated and perhaps sinister photograph like, say, one of artist Gregory Crewdson's thickly detailed and cinematic but uncomfortably bleak pictures. Just a thought. Anyhoo, at opposite ends of the room walls of glass slide open, one end of the room spills out to a covered dining terrace that overlooks the flat lawn and motor court at the front of the house and the other opens to marry the room to the courtyard-like backyard.
The angular kitchen has both stainless steel and smooth flat-fronted wood cabinetry, a massive center island with breakfast bar, sea foam green glass back splash and top-grade commercial-style appliances that include a Mercedes-sized range with six burners and a damn griddle. A full wall of floor-to-ceiling sliding glass doors merges the kitchen with the backyard.
A dark-bottomed rectangular swimming pool with narrow sunbathing terrace anchors the extreme rear of the property. A small piazza-like space with built in barbecue and outdoor fireplace both separates and joins the main house to the detached one-bedroom guest house adjacent to and situated just higher than the swimming pool.
Mister Castellaneta and Miz Lacusta's new neighbors include a number of very high-profile peeps. Retired boxer Sugar Ray Leonard owns the house next door, much awarded comedienne/actor/gab-fest hostess Whoopi Goldberg owns a large house around the corner as does increasing mouthy and opinionated comedian Bill Cosby and the massive resort-hotel style hillside compound of Hollywood super-heavyweight Steven Spielberg is directly across the street.
listing photos (new house, bottom): Prudential California / Brentwood
