Tuesday, March 25, 2008

Michael J. Fox Loves Him Some Quogue

BUYER: Michael J. Fox and Tracy Pollan
LOCATION: Quogue Street, Quogue, NY
PRICE: $6,300,000
SIZE: 7,000 square feet (approx.), 6 bedrooms, 7.5 bathrooms

YOUR MAMAS NOTES: About 100 years ago Your Mama was chatting with a very nice gentleman we'll call Freddy Flapjaw who swore up and down that Emmy winning actor Michael J. Fox was looking to buy a multi-million dollar house in Quogue, a sleepy and (some might say) staid village at the western end of the Hamptons that is wall to wall with old school estates carpeted with vast lawns and anchored by gigantic shingled summer "cottages."

Your Mama unable to confirm or deny the "rumor" about Mister Fox's purchase at the time, but Freddy Flapjaw said, "You'll see." Turns out ol' Flapjaw was indeed speaking the truth and according to the real estate gossip gurls at Newsday, the Parkinson's afflicted actor and his actress wifey Tracy Pollan recently plunked down $6,300,000 for a newly built shingled "cottage" on tony Quogue Street smack in the geographic center of the village.

Having spent many a-summer day frolicking in the riptide at Dolphin Beach on Dune Road, Your Mama knows thing or two about this particular neck of the Hamptons. The general consensus among summer people in that area is that if you want glitz and glamour, keep driving your shiny late model Mercedes further down Montauk Highway to East Hampton where the restaurants are filled to capacity with perfectly bronzed famous folks in designer duds paying big bucks to eat gore-may meals. If you prefer competitive cribbage played pool side, putting 5,000 piece puzzles together on the screened porch, and being surrounded by old and quiet money, then Quogue just might be a finer fit for you.

The new Fox/Pollan property reflects that special brand of Hamptons hodge podge architecture where a dignified and shingled Dutch Gambrel marries a quirky Victorian ladee who secretly has an affair with a giant farmhouse who paws her with his wide porches. Throw in all the mod-ren conveniences and the result is a sprawling 7,000 square foot house with gleaming cherry floors (they're cherry, right?), acres of simple but pleasing mill work, seven fireplaces, a wine cellar, a commodious master suite with two fireplaces, a sitting room/office and private water view terrace, and a gunite pool with a pool side guest cottage all sitting on 1.1 acres of meticulously maintained and supernaturally green grass.

With six en suite bedrooms and 7.5 bathrooms, the Fox/Pollan summer house should provide plenty of room for the four Fox children. However with just four bedrooms on the second floor, the Fox twins will either have to bunk together or one of the older Fox children will need to claim the bedroom on the ground floor or the one above the garage that is accessed by a private stair off the kitchen...which is without a doubt the room Your Mama would have chosen as a teenager because it features a small private balcony perfect for a rebel teen to puff ciggies and other illegal substances. As an aside and for the record, Your Mama has long quit smoking cigarettes and so should you. No offense intended to any of you smokestacks, but it's a dirty, nasty, filthy, stinky and seriously bad habit that invites and even happily welcomes The Dreaded Cancer.

Freddie Flapjaw also whispered to Your Mama that the Fox/Pollan clan already has some residential roots in the area having forked over large sums of cash to rent a large house in Quogue the last few summers. Therefore, Your Mama imagines the sometimes wary and buttoned up Quoglians will be happy to welcome the Fox family with open arms this summer just as long as his celebrity doesn't attract any long lensed paps or freakos who think it's cute to sit out front of his house in their Hondas hoping for a glimpse of the bathing suited family.

Seriously children, don't do that...don't go to any of these celebs houses that Your Mama discusses. These people don't need you beating on their door acting like a damn fool thinking you're so clever for finding them. That just makes you an asshole. Don't think it does? Just ask anyone who's famous what they think of those "fans."

Anyhoo, if Your Mama is being honest, and we always are, Mister Fox is not really on our real estate radar so we're not sure where else Mister Fox and Miz Pollan own property. We do find some indication in property records that they own a Park Avenue apartment in New York City as well as a large house in pretty and pretty rural Sharon, Connecticut. It's also quite possible the Fox/Pollans own property in his native Canada and it's a pretty good guess they own a manse in one of the better zip codes in the Los Angeles area.

21 comments:

Anonymous said...

