PICTURE PERFECT: The north-facing apartment features many paintings by man of the house Steve Bakunas (Lorenzo Ciniglio/Freelance)
ALICE IN WONDERLAND: Linda Lavin plays music in her south-facing apartment, which… (Lorenzo Ciniglio/Freelance)
… is across the hall from her other pad (above). (Lorenzo Ciniglio/Freelance)
A portrait of Lavin as Alice, her TV character (above) (Lorenzo Ciniglio/Freelance)
Linda Lavin and her husband, Steve Bakunas, have something a lot of New Yorkers wish they had — two apartments. But they aren’t in different cities, or even different parts of town. They’re right across the hall from each other.
There’s a sunny apartment that faces south — Lavin calls that one her “country house.” And then there’s a darker one that faces north — that’s the “den.”
Lavin and Bakunas often keep the doors to each open so they can easily walk in and out. Lavin starts talking about the joys of living in two apartments and pauses to greet some neighbors as they pass by in the common hallway. A deliveryman stops to ask for directions, and Lavin pauses again to help him out.
The actress/singer then goes back to extolling the virtues of her living arrangement.
“There are no stairs to climb, and we didn’t have to break through. We just go across the hall. It feels like the old days, like tenement living.” Then she corrects herself. “Actually, it’s more like being in a house. It’s just such a luxury.”
Lavin and her husband — an actor/musician/producer/director, as well as an artist — had been living in Wilmington, NC, for the last few years (apparently they like doing things in twos — they have two homes there, one is currently on the market), but Lavin’s theater and cabaret work kept calling them back to New York. And though Wilmington is still their primary residence, they decided to invest in an NYC condo as a second home.
“Billy Stritch, my musical director, lives three floors down,” Lavin says. “That’s kind of how I got into this building. The fact that he lived here made this a very attractive location for me. It’s in the Columbus Circle area and so convenient.
“And I was very lucky. Once we got into the building, that blizzard two years ago happened. I was in ‘Other Desert Cities’ at the time and I was the only person in the cast who got to get home that night. Elizabeth Marvel was stuck on the subway, Stockard Channing was in a taxi, and I just walked home with my galoshes and my little doggie.”
That was when they had the first apartment.
“We moved here for a new adventure. I think it was in 2008,” says Lavin, who tends to mark time by her many career highlights. “I won a Drama Desk Award that year. That’s all I know.”
Lavin — who is probably best-known as the star of the hit sitcom “Alice,” which ran for eight seasons until 1985 — has four Tony Awards, two Drama Desks, two Golden Globes, a Helen Hayes Award, a Louise Lortel and an Obie; she was inducted into the American Theater Hall of Fame in 2011.
“Then the second apartment became available around the time I was nominated for a Tony for my work in ‘The Lyons,’ in 2012,” she says.
Now they have two bedrooms, 2 1/2 bathrooms, two living rooms and two kitchens, both of which she uses. “How lucky am I to have a choice?” she says.
They paid just under a million for each apartment. And then they started filling them both up with old and new treasures.
“I’ve lived in a lot of places,” Lavin says, “and I’ve collected a lot of art.”
There’s a hand-woven southwestern rug in one living room, an antique rug that she bought back in a duffel bag from Turkey, propaganda paintings from Vietnam, Native American sculptures and lots of paintings — including several by Bakunas — on the walls.
One of her most prized pieces is her mother’s piano. “It was the piano I grew up with,” Lavin says. “I studied to be a concert pianist — hating every minute of it. Finally, I cut myself [accidentally] and didn’t have to do a concert when I was 15. That was the end of my concert career.”
Another special piece is the 17-foot-long custom closet. “It was made by Joe Hammett, a furniture maker in Wilmington,” Bakunas says. “He made it in his shop in North Carolina and brought it here. We priced the same item up here, and his price was $10,000 less.”
Several of their favorite things come from the now-shuttered Daffy’s. “I loved shopping there,” Lavin says. “A day without Daffy’s is like a day without sunshine. But I still shop every day. I check out T.J.Maxx daily. Because the stock changes, and if you’re a good shopper you have to keep going back. Steve’s an unusual man; he loves to shop, too. I’m very grateful for that.”
They do more than shop: Bakunas is the drummer for her cabaret performances and her 2011 CD, “Possibilities.” They will perform tonight through Saturday at NYC’s 54 Below and Feb. 17 at Club Helsinki in upstate Hudson. (Lavin will sing songs she first heard when she was a child; songs that were sung by Sinatra, Margaret Whiting and Jo Stafford. “That music is in me,” she says.)
“We play music together,” Bakunas says. “We act together. We direct each other, we love to build and design and travel. We’re just mates.”
Their relationship is “about two different people coming together — two different backgrounds, two different lifestyles — and putting it all together,” says Lavin, who married Bakunas eight years ago.
“This marriage was a surprise for me,” she says. “At this point, I never expected to find someone who could blend into my life, my heart — and my apartment.”
LINDALAVIN’S
FAVORITE THINGS
* Awall of portraits (including a self portraitby Bakunas)
* A portrait of Lavin as Alice,her TV character
* The custom closet
* A valet for a woman: “Men have a valet to hang their jackets on, but she’s mine,” Lavin says.
* The piano
* Masks they bought when they were in Venice