A Titanic Piece of Malibu Land

Oscar-winning “Titanic” director James Cameron, who is writing and directing the upcoming TV series “Dark Angel,” has purchased about 500 acres in Malibu for $5.4 million.

Most of the land is pasture, but there are a couple of small homes on the site. Built in the ‘50s, each one-bedroom home is each about 700 square feet.

“He didn’t want to build, but he wanted room for a helicopter pad,” a Malibu source said. “He has been taking helicopter [flying] lessons.”

Earlier this year, the producer-director-screenwriter purchased a home on 100 acres in a gated enclave near Santa Barbara for about $4.4 million. The ocean-view property has a 4,500-square-foot main house, a guest house, pool, tennis court and stable. The 15,000-acre community enjoys an eight-mile stretch of beach, mainly accessible by private road.

Cameron, 44, won best picture, best director and best film editing Oscars for “Titanic” (1997), the top-grossing movie in box office history, earning more than $470 million within three months of its release.

Before “Titanic,” Cameron wrote, produced and directed the action-comedy “True Lies” (1994) and “Terminator 2: Judgment Day” (1991). He also wrote and directed “The Abyss” (1989) and “Aliens” (1986), and he co-wrote “Rambo: First Blood II” (1985) and “The Terminator” (1984), which he directed.

Linda Hamilton, who starred in both “Terminator” films, filed for divorce from Cameron in December. Suzy Amis, who played Rose Calbert’s granddaughter in “Titanic,” has been his recent companion.

“Dark Angel,” due to start shooting this month, will appear on Fox in January.

Eleanor Mondale, daughter of former Vice President Walter Mondale and entertainment reporter on “CBS This Morning,” has sold her Los Feliz home and moved to New York “because my work is based here, and my boyfriend is here,” she said by phone from Manhattan.

She and Dr. Joe DeBellis, a New York plastic and reconstructive surgeon, have five acres in the Hamptons. “We’re making it into a farm,” she said. “And we have a one-bedroom [apartment] on Washington Square.”

Mondale, 39, sold her two-bedroom Los Feliz home for close to its asking price of $575,000. Built in 1950, the walled and gated, 1,500-square-foot home has been updated and has an air humidifier and purifier, skylights and patios with a built-in outdoor barbecue and wood-burning pizza oven.

“I loved that house so much,” she said, “but when the people I love are on the other side of the country, that makes the house not so beautiful.”

A young couple bought it. “And they love it,” Mondale went on. “The house is great for entertaining.”

Mondale, who also has been an actress on such TV shows as “Three’s Company,” moved into the Los Feliz house on Valentine’s Day 1998. She was renting in the area before that.

Gary Johns had the listing on her house when he was at Gibson & Associates, Realtors. He is now with Prudential-John Aaroe & Associates at the Pacific Design Center.

The former Montecito home of multimillionaire oilman and former Rep. Michael Huffington has been sold for the second time in less than two years, this time for $8.4 million. The buyer was described as “a corporate executive of a computer company who is in his late 30s.”

The seller was Kenneth Slaught, president of Santa Barbara-based Investec Real Estate Cos. Slaught had purchased the home from Huffington in December 1997. Since then, Slaught put about $2 million into refurbishing the estate, local sources said.

The home was built in 1987 and has a 12,000-square-foot main house on about four acres with expansive lawns, a tennis court, pool, spa and ocean views. There is also a pool house with two bedroom suites.

Gary Goldberg of Coastal Getaways Realty Inc. in Montecito represented the buyer.

Songwriter-composer Mervyn Warren, who produced and performed the songs “Love Train” and “Isn’t It Romantic?” for the Steve Martin-Goldie Hawn movie “The Out-of-Towners,” has purchased a Hollywood Hills home for $775,000.

Warren, who is working on Barbra Streisand’s new album, was in the a cappella gospel act Take 6 before he became heavily involved in film scoring.

He arranged and produced most of the songs in the movies “The Preacher’s Wife” (1996) and “Living Out Loud” (1998), and he appeared in both films, playing the piano. He also produced and arranged many of the songs in “Sister Act 2: Back in the Habit” (1993).

Warren’s new home has two bedrooms and two baths and was built in the 1950s around a lagoon pool. It was sold by Dr. Gary Ross Cohan, a prominent Beverly Hills internist.

Rick Chimienti of DBL Estates, Beverly Hills, had the listing.

Victor Kaminoff, director of architecture and unique properties at Coldwell Banker Previews, Sunset office, and David Gordon, of the same office, represented Warren.

A Beverly Hills home owned at various times by actress Joan Collins, the late comedian Totie Fields and the late British actor Laurence Harvey is on the market at $5.45 million.

Collins sold the one-story 10,000-square-foot home in December 1993, after living there for seven years.

The estate, on four acres behind gates, has a projection room, two-story guest house and long private drive. The home, which also has city views, is wrapped around a pool and grassy area.

Harvey built the home in the mid-’60s. The current owners completely refurbished it .

Raymond Bekeris at John Bruce Nelson & Associates has the listing.