I used to live in Sharon, and would see him and Meryl Streep there, who also owns a house in Sharon, or did.

Anonymous said...

I really like the interior, especially the kitchen. And the fact that it is not surrounded by the bee-u-tee-ful people makes it even more appealing to me.

Long, long ago, before Mr. Fox became the Fox/Pollans, he had a place off Laurel Canyon Blvd. Drove the residents on Laurel Canyon crazy with the exhaust sounds from his car. This, mind you, is probably the ONLY negative thing I have ever heard about the guy.

I wish he and his family much happiness. Parkinson's is NOT easy.

Anonymous said...

When I visited St. John USVI the locals made it known that Michael J. Fox owned a home there (don't know if he still does).

Anonymous said...

I love Quogue and its neighbors, Westhampton Beach and Remsenberg. WB has a nice little village, restaurants are fine (who needs gourmet when you're supposed to be firing up the grill?), you don't need to get dressed, it's closer to NYC and you avoid the horrible traffic that starts where the road narrows past Quogue on the way to the "real" Hamptons. Most of all, it's NOT the famous Hamptons, and I think people have a sense of this and choose it precisely because of that (and of course, prices are lower so that may have something to do with it, but it's all relative).

There's sort of a new money/old money mix, as well as a mix of great old houses and estates. And one of the best things is the sort of ramshackle nature of Dune Road, with its mix of sick houses and old beachy little houses on the ocean and the bay. Give me this area any day (I'd take Amagansett though).

As for this house, it's quite nice, although I like my beach houses beachier.

Anonymous said...

sounds like my kind of place.

and this might be the first house featured on this blog where the buyer has a use for all those bedrooms.

Anonymous said...

Oh.
My.
God.

This is the most beautiful house I've ever seen in my entire lifetime. I'm in love. This would be my version of heaven. (If it were in a more Southern state, but I'll still take it!)

Anonymous said...

I'm lovin it
does it get better than this?
Quogue would be quite...
I'm thinking I'd like Water Mill.. but any way you look at it this is one of the very best HH featured on Mama's blog.

Best ever Mama

Parker said...

This looks like a wonderful family home and I wish the deserving family much luck and happiness. I am absolutely in love with the yard... so perfect for kids!

pch said...

I'm not a big fan of the whole postmodern Robert A.M. Stern school of shingle style revival architecture. People tend to go nuts with quirky elements, and the resulting jumble almost always looks to me like its trying way too hard.

I'm not in love with this house, but I'd like it a lot better without that weird semi-detached ancillary wing.

Anonymous said...

I love everything about it, inside and out. Lovely.

Anonymous said...

I love this house and setting and I love Michael J. Fox and Tracy Pollan. I would pick this any day over the trendier Hamptons. I like to be around old money...so much more refined than new money!

Anonymous said...

Oh, my, my, my. Where is my pocketbook?

Anonymous said...

I need to sit down. I'm a huge fan of ramblers, although older, a bit time worn with creaky floors would make it drool worthy, this is a very nice house.

THE KITCHEN! I could cook AND sneak up to the ante-room deck for my drunken cigs, etc... Ooh, shame on me.

lil' gay boy said...

One of the better examples of when an architect sticks to the program and doesn't try to play "speculator."

No bad, and definitely not a McHampton; execution is almost flawless.

Good location, too - you'll already be sitting on the porch with a G&T whilst you watch the traffic creep towards the "other" Hamptons . . .

Anonymous said...

Damn, another nice house. If this was in LA, this would be awesome. Where are all these home in LA. We have no taste out here.

Anonymous said...

if i knew what i was talking about & i don't, i would say what pch said, so i'll just agree with him tho.

Anonymous said...

I'm with PCH on the whole post-modern Stern thing, but IMO, this one falls short of being a victim of it. While there are a few things I don't love, in general, it's a well done house, and, since I'm guessing this was a builder spec house, could have been much worse.

Anonymous said...

My (teen) daughter said she's diggin' the "weird" ancillary wing and would call it her hizzle until moving day. And as for moi, the rest of the house...well...a picture's worth a thousand words and I think I'm looking at a novel.

Anonymous said...

Just rediscovered this post. Love love love this gem of a house. However, the home seems to be very close to the street not leaving the front of the property much privacy. I hope they plant some large tall trees so no one sees Ms. Pollan in her undergarments.
Curious to find out more after visiting a friend over the summer, i remembered this post. your mama is SO lucky she gets to go there. Your mama may already know, but if she doesn't, certainly will appreciate these fun real estate facts about Quague i discovered.

