Porn Star Haiku: Sara Jay

You are the reason

I get wood for hieroglyphics

And crooked teeth

Nate Berkus Downsizing in Chicago

SELLER: Nate Berkus
LOCATION: Chicago, IL
PRICE: $2,650,000
SIZE: 3,980 square feet, 3 bedrooms, 4 bathrooms

YOUR MAMAS NOTES: We know we ain't the first person to the prom on this one, puppies, but let's have a look-see anyways shall we? The matter of hotshot decorator and designer Nate Berkus putting his Chicago, IL condo on the market with a price tag of $2,650,000 was first mentioned–as best as we can tell–in real estate gossip Bob Goldsborough's Elite Street column for the Chicago Tribune. Mister Goldsborough, some of the children may recall, used to pen the defunct and much missed celebrity real estate blog Big Time Listings.

Mister Berkus rocketed to fame and fortune in 2002 when he began to appear on The Oprah Winfrey Show. Once The Big O gave Nate Berkus her stamp of approval–wham, blam, thank you ma'am–he was a superstar decorator and darling of glossy shelter publications like Elle Decor. We're not saying that cheery and user-friendly Mister Berkus doesn't deserve his accolades but, let's be honest butter beans, his benefactor has a fan base so fervent she could turn a dried up cob of corn into the world's best selling author iffin she said the corn cob wrote a book. Beehawtcha says jump and half the damn world jumps, you know?

In addition to his eponymous decorating practice that has done up dwellings for celebs who include Billy Joel and his most recent ex-wife Katie Lee Joel, Mister Berkus wrote the cumbersomely named book Home Rules: Transform the Place You Live into a Place You Love, hosted Oprah's Big Give and in 2008 he launched a lucrative line of home products for the Home Shopping Network. Can y'all say kaching! In the fall of 2010 charming and eye-catching Mister Berkus followed in his mentor's foot steps got his own talk show, the timing of which we're certain had nothing to do with the fact that Momma Oprah is closing up her talk show shop sometime in 2011.

It wasn't long after Oprah launched Mister Berkus into the stratosphere that he snatched up some high-priced real estate in Chicago. Property records show that in July of 2003 Mister Berkus spent $1,500,000 to acquire a dignified Gold Coast condo formerly owned by the Block family of Inland Steel and re-worked in the 1950s by renowned International Style architect Samuel Marx.

Listing information shows Mister Berkus's 7-room full floor condo, located in a 1928 apartment building with just 12 apartments and photographed for–natch–Elle Decor in 2008, measures 3,980 square feet and includes 3 bedrooms and 4 poopers all done up in Mister Berkus's signature style that Your Mama might describe as a multi-layered and eccentric (but far from funky) mash-up of a photograph-friendly soft-modern female married to a very rich non-confrontational traditional man who openly dabbles with a whimsical David Hicks in the 1970s mistress.

Mister Berkus, being the nice, gay decorator that he is, put his own stamp on his new sprawler that included according to listing information the installation of hardwood floors and a reconfiguration of the master suite. Much to our delight and his credit, Mister Berkus retained some of the apartment's original architectural and decorative details such as the oak paneling in the library and the a-may-zing silver-leafed wall covering in the office. In a magnificent and commendable stroke of restraint Mister Berkus opted to restore rather than replace the steel kitchen cabinetry installed by Samuel Marks. He painted the vintage cabinets army green set them off with up-to-date and high-grade kitchen accouterments.

The apartment contains an large, airy living/dining room with lots of windows and an 18th-century limestone fireplace mantel. The room's most dominant decorative feature–iffin indeed Mister Berkus hasn't swapped it out for something else since the 2008 Elle Decor photo shoot–is a black and white geometric Madeline Weinrib-designed Buche rug that probably cost Mister Berkus more than Your Mama paid for our big BMW. Word to the less financially fortunate than Moneybags Berkus: You can buy a knock off of Ms. Weinerib's rug at the Swedish retail giant Ikea for under two-hundred bucks.

Although it would look utterly redonkulous in Your Mama and the Dr. Cooter's modest abode in the Hollywood Hills our favorite piece of Mister Berkus's furniture selections, a custom-made lemon yellow tufted ottoman, can be seen in his book-filled library where it sits prominently in front of the fireplace. The ottoman, bless it's hard, has been rendered completely useless for sitting by the stacks of books from Mister Berkus's vast and enviable collection of tomes and treatises on art, architecture and design.

There's another fireplace in the reconfigured corner master suite, the third one as far as we can tell. Mister Berkus's boo-dwar includes a decidedly decadent 1930s-ish-style bathroom that's far to Hollywood Housewife for Your Mama's personal taste. What we do like in that there bathroom is the exquisite Jacques Adnet stool Mister Berkus set up next to the bathtub. Were we ever to be invited to Mister Berkus's condo–and we're pretty sure we'll never be invited to any of Mister Berkus's homes–the children can be certain that Your Mama would make a valiant attempt to sneak that stool out in our handbag.

A February 2011 article in Chicago Magazine reveals that the reconfiguration of the master bedroom included snatching half of the original dressing room in order to create an enlarged master bath. What remains is still an impressive custom-fitted walk-in closet with more than enough space for all Mister Berkus's shoes, suits, socks and manties. We could do without the ashy cornflower blue paint on the cabinets and yellow walls always make us feel like we're headed towards insanity but we'd pee our pants with glee if we had a closet that looked even half a organized and Mister Berkus's. Just ask the Dr. Cooter. We do not share closet space, chickens, because Your Mama's closet typically looks like a tornado ripped right through it and it would most assuredly drive the Dr. Cooter into a murderous rage to have to sift through all Your Mama's t-shirts and things just to locate a pair of his shoes.

Anyhoodles poodles, the listing agent for Mister Berkus's Chicago condo told Mister Goldsborough at the Chicago Tribune that Mister Berkus although he spends more and more time in New York City Mister Berkus plans to "keep a presence" in Chicago, presumably something a bit smaller than this suburban mcmansion-sized Grande Dame on the Gold Coast.

