A storied Beverly Hills, Calif., home once owned by “Casablanca” director Michael Curtiz is for sale, asking $24.995 million.
The roughly 10,500-square-foot Mediterranean-style home, built around 1929, sits on North Roxbury Drive, known for famous residents over the years including Madonna, Rosemary Clooney, Lucille Ball and Jimmy Stewart, said listing agent Rochelle Atlas Maize of Nourmand & Associates. The sellers are Les Bider, former chairman and chief executive of Warner Music Group’s publishing firm Warner/Chappell Music, and his wife, Lynn Bider.
Curtiz and his wife, silent-film actress Bess Meredyth, bought the newly built house around 1930, according to Alan K. Rode, author of the 2017 book “Michael Curtiz: A Life in Film.” Budapest-born Curtiz hired a Hungarian cook and often entertained Hungarian actors there, serving Tokay, an imported wine from his home country, said Rode. The couple sold the house in 1934 and moved to the San Fernando Valley, which became popular at the time with actors like Bob Hope and Bing Crosby, said Rode.
The film “Casablanca” was released in 1942, and the home traded hands a couple of times before actress Jeanne Crain bought it around 1955. Crain, star of the 1949 movie “Pinky,” bought the house for about $64,500 with her husband, Paul Brinkman, said their son Paul Brinkman Jr. The couple, who had two of their seven children while living there, did extensive renovations and added a pool to the property, he said. They also had a live-in cook and hosted Christmas and Thanksgiving celebrations there, their son said. In 1963, when Crain’s career began winding down, they sold the house for about $180,000 and moved several miles west to Westwood Village, said Brinkman Jr.
The house sold a few more times in the coming decades, and by the turn of the century, it had been changed into an English-style home. The Biders spent three years shopping for the perfect home before purchasing the estate for $7.4 million in 2001. They chose the house for its size, outdoor space, historical legacy and location near Les’s office, they said.
They returned the six-bedroom house to its original Mediterranean style, giving the stucco, tile-roofed home European-inspired interiors. They updated it with a new kitchen, an elevator, a gym and a poolhouse, said Les, who said they spent about $9 million on renovations.
The noise created by the renovations drew the attention of “Like a Virgin” singer Madonna, who lived next door and was contracted to write songs for Warner/Chappell Music at the time. She sent an email asking Les how she could be expected to write songs for Warner/Chappell if the chairman of Warner/Chappell Music was making so much noise early in the morning, he said. To make amends, Les gave singing stuffed animals to her children, he said. A representative for Madonna declined to comment.
The Biders also redid the pool twice. They initially created a pond-like pool with a waterfall, but they eventually converted it back to a rectangular pool.
“The funny thing though is, you can’t swim in it” as a kidney-shaped pond, he said. “I want a real pool. I want a rectangular pool. I want what they used to call a swimming pool.”
The gated estate sits on about 0.7 acre of manicured gardens with a fountain courtyard, said Maize. The backyard was the site of their son’s 200-guest rehearsal dinner, which had a pie station and a barbecue. There is an open-air pavilion, with wood-beamed ceilings and arched colonnades, which they used as a dance floor for their granddaughter’s bat mitzvah.
Now, the Biders are downsizing to a Century City house previously owned by the late comedian Bob Newhart. They have two children and five grandchildren. Les retired in 2005 from Warner/Chappell and was chief executive of PinnacleCare from 2008 until the late 2010s.
Beverly Hills single-family homes sold for an average $9.1 million in the fourth quarter of 2025, down 5.7% from the same time in 2024, according to Miller Samuel Real Estate Appraisers and Consultants. Buyers are more cautious than in the early 2020s, but there is still competitive interest in well-priced trophy estates, said Maize. Beverly Hills is particularly of interest to buyers because it is exempt from Los Angeles’s mansion tax, and because it is easier and cheaper to insure against fires because of its topography, said Maize.
