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M-ving B-dy, S-ul: Like to Buy an ‘O’?

TIMES STAFF WRITER

Singer GLADYS KNIGHT, who is celebrating her 50th anniversary in show business this year, has sold her home in Chatsworth.

“She decided that she just wanted to have her home in Las Vegas, because that’s where her base is,” said listing agent Tiki Greenberg of Fred Sands Realtors in Northridge.

Knight had been living in the Las Vegas area for a number of months before selling the Chatsworth home, which she had owned for about six years, sources say.

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The house was sold for $435,000, according to public records. Built in 1979, the home has five bedrooms in just under 3,000 square feet.

“She did a wonderful job of decorating the house, which is on half an acre and has a tennis court,” Greenberg added.

Knight, 53, is known as one of America’s finest soul singers. She performed her first recital in her native Atlanta when she was 4. At age 7, she won the $2,000 grand prize on the TV program “Ted Mack’s Amateur Hour.” A year later, she and her family formed the singing group the Pips.

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As Gladys Knight and the Pips, she and her brother, “Bubba,” and cousins recorded 10 No. 1 R&B; hits, and they won three Grammys. In the ‘60s, they recorded “I Heard It Through the Grapevine” and other songs for Motown. In the ‘70s, they scored with “Midnight Train to Georgia.” They were still producing hit singles during the ‘80s.

During the ‘90s, Knight has enjoyed a successful solo career, which she chronicled in her autobiography, “Between Each Line of Pain and Glory: My Life Story,” published last fall.

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“Wheel of Fortune” co-host VANNA WHITE has put her Beverly Hills-area home on the market at just under $3.3 million.

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White, who has been turning letters on the TV game show since 1982, and her husband, entrepreneur-restaurateur George Santa Pietro, are building a house nearby, sources said.

Recognized in the Guinness Book of World Records as the world’s most frequent clapper, White claps her hands about 720 times a show, or 28,000 times a season, said her spokesman. She recently recorded her first CD as a singer, Leslie Bricusse’s “Santa’s Last Ride.”

White, 41, became a mother for the second time last year with the birth of her daughter. She also has a young son. White and her husband were married in 1990, and they moved into their current home, then newly built, in 1991.

The Mediterranean-style house has five bedrooms and seven baths in about 7,000 square feet. It also has a library, three fireplaces, a pool and a tennis court. It is in a gated development.

Marsha Burns of Majestic Realty has the listing.

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JIMMY IOVINE, co-head of Interscope Records with entertainment mogul Ted Field, and his wife, Vicki, have purchased a Holmby Hills house on slightly less than 2 acres for $11.5 million, sources say. The asking price was $17 million. It was a seven-day escrow.

Iovine, in his mid-40s, started his career as an engineer for John Lennon and Bruce Springsteen. He made his name as a record producer in the late 1970s and 1980s, working with such artists as U2 and Tom Petty. He linked up with Field in 1991. Interscope went on to dominate the recording industry with a string of hits.

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The home that the Iovines bought was designed by architect Wallace Neff. It was built in 1937 but was recently refurbished. Along with the main house, there are two guest houses, a spa and sunken tennis court. There are seven bedrooms, nine baths and five fireplaces in 12,000 square feet.

Jeff Hyland of Hilton & Hyland, Beverly Hills, had the listing, and Steve Lewis of Coldwell Banker / Jon Douglas Co., Beverly Hills, represented the buyers.

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Bandleader LES BROWN, 86, got married in February and now has sold his Santa Monica penthouse for close to its $2.5-million asking price, sources say.

Les Brown and His Band of Renown was formed in 1936. Brown became Bob Hope’s musical director in 1947. He and his band traveled with Hope around the world to entertain American troops. Later, Brown and his band were regulars on Steve Allen’s and then Dean Martin’s TV shows.

“He’s still working,” said Brown’s daughter, Denny Marsh, the Realtor who represented him in the sale. “You can hire the band with Les Brown Sr. or Les Brown Jr. [her brother].”

Les Brown Sr. had owned the penthouse since 1991, when he and Claire, his wife of 57 years, moved there from their Pacific Palisades home. In 1994, the building housing the penthouse was damaged in the Northridge earthquake. “It was taken down to the ground and was rebuilt,” Marsh said.

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Built as a hotel in the early 1920s, the two-building complex was converted into 22 condos in the 1980s. The penthouse is in a 10-unit building with ocean, mountain and city views. The two-bedroom unit has two fireplaces and a formal dining room in about 3,200 square feet.

Brown’s wife Claire died two years ago. Soon afterward, he bought another house in the Palisades, where he and his new wife, Evelyn, live now.

Marsh is co-listing Evelyn Brown’s Bel-Air home, with its three bedrooms and English pub, at $860,000.

Nancy Sill of John Aaroe & Associates, Beverly Hills, represented the penthouse buyer; Candis Good of Coldwell Banker-Jon Douglas Co., Brentwood, shares the Bel-Air listing.

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Emmy-winning producer LESTER PERSKY has purchased philanthropist IRIS CANTOR’s Beverly Hills estate for close to its $3.25-million asking price, sources say.

Persky and Faye Dunaway will be co-executive producers of the movie version of “Master Class,” the Tony Award-winning play in which Dunaway starred on tour. Dunaway plans to reprise her role in the film as diva Maria Callas.

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Persky was executive producer of the NBC miniseries “A Woman Named Jackie” (1991), about Jacqueline Kennedy Onassis, and the miniseries “Poor Little Rich Girl: The Barbara Hutton Story” (1987). He produced such 1970s movies as “Hair,” “The Man Who Would Be King” and “Shampoo.”

Persky had been looking to buy for a year, since he sold his smaller house in Bel-Air for about the same price. The 10,000-square-foot house that he bought has a tennis court.

Cantor is the widow of B. Gerald Cantor, the Wall Street veteran who founded the securities firm Cantor Fitzgerald, the biggest broker in the U.S. Treasury securities market. She moved to a larger Westside house that she built, sources say.

Kurt Rappaport of Stan Herman / Stephen Shapiro & Associates, Beverly Hills, represented Persky in his purchase and sale; Rose Borne of Nourmand & Associates, Beverly Hills, represented Cantor, other sources said.

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RICHARD BLOCH, who owned the Phoenix Suns from 1968 to 1987, has listed his Malibu home of 25 years at $6 million.

The property, once part of Lana Turner’s Malibu estate, is next to actor Bruce Dern’s home and a house recently sold by producer Peter Guber, sources say. All three parcels once belonged to the late actress.

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The home, which Bloch built, has three bedrooms and guest quarters. It’s listed with Jim Rapf of Pritchett / Rapf & Associates, Malibu.

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