It was reported recently that Mister Berkus upgraded his living quarters in the N-Y-C. Or has he? In 2006 Mister Berkus paid $550,000 for a puny pied-a-terre in New York City's West Village. He decorated the wee pad and, natch, it was featured on Oprah's program, in a magazine or two and on scads of shelter and design blogs.

Last year, in May of 2010, Mister Berkus gave the Oprah Winfrey people a brief tour of a swank new spread he referred to as "my apartment" in the multi-faceted Jean Nouvel-designed tower at 100 Eleventh Avenue in trendy West Chelsea. Shortly after the piece aired on Oprah, Jennifer Gould Keil at the New York Post repeated the rumor she heard that Mister Berkus does not actually own the featured apartment but rather that he leases the deluxe digs from much lauded and applauded Peruvian-born fashion photographer Mario Testino. Interestingly, in the aforementioned Chicago Magazine Mister Berkus's New York City crib is described as, "A small condo in the West Village." Of course, we don't know a cork board from a skate board. Maybe Mister Berkus lives in a starchitect-designed apartment he may or may not own in too-trendy West Chelsea or maybe he lives in a bantam one-bedroom in the leafy, lovely and lavishly gentrified West Village.

Mister Berkus used to share an apartment in Milan–that's in Italia, kids–with his former man-friend Brian Atwood, a sultry male model turned ladies shoe designer. The quondam man-couple had their fourth floor walk-up residence in a 1920s era apartment building photographed for the April 2009 issue of Elle Decor. The swell photographs depict the top floor apartment features such decorative choices as a Farrah Fawcett poster, palm leaf print wallpaper identical to that in The Fountain Coffee Room at the Beverly Hills Hotel–which Your Mama has to admit was a deliciously campy selection–a Pedro Friedeberg hand chair and a lot of shimmery chrome and brass things that evoke that 1970s David Hicks thing Mister Berkus likes so much. Mister Berkus announced recently that he's two years into a relationship with an unnamed architect, which indicates that he and the dashing shoe designer parted ways quite some time ago. Since the apartment in Milan was occupied by Mister Atwood before he and Mister Berkus hitched their gay wagons we're guessing that Mister Berkus no longer makes use of the apartment. What we really want to know, of course, is if Mister Atwood scrubbed the fancy flat clean of the Nate Berkus designed day-core. Anyone? Bueller? Bueller?

Your Mama recently heard through the real estate gossip grapevine that Oprah Winfrey is getting sick and damn tired of her frequent commute from her fifty-million dollar estate on Montecito, CA to her new OWN (Oprah Winfrey Network) offices in Los Angeles' Miracle Mile District. It seems like it'll only a matter of time before Oprah looks to buy a crash pad in Los Angeles, don't it? Your Mama humbly suggests she consider the star-packed Sierra Towers building on the Sunset Strip where The Big O can ride up and down the elevators with all those other a-list ladies who own condos in the building like like Cher, Joan Collins and Elton John. Just a thought. Wherever The Big O alights in Los Angeles, Your Mama wonders if her protégé Nate Berkus will snag the gig to do up the day-core? We'll just have to wait and see.

photos: Pieter Estersohn/Elle Decor via Apartment Therapy (all interiors); Coldwell Banker (exterior)

Weekend Wrap Up

1.
American ex-pat actor Johnny Depp and his French baby momma Vanessa Paridis are reported to have picked up the Palazzo Donà Sangiantoffetti that overlooks the Grand Canal in Venice. Mister Depp, who reportedly outbid an Arab royal, paid around £8,580,000 for the fixer upper. That's 13,599,800 at today's rate in American dollars.

2.
Did y'all know that tennis queen Venus Williams thinks she's a decorator?

3.
New York Yankee Derek Jeter's new department store-sized mega-mansion on the Davis Islands in Tampa, FL is finished and, hunnies, it's an architectural damn doozy, a real hot mess of the highest magnitude.

4.
The art- and book-filled Upper East Side penthouse of legendary New York City restaurateur Elaine Kaufman has hit the market with an asking price of $2,995,000. The petite two bedroom and 2.5 pooper penthouse has a wood burning fireplace in the living room, a gigantic wrap around terrace and is so far east it might as well be Brooklyn.

We are definitely not down with Miz Kaufman's choice of Southwestern print sofas in the living room, but we'd probably walk buck-nekkid through a ring of fire for the abstract impressionist painting in the dining room and we suffer even greater humiliation for the painting in the entrance hall that may or may not be a Franz Kline.

Ms. Kaufman's eponymous restaurant on Second Avenue near 88th Street has been a mecca and institution for the literati, glitterati and celebrati for decades.

5.
The folks at Curbed had a little conference call chit-chat this week with the real estate boys from Million Dollar Listing. The season 4 premiere is February third. Your Mama is not being paid any money for plugging the show–hello!–but we did get an invite to the premiere party and plan to drink our payment in numerous gin & tonics at the open bar.

Porn Star Haiku: Cherokee D'Ass

You remind me of

My jeep — lots of trunk space,

Guzzler — I'd ride you rough.

BRITTNEY SKYE

Date of Birth

5 November 1977, Cape Girardeau, Missouri, USA

Birth Name

Brandie Rae Rothwell

Height

5' 5" (1.65 m)

STEPHANIE SWIFT

Date of Birth

7 February 1972, Louisiana, USA

Birth Name

Melody Clark

Height

5' 5" (1.65 m)

Mini Biography

A veteran of more than 180 adult films, Stephanie Swift grew up in Louisiana. When she was ten years old she and her mother moved to Chula Vista, California, and she later attended Bonita Vista High School. After graduation in 1990 she worked in San Diego as a dental assistant and then as a stripper. In 1994, at 22 years of age and with a couple of Playboy videos under her belt, she decided to break into the porn business. The small-breasted Southern belle has since starred in some very high-profile adult blockbusters, such as Hell on Heels (1999) (V), Sex Safari (1999/I) (V), Double Feature (1999) (V) and _Dream Quest (2000) (V)_. She lives in California with her chihuahua (called Shakespeare) and a cockatoo named Rio.

Spouse

Reuben

(? - ?)

