When you think of high-end New York City real estate, what comes to mind? It might be the stately apartment buildings lining Fifth or Park avenues, or cavernous lofts in Soho or Tribeca. But for Anora, the Palme d’Or-winning new romantic comedy from writer-director Sean Baker, none of those options were quite right.
“Sean basically Googled ‘most expensive mansion in Brooklyn,’ and it came up,” Sammy Quan, one of the film’s producers, says. “He said, ‘that’s the place I want.’”
That’s because Anora isn’t your average romantic comedy. The film—the first American picture to win the top prize at Cannes in more than a decade—tells the story of Ani (Mikey Madison), a young woman working in a strip club in Brooklyn, who begins a troubled whirlwind romance with Ivan (Mark Eydelshteyn), the son of a Russian oligarch. And the massive waterfront mansion where he lives—his parents’ place, to be clear, with the accompanying high-end design, security gate, fleet of fancy cars, and entourage of minders—had to fit a certain mold.
Sean Baker, Mikey Madison, and Mark Eydelshteyn on the Brooklyn set of Anora, which features a real-life mansion once listed for $30 million.
“We were working on the script, talking out where the scenes would take place, and I think we initially had it at a really nice apartment,” says producer Alex Coco. “But after that Google search, we were like, ‘OK, great, now we'll just write for this house.’ But first, we had to make sure we could get it.”
The home, in the Mill Basin neighborhood of Brooklyn, was once the most expensive listing in the borough, with a 2013 asking price of $30 million. (It most sold in 2021, reportedly for cool $7.2 million.) What do you get for that kind of change? Five bedrooms and four and a half bathrooms across 14,000 square feet, as well as indoor parking for six vehicles, a 1,000-square-foot pool and spa, and a meditation room, among other fancy features. A story about the home’s 2021 sale in The Real Deal called it “a mobster-style mansion.”
“It was designed by an actual Russian oligarch,” Quan says. “You can't see it [in the film], but the walls in the bedroom are made of buttery leather, and even the wallpaper was handpicked. We couldn't have made it more authentic.” Coco adds, “We really wanted it to feel like this character was a part of that community as well in a different tax bracket.”
Anora director Sean Baker with his Palme d’Or at the 2024 Cannes Film Festival. Anora was the first American film in more than a decade to take home the fest’s top honor.
The film shot in the home for around two weeks, and even used the current owner’s own cars to fill the garage. “It mattered to Sean that this was a real place in Mill Basin, because he wanted to tell a story that takes place in a certain part of Brooklyn,” says Ben Wiseman, the film’s assistant location manager. “Having a mansion like that as almost a character in the movie was important. It really speaks to the character of Ivan and the over-the-top, crazy rich person he is.”
It might not be surprising, then, that behind the scenes of the film, the house was a set for some over-the-top antics as well. “I ended up living there for the whole run of when we were shooting, we all kind of turned it into our home” says Ross Brodar, the film’s location manager. “The owners are Jewish and keep kosher. So, during the time that we were there, one of the assistants decided to cook a pork chop—and that was not a kosher thing to do. It turned out that plate that pork chop was eaten from had to be discarded, and there's a tradition that says you have to bury a plate that something non-kosher has been eaten from. So, we had a ceremony and buried the plats on the property—it was a Hermes plate, too.”
Other issues with filming in a posh, residential area required slightly less ceremonial fixes. “We definitely made nice with the neighbors and worked out deals with them so we could do the type of stuff that Sean wanted—like shooting off fireworks in the middle of the night,” Brodar says. “That might have been our biggest challenge, working with the community and the mayor’s office to get the ability to set up camp in the area the way that we wanted.”
Now that the film is in theaters and earning deafening awards buzz, however, can those patient neighbors breathe a sigh of relief? “There will probably be a bunch of tour buses coming by now,” Brodar jokes. “The neighbors will love it.”
Adam Rathe
Deputy Features Director
Adam Rathe is Town & Country's Deputy Features Director, covering film, theater, books, travel, art, philanthropy, and a range of other subjects.
