The Most Extravagant Sweet 16 Present Hits the Market for $16.5 Million in East Hampton, New York
Time：2024-08-01 Click：
A wealthy family built the Tudor-style structure with a grand Elizabethan performance hall in 1916 for their aspiring-actress daughter
BY CHAVA GOURARIE
| ORIGINALLY PUBLISHED ON JULY 30, 2024 | MANSION GLOBAL
A theater built for a 16-year-old with dreams of being a star is on the market in East Hampton, New York, more than a century later-as a residence-asking $16.5 million.
GAVIN ZEIGLER FOR SOTHEBY'S INTERNATIONAL REALTY
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A theater built for a 16-year-old with dreams of being a star is on the market in East Hampton, New York, more than a century later—as a residence—asking $16.5 million.
The Tudor-style structure with a grand Elizabethan performance hall has both architectural and historical significance, surviving as one of the great houses of early 20th-century Hamptons that also hosted performances by 1920s stars, benefits for New York City cultural icons and a movie shoot by the writer Norman Mailer.
The structure was built by the prominent Woodhouse family in 1916 for their daughter, Marjorie, as a “playhouse,” after she expressed interest in acting, part of a larger acting school that they built for her.
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The parents, Lorenzo and Mary Woodhouse, had already established themselves as the cultural godparent of the East Hamptons and would finance the construction of the village’s major cultural institutions: The East Hampton Library, Guild Hall and Clinton Academy, all on the Village Green on Main Street.
Lorenzo Woodhouse had also built, along with his first wife, one of East Hampton’s most famous homes, just across the street from the playhouse, known as Greycroft, which was also put into use in service of the acting school.
The Woodhouses commissioned the architect F. Burrall Hoffman Jr., best known for designing the opulent Villa Vizcaya in Miami, which is now a museum, to build the playhouse. In addition to the 75-foot-long performance hall, the exterior of the house has a 30-foot gabled roof interrupted by a double-height, church-like nave with a grid of stained-glass windows.
The Tudor-style structure with a grand Elizabethan performance hall has both architectural and historical significance, surviving as one of the great houses of early 20th-century Hamptons.
Gavin Zeigler for Sotheby’s International Realty
In its heyday, the playhouse hosted performances by international artists, musicians and dancers in the soaring grand hall, with its 40-foot ceilings and impeccable acoustics, including the dancer Isadora Duncan, actor John Drew and the Westminster Choir. The school remained open even after Marjorie Woodhouse’s death in a car wreck in the 1930s, and closed in 1939.
About a decade later, Mary Woodhouse, who had outlived both her daughter and husband, added a residential wing to the playhouse, while keeping the performance hall intact. After she passed, it was purchased by New Yorkers Elizabeth and Daniel Brockman, a lawyer and patron of the arts who led the charge to save Manhattan’s Carnegie Hall in the 1960s.
The Brockmans updated the building further to convert it into a residence, while continuing its cultural legacy, according to their son, Richard Brockman, who inherited it from them.
In the ’60s they hosted the first benefit for “Shakespeare in the Park” founder Joseph Papp outside New York City, and he brought actors Michael Moriarty and Kathleen Widdoes to perform. Other events included performances by conductor Leopold Stokowski (who said the acoustics were the best he’d ever experienced), opera singer Martina Arroyo and an independent film directed by Mailer starring himself, to which he invited all his ex-wives, according to Brockman, a psychiatrist who is himself a playwright.
When Brockman and his wife, Mirra, inherited the house, they updated it once again, adding heating and cooling, a pool and a glass-encased dining room with casement windows that won an American Institute of Architects award in 2023.
They also continued the tradition of supporting the arts, hosting summer music classes for public high school students for many years. “My wife and I continued the history, or tradition, of performances open to the village, to the community of East Hampton,” Brockman said.
Now, the home spans 6,000 square feet with five bedrooms, five bathrooms, and 2.8-acres of manicured lawns. In the winter, the unheated great room is unused, which is one reason why the Brockmans built the new dining room addition. “We made this addition to make it more livable in the winter,” he said.