Trivia

Attended Bonita Vista High School in Chula Vista, CA. Graduated Class of 1990.
Has an Orange-Belt in Wado Ryu karate

SHAY SWEET

(Bio To Be Found)

Rose McGowan Leaving Los Feliz

SELLER: Rose McGowan
LOCATION: Los Angeles, CA
PRICE: $1,849,000
SIZE: 4,278 square feet, 4 bedrooms, 3 bathrooms

YOUR MAMAS NOTES: Yesterday, while sipping an ice cold gin & tonic scoping out all the new listings in The City of Angels we ran across a particularly fetching abode in the Los Feliz area that set off all of Your Mama's highly-tuned celebrity real estate sensors. A short spin through the interweb and a few ringy-dingy's on our bedazzled Princess phone turned up two snitches who confirmed the house, listed with an asking price of $1,849,000, belongs to sultry actress, Boston Terrier advocate and sartorial daredevil Rose McGowan.

For better or worse and likely much to her chagrin, Miss McGowan will likely go down in Your Mama's (entirely subjective) version of Hollywood history for three things for which she might rather not be remembered: Her long-running role on that hare-brained tee-vee show about sister-witches Charmed, her 3.5 year relationship with Goth-rock provocateur Marilyn Manson and her sensationally ribald walk down the red carpet at the 1998 MTV Video Music Awards in little more than a handful of beads that did nothing to conceal neither her booty nor her boobies. In an inexplicable nod to modesty, some of the children may recall, Miss McGowan did sport a sparkling pair of beaded thong panties that covered her (probably hairless) baby maker. Nowadays the Miss McGowan works her thing a far less scurrilous but still vixenish Betty Page-inspired sort of style mirrored in the day-core choices made in her house.

Anyhoo, Miss McGowan hung on to Charmed until it went off the air in 2006. A few of her more recent professional engagements include Brian de Palma's Black Dahlia, Quentin Tarantino's double-feature Grindhouse, Fifty Dead Men Walking and a stint on the boob-toob program Nip/Tuck with the also happy-to-be-expose-my-kiester-on-television Julian McMahon. According to her resume on the Internet Movie Data Base, Miss McGowan will appear in three movies in 2011 including a in the action-babe flicks Conan the Barbarian and Red Sonja.

Property records show that Miss McGowan scooped up her walled and gated residence in the Los Feliz area of Los Angeles in July of 2004 for $1,850,000. That's exactly one thousand dollars more that the property's current price tag of $1,849,000. Even with a full price sale–an unlikely event in today's still tough real estate times–Miss McGowan will be faced with a wham-blam to her pocketbook.

Old listing information Your Mama scared up out of the internets shows that Miss McGowan snapped up this house after just one day on the market. Listing information from that time also shows the house was priced at $1,749,000, which suggests that Miss McGowan paid about $100,000 more than the asking price. That was way back in 2004 when the market was sizzling. We doubt Miss McGowan will be so lucky but, chickens, iffin Your Mama and the Dr. Cooter were in the market for a nearly two-million smacker house in Los Feliz, we'd be all over this place lickety-split.

Listing information shows the muted coral-colored villa, an intriguing and exquisitely patinated melange of Spanish, Moroccan, Moorish and Andalusian architectural elements, was built in 1928 and spans 4,278 square feet. The house contains a total of 4 bedrooms–one located on the lower floor–and three bathrooms. Listing information indicates–but isn't entirely clear–that one of the upstairs bedrooms may have been converted to a walk-in closet/dressing room for all of Miss McGowan's many pairs of shoes and vintage dresses.

The front door, set dramatically into an elaborately carved stone threshold, opens into an impress-the-guests-style entrance hall with tile floor, double-height ceilings, stained glass window, decorative iron banister, minstrel's balcony and a trio arched doorways that lead to the living, dining and family rooms.

The sizable and architecturally swoon-worthy but not cavernous living room has peg-and-groove hardwood floors, a high pitched ceiling with exposed trusses, carved stone fireplace, classic arched window and four sets of French doors the open into courtyard-like gardens. While it certainly won't be to every one's liking, Miss McGowan's quirky personal style shines through in the living room that's done up with moss colored velvet Art Deco furniture, shimmery orange curtains (a bold statement that Your Mama loves but isn't fully effective here, and a burled wood credenza over which hangs an original lighted sign from the legendary Brown Derby restaurant that used to be at Hollywood and Vine. This may not be what we'd do with this house decoratively speaking but Your Mama would far more look at day-core that is an overt reflection of the occupant rather than to peep at the sterile decorative perfections that have been washed free of any personality and are often seen in most of the glossy shelter publications.

Miss McGowan wisely kept things basic in the nicely-proportioned formal dining room where a complicated geometric tile floor–that we hope and imagine is original to the house–takes center stage. The fab tile floor continues out a wide bank of French doors to a grassy and private part of the yard. A glorious and very shallow groin-vaulted ceiling graces the kitchen that opens to the dining room and is renovated in a manner that both preserved the original aesthetic of the house–note the lattice front lower cabinets–and added high-grade modern conveniences. The tile floor is an identical pattern to that in the dining room except with a tweaked color combination that swaps the red in the dining room for the yellow in the kitchen.

A family room with a coffered ceiling that mirrors the coffered detailing of the front door has hardwood floors, fireplace, built-in bookshelves filled with actual books–it seems Miss McGowan reads–and a big-ass flat screen tee-vee mounted on the wall above a streamlined Art Moderne cabinet. Like in the living room, Miss McGowan opted for Art Deco style furnishings–this time clean-lined black leather with white accents. Your Mama feels the room could benefit strongly from the introduction of a playful and richly colored antique Art Deco-style area rug with a rounder, more female pattern that plays off the hard edges of tile floors in the kitchen and dining room.

Miss McGowan's boo-dwar includes a bedroom with wood floors and French doors that open to a covered balcony with beautifully lathed wood columns and a perfectly period Jack-and-Jill-style pooper with spectacular lavender and black tile and historically accurate (and possibly original) fixtures.

While there does not seem to be a single large expanse of outdoor space there are several intimate courtyard-style terraces and patios that ring the residence and provide plenty of room for Miss McGowan's Boston Terriers or, perhaps, a couple of long bodied bitches like Your Mama and the Dr. Cooters' Linda and Beverly.

