Wednesday, November 11, 2009

Sophia Loren Slept Here

SELLERS: Edoardo Ponti and Sasha Alexander
LOCATION: Chelan Drive, Los Angeles, CA
PRICE: $2,135,000
SIZE: 4 bedrooms, 4 bathrooms
DESCRIPTION: Indoor/Outdoor living at its finest. Beautifully remodeled contemporary 4+4 home with perfect flow for entertaining w/ stainless steel appliances, open living room with Ledger stone fireplace. The master suite includes sitting area, fireplace and features pocket doors that completely open the room the the private pool/spa and expansive views of the canyon.

YOUR MAMAS NOTES: Okay babies, Your Mama confesses that we don't really know if Oscar winning Italian actress and international sex symbol Sophia Loren (Matrimonio all'italiana, La ciociara, Prêt-à-Porter) actually slept in this house in the Outpost Estates area of Los Angeles. What we do know is that the world's sexiest senior citizen's son Edoardo Ponti and his wifey, Sasha Alexander own the house in question and have recently listed it with a price tag of $2,135,000.

Signore Ponti is, of course, the thirty-something year old son of La Loren and legendary Academy Award winning Italian film producer Carlo Ponti (Doctor Zhivago, La Strada). Young Signore Ponti has followed in his papà's footsteps right into the big, bag movie bidness, writing and directing a few films including Between Strangers and another one called Italian Holiday which has yet to be released. Since 2007, Signore Ponti has be betrothed to actress Sasha Alexander who is perhaps best known for her boob-toob roles on the icky-sappy and thankfully erstwhile Dawson's Creek in the late 1990s and on Navy NCIS: Naval Criminal Investigative Service in the mid 2000s. More recently she has wound her way into films like Mission Impossible III, Yes Man, and He's Just Not That Into You.

Some previous reports and records show the property was purchased in 2004. However, that is not, according to our research, correct. Records Your Mama accessed show that Signore Ponti purchased the Chelan Drive domicile in January of 2006–or March depending on where Your Mama looks. The property records Your Mama accessed are vague on the purchase price but with a little assistance from our good buddy Babbling Babette we've managed to suss out a purchase price of $1,745,000. Listing information and public property records agree that there are four bedrooms and four poopers on the property, but when it comes to square footage, there seems to be some discrepancy. Listing information indicates the house measures 2,800 square feet while the tax man shows it covers 2,569 square feet.

Although there is a two car garage under the house and some sort of small, odd attachment on the roof that is accessed via a spiral stair on the pool deck–the Ponti/Alexander residence sits mostly on a single level. Listing information indicates the house was recently renovated but Your Mama happens to know it was not by the current owners. What the current owners are responsible for is the all beige all the time look look that begins with the front facade of beige stucco and beige stacked stone walls and accents. The children will not the amazing banana plants. Love, love, love those nanner plants.

Inside, the sufficiently sized living room has a very high wood ceiling, blond and glossy bamboo wood floors and a monolithic stacked stone wall which has a three sided fireplace at one end. A low, built in bench runs along the length of the stacked stone wall which also has a big black bas relief of the face of Buddha or some other eastern deity tacked up on it. Listing information indicates the fireplace is made of Ledger stone." As best as Your Mama can tell, that means it's a stone veneer hot glued onto a cement wall rather than an actual wall made of stacked stone. The floors switch to travertine in the dining room which has a vaulted wood ceiling, and huge floor to ceiling windows overlooking the back yard and the swimming pool. Although we think the dining room would benefit greatly from some kind of color–say, and an area rug with a deep eggplant colored base–but otherwise we're sorta digging the mixing matchy of the chunky farm table with the antique Louis the Something cane backed chairs and the uber-elaborate, glammy, gilded and–we're gonna say it–gaudy Italian looking mirror with its warts, gew-gaws and gilding mixed with the smooth planes of the banana leaves sticking up all manly-like out of the vase on the table.

