From 1969 to 1974, the Brady Bunch was America’s family. The show was originally a reaction to creator Sherwood Schwartz reading that a third of American marriages contained children from previous relationships. But as we learned well after the show ended, the Brady’s were more American than we knew. Patriarch Mike Brady actor Robert Reed was a closeted gay man who’d had his own sham marriage. Alice the maid was played by long-rumored lesbian Ann B. Davis. Meanwhile, the various Brady children over the years have struggled with drugs, alcohol, hair plugs, homophobic tirades, and a lot of reality TV.
The 1959 Brady Bunch house, at 11222 Dilling Street in Studio City, California, ignited a bidding war after being listed for the first time since 1973. The three-bedroom, three-bathroom home has 2,477 square feet on nearly a third of an acre. Priced at $1.885 million, its fame pushed the listing price a third more than neighboring comps. The bidding war included Lance Bass and Miley Cyrus, who’d bid waaaay above the already fame-inflated asking price. Bass tweeted he’d gotten the home over the weekend only to retract that statement in a last-minute twist. As of this writing, the home has reportedly been purchased by an unnamed Hollywood studio willing to pay any price for the home.
Being Hollywood, the home, like the show’s actors, offers a different reality to its “America’s family” façade.
Head over to SecondShelters.com to see how Hollywood differed from reality.
UPDATE: It’s been revealed that HGTV is the buyer of the home. Parent company Discovery networks made the announcement on their earning call early this morning (8/7). The most likely scenario will be a show following the renovation and restoration of the home. Will the home then be flipped or wind up as an HGTV Giveaway home?