Miss McGowan's Los Feliz home has a long list of celebrity neighbors who include January Jones (Mad Men), Jon Hamm (also from Mad Men), Laura Prepon (That 70s Show), director David Fincher (The Social Network, Fight Club). A bit farther away are all the celebs that line the streets of the gated Laughlin Park community who include preggers Natalie Portman (Black Swan), pop star Natasha Bedingfield, Jenna and Bodhi Elfman, Casey Affleck and Summer Phoenix, and Black Eyed Pea will.i.am.

Previous to living in Los Feliz, Miss McGowan owned a Spanish-style casa in the historic Whiteley Heights 'hood in Hollywood. That house, interestingly, has had a slew of subsequent celebrity owners. Records show that Miss McGowan sold the house in July of 2004 for $1,235,000 to actress Rachel Bilson (The O.C.). Miss Bilson quickly caught a case of The Real Estate Fickle and sold the house in December of 2005 to the dee-voon Busy Phillips (Cougar Town) for $1,349,000. As far as Your Mama knows Miss Bilson still owns and occupies an abode in Los Feliz records show she bought in the fall of 2006 for $1,880,000.

Miss Busy and her rom-com screenwriter husband Marc Silverstein (He's Just Not That Into You) moved to bigger digs nearby they bought for $2,100,000 in March of 2008. In January of 2009 Miss Busy sold the 2,204 square foot house in the hills as a short sale for $1,075,000. We were told by the always knowledgeable informant Lucy Spillerguts that the house was acquired thespian turned tee-vee star Ginnifer Goodwin (Big Love) who recently became engaged to actor Joey Kern.

JENNA HAZE

Birth Name

Jennifer Corrales

Height

5' 3" (1.60 m)

Summary

"Jenna Haze" (born February 1982) is an American pornographic actress. She entered the adult film industry in 2001 at the age of 19. Between 2002 and 2005, she was a contract girl for the film company Jill Kelly Productions. During most of her time at the company, she performed exclusively with women, out of loyalty to her then boyfriend, an industry cameraman. She returned to working with men in the 2006 multi-award winning release "Jenna Haze Darkside", produced by Jules Jordan. Haze herself has won numerous adult industry awards, including the 2003 AVN Award for Best New Starlet.

Biography

Early life

Haze was born in Fullerton, California and grew up mainly in La Habra, California, but also spent time in Lancaster California and Inver Grove Heights Minnesota. Haze grew up with divorced parents and has two sisters and a brother; all much older than she is. She is of mixed Spanish, German and Irish descent.
She received good grades in school, until about junior high school when she 'discovered boys and sex'. By age 15 she had dropped out of high school, had to receive homeschooling and find her first job. She had a series of low wage jobs such as a fast food manager, oil change girl and a Christmas job stocking shelves at a toy store.
When Haze turned 18, she tried stripping for a day, but did not enjoy being a "house girl", giving lap dances to men she had to pretend to like for low wages. At age 19, while at her favorite nightclub in Anaheim California her boyfriend introduced her to a friend who knew the adult actor Peter North and the actor/director Craven Moorehead. She gladly accepted an offer from Moorehead to participate in a film and two days later she shot her first scene. Haze had chosen her stagename before entering the industry, as friends had previously asked her what it would be. "Jenna" was the name she was given to distinguish her from the other Jennifers who worked at the same pie restaurant as her at the time; "Haze" was in honor of her then fiancé - who had the surname "Hayes" - and her favorite song, Jimi Hendrix's 'Purple Haze'.

Film career

Haze's first scene was with Miles Long in Joey Silvera's "Service Animals 4". The next day she shot a scene for "The Oral Adventures of Craven Moorehead 8" with her agent Slim Shady (Dez) and his best friend, Moorehead. It was intended to only be an oral scene, but in the heat of the moment she had intercourse with both. A few months later, she realized that she did not need an agent and started to represent herself. For just over a month, Haze dated Simon Dope from the rock band Dope. They met in 2002 on the set of "Taste of a Woman", her first feature film and her first lead. She briefly followed his band on tour until the relationship ended.
In February 2002, Haze appeared in a scene for Jill Kelly Productions (JKP), directed by Jill Kelly herself. Kelly was impressed by her performance and JKP offered Haze an exclusive performing contract. This was soon followed by offers from other companies, but in April 2002 Haze decided to sign with JKP, as they offered the extra flexibility she needed to make money and build her career. The company to her was more than just a business, but a family too. She also enjoyed the idea of having a group of girls around her and working for a company run by a woman. Soon after signing with JKP, she formed a serious relationship with an industry cameraman and began a three year period of performing exclusively with women. At the 2003 AVN Awards ceremony, Haze was named Best New Starlet and her masturbation scene in "Big Bottom Sadie" was awarded Best Solo Sex Scene. In 2004, she appeared on the HBO show Pornucopia, a six-part documentary on the pornography industry in California.
Haze became a free agent in April 2005, after deciding not to renew her contract with JKP, partly because Jill Kelly had recently left the company. After leaving JKP and splitting with her boyfriend, Haze returned to working with male performers. The April 2006 release "Jenna Haze Darkside" featured her first boy-girl scenes in over three years, along with her first interracial scene with Mr. Marcus. The film was produced and directed by her new boyfriend Jules Jordan. Later in the year, she began writing a sex advice column for the pornographic magazine, "Fox". She also started feature dancing, represented by the agency Lee Network. The first achievement in her feature dancing career was a nomination for Best Feature Entertainer at the 2007 Night Moves Awards. Her film work was also rewarded in 2007, with AVN Awards for Best Oral Sex Scene (Video) and Best Group Sex Scene (Video), as well as a nomination for Female Performer of the Year. In April 2007, "Jenna Haze Oil Orgy" became the first adult movie to be released on Blu-ray format. Meanwhile, in the same month, her official website was launched by Premium MultimediaIn the 2007 mainstream comedy film, "Superbad", Haze made a short appearance in the role of Vagtastic Voyage Girl #2. She was also among the adult stars featured in the erotic photography book "Naked Ambition: An R-Rated Look at an X-Rated Industry", published in November 2007. The special edition of the book included a fine art photograph of Haze signed by the photographer Michael Grecco. In January 2008, her scene with Manuel Ferrara in "Evil Anal 2" won the AVN Award for Best Couples Sex Scene (Video). In August 2008, Haze achieved the first feature dancing award of her career winning Adult Movie Entertainer of the Year in the 11th annual Adult Nightclub and Exotic Dancer Awards. On January 10, 2009, Haze and Belladonna will host the 2009 AVN Awards.

