Gawker
Brooklyn "power couple" Jennifer Connelly and Paul Bettany are leaving the neighborhood. Their beautiful Prospect Park West mansion (see pic, above) is on the market for $8.5m (they paid $3.5 for it back in 2003). They'll be fleeing to a fancypants penthouse in TriBeCa. So, is everyone going to just abandon Brooklyn? First it was Michelle Williams and the late Heath Ledger (though she kept their Boerum Hill brownstone, she spends most of her downtime in LA, he spent it in Manhattan), and now these well-respected "boho" "artists." Thank God we've still got Maggie Gyllenhaal, Peter Sarsgaard, and Keri Russell. And I think M.I.A. lives somewhere in Bed-Stuy. But, they'll probably leave too.
As Brooklyn gets less trendy and more mainstream (and more expensive), the hip young celebrities, flush with a little bit of money, will choose more convenient places to live. It used to be something of a tip of the hat for a rich famous person to move to the borough. "Aren't we shy and intelligent!" "We're just like you!" That kind of thing. But now all sorts of people live out here and there's no gesture or identity associated with "brownstone Brooklyn" anymore. If they moved to Crown Heights, that'd be something! But, they won't. They'll go for ease and (though they'd never admit it) status. And then we'll just be left with a bunch of boring old writers, who actually spend time in the neighborhood and clog up the streets. More pictures of the Connelly/Bettany manse at Curbed.
Comments
Yeah, but I just saw Alex McCord in Cobble Hill, so we're still ok.
Paul Giamatti is hip!
Jennifer Connelly actually left Paul Bettany, and moved in with me. She brought her double-ended dildo from Requiem for a Dream, too.
Nobody better pay that. Don't even think about it. If they're leaving the BK, they're leaving at a loss.
Seriously, don't do it.
We will know where you live.
@fiveinchtaint: Pekar Giamatti but not John Adams Giamatti.
Hi Richard. Is it too much to ask that you change the wording of the second sentence to "mansion on Prospect Park West." Otherwise folks might think that their mansion is in the mansion-filled neighborhood of Prospect Park South West. Nit-picky, I know, but it confused me & I live there.
I was looking for a quiet place to die. Someone recommended Brooklyn...
If a well-manicured, picturesque tree grows in Brooklyn but there are no bourgeois-bohemian celebrities nearby to confer status upon it, will it wither in the shade of its irrelevance and if so, what sound will that make if it does, indeed, make any sound at all? Please submit your answer in the form of slapping yourself in the face.
@Bell County: "Don't look at me like that. I'm just plain old John Adams now, living in Brooklyn."
Queens is next. Flushing better watch the hell out.
Rufus Sewell In Williamsburgh I think.
Steve Buscemi. Gabriel Byrne.
@In Other News...: Hah.
Even if I was rich and famous, I'd rather live in the burbs. Seriously, why would someone wit ha lot of money choose to be crammed into a tight space like the middle of a overly populated city such as NYC? Live in the outskirts, it's easier.
That looks like a nice place. Might I trade in my efficiency?
@TheHonJudgeSmails:
Don't fuck with Gangster No. 1!
@riskybusiness: if it confused you, how do you get home everyday?
@Goober_Pea: What celeb lives in Flushing? That's pretty much Chinatown.
@Dusty in the Wind: Alright, fine. I was ready to make an offer...you talked me out of it. That, and not having $8.5 million to spare right now.
It's not fair, does Jennifer Connolly really need all that money and beauty and tall British husband? Can she spare ONE of them at least?
@GOKOR: woah woah woah... the outskirts is just a nice way of saying the suburbs. and for saying you would rather live in the suburbs I will say his name thrice... Jack Ketch, Jack Ketch, Jack Ketch! Come and execute. also... IFL? come on.
That is a nice place. Shit furniture
@Unfun: I'll be he's hung too. Face it, your life is a cruel joke compared to hers. The sooner you realize it, the more bitter you can acceptably be.
@Bell County: He'll always be Pig Vomit.
@nicepony: The Irish Silver Fox lives in Williamsburg? Please say it ain't so. I don't need another reason to shoot myself.
Park Slope is becoming one of those scary Toon Town-like developments from the West Coast.
@GOKOR:
What?
@GOKOR: I don't know, that place looks pretty fucking spacious to me. Just enough room that you never actually have to see your spouse.
@GOKOR: Easier to do what?
I think a more apt name for this article would be "Celebrities We Pretend to Care About Leave Brooklyn." Do I really care about Jennifer Connelly and Paul Bettany?
Timely! I looked at a one-bedroom condo last night. I think I can steal it from the bank (it was a foreclosure and it needs a shit-ton of work) but the idea of spending six figures and tying myself down to one place for the next 30 years makes me hyperventilate.
It must be nice to be rich.
@GOKOR: Because all the cool shit is in the city?