I heard Quogue is famously known for not being famous, and it definitely is. So different from East Hampton, no night clubs or main street that is a mini madison avenue, just a deli. Immediately, you know it'suber WASP.. However, after some research it seems that a few somebody's, have picked Quogue as their summer residence. Let me tell you, it was well worth the three hour treck from East Hampton to finally get around to visiting. You could blink and miss the town when driving by. The somebodys who live in Quoge are a random bunch. Your mama, PLEASE find out info on the last resident I listeds house.

Tina Brown, editor of The Daily Beast, and her hubby, writer Sir Harold Evans share a nice ocean sidepad on dune road only a few homes away from...

The mega real estate developer Mr. Moynihan. Moynihan purchased his ocean front estate from Saul Steinberg around 2000. Steinberg had quite the real estate portfolio before selling Quogue and the oh-so-famous and talked about liquidation of his s gigantic (20,000 square foot!!!!) apartment at 740 Park to money man Steve Schwartzman. Steinberg's son wed CNBC's Money Honey Maria Bartiromo at his Quogue beachfront property.

The now famous Winklevoss Twins, (The Social Network) who call themselves the "real" founders of facebook, have summered in Quogue since birth. The Winklevii, or rather their parents, according to an NY Post article from 2002, own two Dune Road properties.

Tyra Banks' money man (yes, she has a boyfriend) , super wealthy financier of some kind, John Utendahl, owns a home in Quogue. .

The Queen of Soaps herself, Susan Lucci, has lived in a Robert A.M. Stern ocean front mansion on Dune Road in Quogue for 30+ years.

LAST but certainly not lease, the Silver Hair Fox, Mr. Anderson Cooper, owns a home in a small enclave adjacent to Quogue, adequately named Quiogue. He hosts Christmas for his family at his bayfront estate every year, with his fabulous mama Mizzus Gloria Vanderbilt.

Your Mama, please find out more about Anderson's estate, dying to know the details!!!!

iHeartAnderson!!!!!!!!! said...

Well, this made me think of an artcle I read over the summer that tells us just where Anderson Cooper lives in Quiogue, Although in a New York Magazine article Cooper says he lives in Quogue, he lives in Quiogue, which is basically the same AND The Silver Fox"s retreat on the bay is across the street from deceased award winning TV Producer and writer of On The Waterfront, Budd Schulberg. according to an article from Newsday published August 2010:

"Two properties in the secluded hamlet of Quiogue are on the market.
One is the waterfront home of the late Academy Award winner who wrote the screenplay for the 1954 film “On the Waterfront” – including Marlon Brando’s immortal line, “I coulda been a contender.” Writer and TV producer Budd Schulberg’s widow, Betsy Schulberg, has listed the 1946 wood-shingled home the couple shared for $3.5 million.
Schulberg, who died last summer at the age of 95, also gained notoriety for his involvement with, and subsequent testimony against, the Communist Party of the United States. He joined the party in the 1930s, but left six years later, when he become convinced the party posed a threat to the freedom of speech. He testified before the House Committee on Un-American Activities in 1951, publicly naming eight Hollywood figures as party members.
Schulberg’s 3,654-square-foot home, which has two fireplaces, sits on a wooded 2.4-acre lot overlooking Aspatuck Creek in Quiogue. The house has four bedrooms and four bathrooms. The property includes a garage with an office above it, a pool and a guest house. Paul Brennan of Prudential Douglas Elliman Real Estate, who is co-listing the property with Kent Rydberg, said, “It’s private, historic and a beautiful setting.” It also has a noteworthy neighbor – CNN’s Anderson Cooper owns an adjacent property, Brennan said"

credit for article and for photos:

http://www.newsday.com/classifieds/real-estate/real-li-1.812034/quiogue-estates-for-sale-border-anderson-cooper-house-1.1782616

Anonymous said...

Actually quiogue has a westhampton beach PO address and Anderson cooper's home is directly across the narrow creek from Marvin hamlisch's old place in WHB. Coopers home is not accessible to drive by. Another Quogue resident on dune road in a fabulous small oceanfront cottage was the late Gwen Verdon but I don't know if Robert fosse lived there when she did.