Trade Mark

Girl-next-door voice.

Trivia

Is a natural brunette.
Measurements: 34B-22-34
Was at one time a waitress at a Marie Callender's restaurant.
Is not related to actor Scott Haze.
She is of mixed Spanish, German, and Irish descent.

 

Comedy Writer Bruce Vilanch Lists Nichols Canyon Crib

SELLER: Bruce Vilanch
LOCATION: Los Angeles, CA
PRICE: $1,150,000
SIZE: 2,399 square feet, 3 bedrooms, 3 bathrooms

YOUR MAMAS NOTES: Tinseltown is nothing if not a Botox-induced wrinkle-free fairyland of illusion and make-believe. It's a wacky world in which oodles of beefy waiters drive Range Rovers and Maseratis paid for by their older man-friend benefactors and glammy middle-aged grandmothers have tramp stamps and porn star-style boobs. It should come as no surprise then that many of the entertainment industry's most famous funny folks don't actually write their own bon mots and witty repartee. For decades, the job of making celebs seem hilarious or, at least, droll has fallen to the Bruce Vilanch, a La-la Land legend who recently put his long-time Los Angeles, CA home on the market with an asking price of $1,150,000.

Think of Mister Vilanch as a kind of Wizard of Oz. He's the man behind the curtain pulling the joke levers. His snappy way with words has earned him a special brand of fame. He was a regular on Hollywood Squares, lost 75 pounds on Celebrity Fit Club and he recently popped up on RuPaul's Drag Race dressed as a somewhat slovenly Santa Claus. He even had a documentary made about him called Get Bruce!

The campy and disheveled appearing overweight homosexual–who typically sports Sally Jesse Rafael-style eyeglasses, ironic t-shirts and a tussled blond shag that he probably pays Sally Hershberger $800 to cut–clearly does not adhere to Hollywood's rather limited perception of beauty that tends toward fake tans, fake pecs, fake lips and fake every damn thing that can be made fake. He is, none-the-less, a beloved, witty, charming, self-effacing, flamboyant, over-sized, over the top, sharp and funny funny funny showbiz treasure.

Mister Vilanch actually started out as a journalist, in Chicago. In the mid 1970s he somehow hooked up with Bette Midler and wrote her Clams on the Half Shell Revue for Broadway in 1974. He's been penning ditties for The Divine Miss M ever since. He relocated to Los Angeles to write for the Brady Bunch Variety Hour–an idiotic but delightful piece of tee-vee trash, for sure–and was soon began to provide quips and funny bits for legendary entertainers and comedians who include Lily Tomlin, Billy Crystal, Roseanne Barr, Elizabeth Taylor, Dolly Parton, Donne and Marie Osmond, Barry Manilow, Paul Lynde, Betty White and Robin Williams. Since the late 1980s Miz Vilanch has written gags and what-have-you for the presenters and the hosts of the the Academy Awards and in 2000 he was named head writer of the self-congratulatory awards program. He has Emmy awards and nominations up the wazoo and a close examination of the listing photo of the living room turns up a couple Emmy statuettes up on the built-in entertainment center thingamabob in the living room.

It's not clear when Mister Vilanch purchased his dingy-looking wood-sided post-and-beam home in the semi-rustic Nichols Canyon neighborhood in the Hollywood Hills but, according to someone Your Mama knows who's friendly with Mister Vilanch, he's lived in the house for decades. Listing information for the two-story cabin-style crib shows it contains 3 bedrooms and 3 poopers in 2,399 square feet.

The Mexican paver floors start in the entrance hall and continue into the living room that features an exposed wood beamed ceiling and a stone fireplace and is furnished with a pair of rose-colored swivel bucket chairs that make Your Mama's heart come to a complete stop. And not in a good way, ramekins. Clearly and contradictory to common belief, as the children can see from this decorative hot mess, not every gay gets the decorating gene. Shiny copper-colored pillows on the tan sofa do not make up for the grievous error of the geometric rug. The worn pavers continue through the house to the ho-hum but far from horrid galley style kitchen complete with up-to-date stainless steel appliances, white-tile back splash, blue counter tops and sky light. Mister Vilanch's kitchen in its current state ain't going to win any style awards, but it's 10-14 times better than all those over-wrought and over-corbeled "gourmet" kitchens they install in thousands upon thousands of suburban-y mock-Med mcmansions all over Los Angeles.

The stairs that lead from the upper to the lower floor are carpeted wall-to-wall but beige shag. Gawd. Your Mama loathes carpeted staircases. Unless you can afford to hire a minimum wage gurl whose only job is to fluff the shag on stairs, carpeted staircases just get nappy and matted and quickly look like nasty ol' crack house carpet. Your Mama and the Dr. Cooter are, in fact, gearing up to replace the nasty carpet that lines the stairs in our house. (Don't blame us, chickens, it was there where we moved in.) The master bedroom, also with beige wall-too-wall carpeting, includes built-in cabinetry, a bank of sliding glass doors fitted with shoji screens for privacy and light modulation, and a built-in platform bed buried in a fur blanket and matching fur pillow shams. We know there are a lot of people who enjoy wrapping themselves in dead animal pelts, but Your Mama genuinely hopes those creepy bed things are faux.

The house opens to series of tree-shaded decks that hang over the bucolic seasonal crick that runs through Mister Vilanch's canyon property. Say what you will about the somewhat distressed condition and questionable day-core of this house but how amazing is it to live right in the center of the damn city and have a crick run through your yard?