The monolithic, stacked stone veneer wall and three sided fireplace that starts in the living room wraps around into the kitchen which is blessed with a wonderfully vaulted wood beamed ceiling and sky lights. The smallish but gore-may kitchen set up has more of the beige travertine floors as in the dining room, honey colored cabinetry, beige and brow flecked granite counter tops and some uppity stainless steel appliances that probably combined cost more than middle class people earn in a damn year.

The honey colored wood floors in the living room continue into the master bedroom which according to listing information has it's own sitting area and fireplace as well as a vaulted wood ceiling and an entire wall of windows that slide open and over look the swimming pool. While we do love this bedroom as covered porch sort of thing, we'd never leave it open unattended because fraidy cats that Your Mama and the Dr. Cooter are, we'd be awfully concerned with coyotes comin' 'round and slipping up onto the bed for a nice soft place to sleep. Don't laugh chickens, just days ago Your Mama watched a kie-ote titter down the street right in front of our damn house probably looking for dinner and a quiet place to sleep. Anyhoo, the master bathroom is slathered in beige travertine and offers a double vanity with dog bowl sinks, a couple of skylights and windows for light and, uh, ventilation, and a jetted tub/shower combination that shares the through the wall fireplace in the sitting area of the master bedroom.

The backyard of the Ponti/Alexander residence is small, as is expected in these hillside homes and includes a rectangular pool with rounded corners and in-ground spa surrounded by a terrace too slim to do the downward facing dog or put a damn chaise lounge for sunbathing in the newd. If Your Mama is being honest, and we always are, we'd have made the this swimming pool plunge-sized in order to gain a few more square feet of terrace so that we would not have to worry about rounding the corner of the house and falling into the damn pool after a pitcher or two of late afternoon gin and tonics. Around the corner from the pool and up a few steps is a larger courtyard/patio/terrace like space with a built in firepit.

For what it is worth, the house that sexy and balloon breasted actress Salma Hayak called home before she got knocked up by her billionaire baby daddy Francois-Henri Pinault and moved into a behemoth of a mansion on Bel Air Road in Bel Air is just around the corner. As far as we can tell, Missus Pinault still owns the property.

16 comments:

Anonymous said...

Not impressive. The layout of the kitchen looks like a nightmare. You have to walk all the way around the counter to get from the stove to the fridge?

stolidog said...

Anon 9:35...that's exactly what i was thinking. it's a bizarre kitchen layout and the dining room looks like a steaming hot terrarium.

Anonymous said...

While I have not been inside this house, it strikes me as odd. Chelan is an ok street.

Anonymous said...

What'w wrong with a coyote coming to snuggle up with you at night? Sounds like a right friendly thing to do.

Viva! said...

Rather than call this 'Sophia Loren Slept Here' I'd call it 'Sophia Loren Recovered From Her Facelift Here' for we all know Ms Loren gets her fender work done in La La Land (plus New York and Rome and Paris). An odd house, especially the kitchen. And I hate the view.

Anonymous said...

I knew you were a gin-and-tonic lover Mama! A mellow gurl like myself...My word verification is "Bombay Sapphire."

Madam Pince said...

I guess I've been living with my 70s hot mess of a kitchen so long that I'm not appalled by this one like all the other chirren. In fact, I like this house. The four-footed bunch and I would be quite happy (and secure against those ki-yotes!).

Madam Pince said...

And I'd happily post a "Sophia Loren slept here" sign as well!

Anonymous said...

House purchased in 2006 for $1,745,000 near the peak of the housing bubble...now listed at $2,135,000 in 2009...property has increased in value? Interesting.

Anonymous said...

it's nice.

Anonymous said...

Hi People:
I have a quick question: Is there anyone who knows anything about the house at N Faring Road and Greendale drive across from the Harvard Westlake school in L>A>?
Thanks

Thomas said...

Besides the kitchen I really like it. I wouldn't cost THAT much to turn that island around.

Anonymous said...

I like this house

Imoti Varna said...

The house is wonderful but very expensive ;)

Bel said...

Do the Pontis still live there?

Anonymous said...

Reno the kitchen and update the paint.