Red Hook's pretty great. Too bad they're building an Ikea, like, right on top of it.
Every time I go to New York, I find it looking and feeling more and more like everywhere else.
Sad. Shed a tear. Move on with life.
@Clare:
No worries. When the mood strikes you, just put your keys in the mail and hitchike to burning man... It'll sort itself out.
@fiveinchtaint: And Bob Zmuda!
Too much church wood.
@GOKOR:
Are you looking at the same palatial house that I am?
@GOKOR: If the great celeb migration picks up and moves further east eventually their caravan will hit the Flush.
What would be awesome is if they kept moving east and eventually had a celeb-off with the South Fork famous. No, wait, these bohemian bitches would of course go towards the North Fork and eliminate one of the last bastions of local Long Island living. Bastards.
If I bought that brownstone, I would make the extra bedrooms into one closet for every day of the week and two for Sunday.
@Chaim Gnadelstein: Oh man, chuch wood was always so embarrassing. Thank God for hymnals...
It kind of looks like it would creak a lot and have old ladies wearing long white nightgowns floating around at night. And like it might smell like mothballs.
@LeGagneur: Excuse me - I care deeply about Jennifer Connelly.
I have seen "Requiem for a Dream" and approve this message.
@Botswana Meat Commission FC: Agreed but you could fuck with Wimbledon seed no. 31
[tbn0.google.com]
@VirusWithShoes: That movie still makes me wriggle whenever it's name is mentioned.As do you,VWS.
That's not too creepy is it?
@Goober_Pea: I got you now.
@transomist: I'm not talking about inside the home (because there are some large homes in NYC), I just don't like to be crammed right up tight to another house. I'd rather own a little land around my home.
No celebrities in Brooklyn? Excuse me while I off myself.
That better be a private roof terrace they have in the new loft, 'cause -- compared to the "mega-mansion" -- that shit is hideous.
Also, @TheHonJudgeSmails: saying "ass to ass" to you simply never gets old!
My Grandma grew up in Brooklyn. She was 85 years ahead of the curve.
@GOKOR: So lemme get this straight: You're looking for a yard?
In the city?
@Calraigh: It depends on what kind of wriggle it is, I think.
@DorothyMantooth: Uh, no...why do you think I said I'd rather live in the burbs?
@DorothyMantooth: no, Gokor is looking to live in the suburbs and should therefore not be allowed to comment for a well-displayed lack of interestingness. also for liking IFL.
@GOKOR: No, no. I got that part, silly! My point was merely that you're not gonna get anything like that in the city, so it's pretty much moot to poo-poo the place for something that's unattainable, anyway.
(Oh, and I'm including all 4 non-SI boroughs in "the city.")
@hypocriteoath: Ha!! Sorry, GOKOR, but I gotta agree.
@DorothyMantooth: Pics of the other place are on Curbed and it does have a pretty nice terrace with a view of the river, but it's nowhere near as awesome as this - just a lousy two guest bedrooms and a library in addition to the master.
@GOKOR: I'm terrified of the suburbs. So quiet, and no streetlights...awful. But then I'm also terrified of the city, and as for the countryside...hellish. In short: hold me, Klonopin.
@VirusWithShoes: Gotcha.I better go and perfect it so.Wriggling 101, HERE I COME.
As in, I'll be there at some stage.
Ahem.
I'd imagine that MIA lives in East New York underneath the holding patterns for flights coming into JFK.
@hypocriteoath: IFL has great fights and a lot of fighters on the cusp of top ten lists. Sorry I'm not a UFC clone, but IFL has a lot going for it, especially with it's new formula.
Oh, and stop the douchiness.
the shit stench must have wafted to the west, back toward the city. flies follow this, you know....
@asketchymess: That's what I was talking about, m'dear. If you actually look at the layout of the new place, it doesn't say "terrace" or anything like that, photo notwithstanding. There's just a "sun room" and "roof access."
All's I'm saying is, unless that roof is for their exclusive use, they're getting hoooooooosed.
@Mary Mouse: No streetlights? Really? Everywhere I've ever lived has been well lit. I do have to say, I like the quiet after a night hanging out in the city. Which is why I prefer the suburbs.
@DorothyMantooth: I think I know someone who lives in that building. I'm tracking them down to confirm.
@GOKOR: I'm basing this on the five or so years that my parents lived in the Philadelphia suburbs, where it was pitch black and utterly silent at night. I used to sit out on the porch and want to die.
@GOKOR: My boyfriends street in Bushwick had no street lights, and it was on a block where there was a shit/dead animal factory. Lots of dumb hipster kids got robbed here.
@TheHonJudgeSmails: apropos of nothing, I know the gal who was on the other end of that dildo. cool chick. seriously. afternoon, Judge!
@DorothyMantooth: Listing says "sprawling private outdoor space" - but I see what you mean - the current residents aren'