We're not sure why after all these years Mister Vilanch has finally opted to pack up his whoopee cushions and move but Bruce, doll baby, Your Mama has a message for you: Please give us a shout when you get moved to your next crib and we'll come help you pick out a sofa and dining room table because you can not–do your hear Your Mama?–you can not move all that crappity-crap-crap furniture to another house. Iffin you don't want to deal with Your Mama–and we can understand why you might not want to–we sincerely hope you'll utilize your deep connections in in West Hollywood to find and hire a nice, gay decorator who can do up your new house in a manor more befitting a man of your professional stature. We're not saying you ought to occupy an Architectural Digest-ready superstar-style mansion in Beverly Hills like Jennifer Aniston. But even a more modest residence could benefit from the insane talents of a young gun color maverick like Rafael de Cárdenas who worked over the New York City apartments of supermodel Jessica Stam and indie film royal Parker Posey. We just think you need an exuberant and colorful house to match your exuberant and colorful personality.

listing photos: John Aaroe Group

Did Putin Get a Palace?

Did Russian's Prime Minister Vladimir Putin get a pricey new palace that over looks the Black Sea?

It seems nobody knows for sure–or at least no government official will confirm–but a Russian biznessman named Sergei Kolesnikov who has professional ties to Mister Putin claims that a palatial residence under construction in the Black Sea resort town of Praskoveevka is being built with "dubious funds" for the personal use of Russia's frequently shirtless and all but hairless prime minister Vladimir Putin.

Mister Putin's press secretary, Dmitry Peskov, publicly declared that the prime minister has no connections to the obscenely large residence on the Black Sea but Mister Kolesnikov claims that Mister Putin regularly visited the site to supervise the construction and furnishing of the massive mansion.

After Mister Kolesnikov's claims were made public a 2009 article materialized out of the interweb in which a journalist for Novaya Gazeta reported that he swam up to the beach behind the property and spoke to a construction worker who snitched that Prime Minister Putin visited the site regularly. It wasn't long before an anonymous man who declared he worked on the construction of the building publicly alleged that many illegal Chinese workers were employed at the site. Oh dear.

After Mister Kolesnikov let the cat out of the bag about Mister Putin's (alleged) new palace in Praskoveevka, a couple of photos taken by tourists surfaced that show the sprawling roof of the civic center-sized structure and the beach side entrance to a tunnel that (allegedly) leads up to the palace on the bluff above.

Finally, about a week ago a clandestine cache of photographs was leaked by an anonymous individual and posted on Ruleaks, a website that publishes Russian translations of documents posted on Wikileaks. The photos show a bulky and colossal Neoclassical structure built around a symmetrically designed interior courtyard ringed by arched colonnades.

Photos of the interior spaces show heavy and intricate architectural details that include lots of pilasters, hand-painted murals on the walls and ceilings, car-sized chandeliers, shiny marble floors with inlaid patterns, unrestrained gilding, heavy drapery, paneled and gilded walls, antique commodes, dining room sets and and desks that tend towards the Baroque. Prairie-sized terraces and formal gardens filled with topiary, surround the palace that reportedly includes a private casino, fitness spa, tea house, amphitheater and a pad for not just one but three helicopters.

While there's a very real possibility this mansion does not belong to or in any way have anything to do with Prime Minister Vladimir Putin, what is clear is that there is still some serious money in the hands of oligarchs willing to spend a truly shocking and–let's be honest chickens–scandalous billion bucks or more on a seaside vacation house.

photos: Ruleaks

Radio Hostess and Heiress Alexis Stewart Marks Down Penthouse Price

We know we're a little late to the rodeo on this bit of real estate bizness it having already been discussed on Curbed. None the less, we've been following this real estate saga for some time and quite simply can't control our impulse to weigh in on the matter. Plus we're sort of smitten with the idiosyncratic pluck of radio hostess and heiress Alexis Stewart. Iffin you already know this crap and don't want to hear about it again just move along like good little doggies and Your Mama will have another celebrity real estate bone for you soon.

With housekeeping honcho Martha Stewart's radio co-host daughter Alexis ensconced in her elephantine triplex in one of the celebrity-packed Richard Meier towers on New York City's bizzy bizzy bizzy West Side Highway, it seems she might finally be getting serious about unloading her previous penthouse pad located atop The Ice House building on TriBeCa's North Moore Street.

Property records show Miss Stewart–presumably with some money from mommy–purchased her loft-like duplex penthouse at The Ice House in May of 1999 for $2,953,000. She first tried to sell the 3,884 square foot aerie in September of 2007 with an asking price of $12,400,000. Nine months after first appearing on the open market Miss Stewart's apartment at The Ice House was taken off the market and seven months after that it was re-listed with a notably higher price tag of $12,950,000. By November of 2010 the price had plummeted to $10,450,000 and in mid-January 2011 Miss Stewart and her Real Estates slashed the asking price to $9,500,000. Perhaps finally selling her old penthouse is sassy Miss Stewart's New Year's resolution.

Miss Stewart's real estate white elephant at The Ice House includes private elevator access, 2-3 bedrooms, 3.5 poopers, a living room with fireplace and dramatic pitched-glass ceiling, a gore-may kitchen even a domestic dervish like her mother Martha could appreciate and a 500+ square foot terrace. Listing information shows the common charges and taxes total $6,590 per month.

Miss Stewart's current crib is a collection of contiguous apartments on three floors that were bought for a combined cost of around $35,000,000. No babies, that is not a error. Miss Stewart's digs actually cost her–or, more likely, her mother–around thirty-five million smackers, a blood curdling amount of moolah that does not include the many millions more spent on the combination, renovation and decoration of the super-sized condo.

Miss Stewart's penthouse at The Ice House was done up by nice, gay decorator–and Martha Stewart Living Omnimedia employee–Kevin Sharkey and although we have no inside information or hard evidence to prove it, Your Mama would bet our long bodied bitches Linda and Beverly that it was Mister Sharkey who did up the day-core at Miss Alexis's new mansion in the Meier-designed tower.

Probably not coincidentally Mister Sharkey lives in a lavish spread in a recently-debuted-to-the-public apartment in the very same Richard Meier-designed building as Miss Stewart. While we're having trouble sorting out the property records it appears to Your Mama that Mister Sharkey's apartment is contiguous with Miss Stewart's multi-unit spread and might actually be one of the five apartments purchased by Miss Stewart and (allegedly) paid for by her momma.

Among the many dazzling photos of Mister Sharkey's apartment, one in particular caught Your Mama's eye. The photo shows Mister Sharkey and Miss Stewart, both in cocktail party attire, sitting on the tile floor of a bathroom with a bathtub full of Veuve Clicquot champagne and a frameless glass shower stall stacked to the ceiling with dozens and dozens of iconic orange Hermès gift boxes. While we love love love the color orange and we adore all things Hermès, Your Mama just doesn't understand the impulse of a certain kind of design queen who feels compelled to display Hermès gift boxes as if they are day-core. We happen to think Mister Sharkey is a talented and accomplished gentleman but bitch, pleeze. Really? The only reason we can conjure to explain why a person would use Hermès boxes as "day-core" is that they want to–as George says in Edward Albee's brilliant play Who's Afraid of Virginia–"impress the guests." The whole thing is a little unseemly and, quite frankly, it's even more unseemly to stack and "stash" dozens upon dozens of orange boxes in an all-glass shower in a feeble attempt to look like you don't care that much about them even though their careful arrangement screams another something else entirely.

Say what you may about Big Bad Martha Stewart but for where Your Mama sits she's an undeniably generous parent whose vast fortune allows her only daughter to live like a modern day tsarina and an unusually magnanimous (if notoriously persnickety) boss who pays at least one of her favored employees enough dough-ray-me to live in one of New York's most illustrious and exceedingly expensive buildings.

We should all be so damn lucky.

floor plan: Prudential Douglas Elliman Real Estate via Streeteasy

Brittney Murphy's House in the Hills in Foreclosure

Actress Brittany Murphy (King of the Hill, Clueless, 8 Mile) died suddenly and surprisingly in her house in the hills above the Sunset Strip in Los Angeles, CA in December of 2009. She reportedly went to meet The Great Director in the Sky due to a case of acute pneumonia and severe anemia.

Property records show that Miss Murphy purchased the four story residence during her professional salad days in June of 2003 for $3,850,000. She bought the 8,000-ish square foot hillside house from another famous and famously troubled Brittany, Britney Spears. After her death Miss Murphy's rather odd widower Simon Monjack continued to live in the house along with Sharon Murphy, his mother-in-law.

In March of 2010 Miss Murphy's house was heaved on to the market with an asking price of $7,250,000. Mister Monjack rather creepily told gossip juggernaut TMZ that once the house sold he and Sharon planned to move to New York. Together. Ew. Listen bunnies, Your Mama don't know an earth shoe from a cork trivit and we certainly don't know a damn thing about the inner workings of the former Miss Murphy's family structure. None the less it's quite inexplicable and just plain creepy that Miss Murphy's mother would plan to relocate to New York with her dead daughter's shady-seeming widower.

Anyhoo, Miss Murphy's many-quoined crib was mysteriously taken off the market just a month after it was listed and about a month after that Mister Monjack was found dead in the house by his roommate/mother-in-law Sharon. He reportedly perished from acute pneumonia and severe anemia, the very same causes reported to have killed his wife.

Miss Murphy's house suddenly reappeared on the market this week with a new, much lower and probably far more realistic asking price of $4,995,000. A quick and dirty peep and a poke around the property records reveals that Miss Murphy's house is–gasps all around–in foreclosure. According to the records Your Mama accessed a Notice of Sale was recorded on January 10, 2011 that scheduled a public sale of the property on the 31st of January with a minimum bid amount of $4,035,666.

Use your heads, sweeties, and recognize that it's quite possible Miz Murphy managed to pull the house out of foreclosure and that the property records just haven't been amended to reflect that. Whatever the case, this seems like last ditch effort by Miss Murphy's mother to unload the house tout de suite..

listing photo: Rodeo Realty

LUNA LANE

Birth Name: Age Nickname: Current Home: Job: E-mail: Photos: Photos:	Simone Dubois 28 Annie, Tiffany, Ryan, Emily, Luna Toulouse, France Glamour Model & Pornstar simi@lunalane.me Non Nude Nude pics & hardcore movies (over 18s only, please)

(IF YOU WANT MORE OF HER BIO CLICK HERE)

Katey Sagal Downsizes Digs

BUYER: Katey Sagal and Kurt Sutter
LOCATION: Los Angeles, CA
PRICE: $3,695,000
SIZE: 3,844 square feet, 5 bedrooms, 5.5 bathrooms

YOUR MAMAS NOTES: In early 2010 versatile veteran boob-toob actress Katey Sagal and her writer-producer huzband Kurt Sutter (The Sons of Anarchy, The Shield) hoisted their 7,202 square foot Los Angeles home in the Hollywood Hills on the market with an asking price of $4,750,000.

Several price drops and one failed sale brought the price tag of the Sutter-Sagal's house in the hills down to $3,995,00. Just before the Christmas holidays (2010) the property was finally sold for $3,770,000. Records show the property was purchased by Rickey Minor, Emmy-nominated former musical director of American Idol and current bandleader for The Tonight Show with Jay Leno. Other notable residents of their star-stuffed neighborhood include Taylor Swift's heart breaker Jake Gyllenhaal, über artist David Hockney, Oscar-winning actor Forest Whitaker (The Last King of Scotland), Oscar-winning filmmaker Quentin Tarantino, tatted-up beau-hunk Brian Austin Green (Desperate Housewives) and D-list diva Kathy Griffin who lives in a contemporary B-lister worthy residence.

A quick study of property records informs Your Mama that the Sutter-Sagals acquired their former 6 bedroom and 8 pooper pad in July of 2005 for $3,710,000. A second look at the sales figures and a few flicks of the well-worn beads on Your Mama's bejeweled abacus reveals that after the Tinseltown couple paid the fat real estate fees they probably lost a bit of money on the sale of their house.

Thanks to an informant we'll call Anita Tellsomebody we've learned that just before the turn of the New Year the Sutter-Sagals closed on their new crib, a secluded mid-century modern house located near but not in the Moraga Estates, a 24-hour guard-gated community in Bel Air (90077) that is so far west it's got a Brentwood zip code (90049). Their new nest in Bel Air with a Brentwood zip code, significantly smaller then the huge home they just sold, cost the Sutter-Sagals $3,695,000. The seller was a big-shit literary agent who had a hand in representing television writer Marc Cherry when he sold the pilot script for the money-minting mega-hit show Desperate Housewives.

Miz Sagal, whose daddy was the prolific Emmy-nominated tee-vee movie directer Boris Sagal (Masada, Rich Man, Poor Man, A Case of Rape), has been toiling in Tinseltown since the early 1970s. Her big break came in 1987 when she signed on to be the big-haired, buxom and wickedly indolent housewife Peggy Bundy on the long running hit sitcom Married With Children. Since that program wrapped up in 1997 Miz Sagal has been a bizzy beaver and racked up an exhaustively long list of television credits that include Recess, 8 Simple Rules, Eli Stone and Lost. Along the way she's lent her voice to a number of animated projects including Higglytown Heroes and the long-running Futurama. Currently Miz Sagal stars on the critically acclaimed drama Sons of Anarchy, a program created, written, produced and directed by her current and third huzband Kurt Sutter who sometimes acts in the series and, it should be noted, sometimes looks an awful lot like cheese ball romance novel model Fabio.

Listing information for the Sutter-Sagal's new 1.5 acre spread indicates that a long gated drive clims through a densely wooded hillside to a sunny clearing where the privately-sited and vaguely-Asian wood, concrete and glass dwelling cleaves alluringly to the landscape. The house was built in 1962 and the architect–whomever he or she was–clearly channeled the distinct style and motifs of the exhalted architect Frank Lloyd Wright who expertly married angular and bossy geometric forms with earthy and dramatically subtle materials.

The foyer gives way to the dining room where an imposing and space defining triangular shaped two-sided fireplace separates it from the living room. It can sometimes be awkward and ill-advised to create a floor plan where one must traverse the dining room to get to the living room but in this case the dining room is sufficiently wide enough for unobstructed passage through the room. The impressive 19 x 28 foot living room, situated four or five steps lower than the dining room has sliding glass doors that open one side of the room to a living room-sized terrace perched in the tree tops and the other side of the room to a flat and grassy pad where the slim swimming pool and attached spa sit snugly between the house and the hillside.

While the house looks and feels superbly grounded, the main rooms soar theatrically due to the exceedingly high-peaked A-frame ceiling where the exposed beams and trusses create a triangular shape that repeats itself in a seemingly endless pattern. Your Mama might call the main living spaces fanciful and even indulgent if the architecture weren't so unapologetically rigorous, algebraic and–let's be honest, chickens–far more than a little ecclesiastical.

The service areas of the quirky crib include a built-in breakfast banquette and a clean-lined, nicely-equipped contemporary kitchen with concrete counter tops and all the high grade appliance bells and whistles one can and should expect in a $3+ million home. An adjacent staff room with private pooper and separate entrance is definitely on the wee sides but not punishingly so. Even still, it's a tight enough space that a live-in domestic would be hard-pressed to live comfortably full-time. For sure our space-demanding housegurl Svetlana would to have a hissy fit to end all hissy fits iffin she was made to live up in that squeezy room. Ol' Sveta insists on an apartment of her own and goes plum berserk if her bedroom is small enough that she can touch her grandmother's faux-vintage Rococo commode while lying on the Vi-Spring mattress she insists be set directly on the floor lest she have to worry passionately about some awful intruder or demon who might hide under her bed. So, certainly, she would take verbal and possibly physical umbrage to the size of this room. Anyhoo, a set of sliders opens from the kitchen to a tree-shaded collection of entertaining and dining terraces tucked into the steep hillside.

A discreet staircase winds up from the foyer to the deliciously sequestered guest suite that monopolizes the entire second floor and includes a sitting area, walk-in closet and private pooper. Three additional bedrooms occupy a wing of their own off the foyer on the main floor. The two very modestly-sized family bedrooms–one is barely bigger than the damn maid's room–share a full bath and a powder pooper and both open to a balcony that overlooks the swimming pool. The master bedroom at the end of the long bedroom corridor has a nicely sized but far from over-sized pooper with separate soaking tub and shower, an entire wall of closets plus a walk-in closet, a vaulted ceiling and two banks of windows that come together in a corner of the room and open out to a balcony that cantilevers over the motor court at the front of the house and allows for distant views of the Pacific Ocean.

The lowest level consists of two unconnected volumes carved into the hillside that can not be accessed from the interior of the house. That's right, there are potentially vital parts of this house that can only be accessed by a trip through the outdoors. This is fine, in theory, because although Albert Hammond famously declared in song that It Never Rains in California, in reality it rains (and mists) more than most people think, sometimes even for days at a time. A volume at the front of the house holds a garage and extraordinarily large laundry facility. Listing information rather disturbingly called the second space on this level, a wood-paneled, almost cave-like space at the rear end of the house, a "gentleman's lair." This, ahem, "gentleman's lair" consists of a small entrance hall, walk-in wine cellar and a 400+ square foot room lined with storage on one wall and windows on the opposite wall. A blessed window-free three-quarter bathroom was wisely installed so that sports fanatics can evacuate and emit their Superbowl Sunday beer and salami farts without disturbing or asphyxiating any of the other people in the house who might be pretending they don't know what the Superbowl is.

Your Mama can't be sure why the Sutter-Sagals would want and choose to pack up and decamp a beautifully sited 7,200+ square foot house in the Hollywood Hills for a much smaller–although far more architecturally stimulating–residence in a posh part of Los Angeles that is neither Bel Air nor Brentwood. But decamp they did–or soon will–and since we genuinely think Miz Sagal is the got-damn bees knees Your Mama and the Dr. Cooter wish them and theirs a happy new home. Mazel tov.

listing photos: Deasy Penner & Partners

MICHELLE BARRETT: BIO

A.K.A - Michelle B

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DOB: July 17, 1981

Birthplace: Sheffield, England

Hair Color: Blonde

Eye Color: Blue

Height: 5’5”

Weight: 126lbs

Measurements: 32DD–24-35

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URL: www.michellebpics.pwp.blueyonder.co.uk