Mary Richards--Mary Tyler Moore House For Sale

So the Mary Richards house is for sale! Mary Richards...well, no relative of mine although we share the same last name...and actually not a real person. Mary Richards the television character played by Mary Tyler Moore in the 1970's was a pretty high rated sitcom. I have to say this for it seems to the younger generation the mention of some of these ole greats draws a blank. I was doing some work with a student a few days back and I happened to mention the name of 'Carol Burnett'. "Never heard of her," he replied.


 For people of the baby boomers generation I guess we're all becoming increasingly amazed at the names of ones we considered the SUPER GREATS don't  mean any thing much to ones of the new age. Back to Mary Tyler Moore....she stared in the award winning, 'The Dick Van Dyke Show' in the 60's and eventually launched out on her own a few years later with the Mary Tyler Moore show. To begin with it didn't score high in the ratings but with time, that's back in the time when networks would provide it MTM became a hit.

The beginning trailer of the show had Mary drive up to a house in Minneapolis which was meant to be the place she rented an apartment. For numbers of years the house served as a backdrop scene in many shots throughout the episodes as Mary's home residence. Seen below is the picture of the house.

 

As the story line went Mary's apartment was on the third floor behind the Palladian windows with the iron balcony. The opening trailer of the show had Mary Tyler Moore drive up to the house in a Ford Mustang. Seen below...

The top loft apartment which was supposed to be Mary's was created on a Hollywood set and you might remember it as the picture below,

My wife and I brought out some Mary Tyler Moore DVD's and watched a few shows.  Quite a small place for Mary really. There was a very small kitchen to the side appearing only about two feet wide and the back closet where she'd store all her millions of different type clothes but never did hear where the washroom was....STARS don't need them I guess.  There was no bedroom but merely a bed sofa in the living room...so it was kind of like a one bedroom apartment. 

There's news this week that the real 'Mary Tyler Home' from  Minneapolis  is up for sale. Here's a picture of the real  interior of what Mary's apartment truly looks like.

One wonders how much fun it would be to watch some of those MTM shows sitting in this room. Be kind of a strange feeling would it not? More trivial. Apparently so many fans of the show in the 70's would drive by and look at the place the then owners of the home put out a political sign stating "Impeach Richard Nixon". The producers of MTM then decided to have Mary Richards move to a high rise apartment building so as not to have the sign in future shots. I'd assume the home owner probably had an agreement at first but probably tired of the many fans. The house is listed for 2.9 million dollars. According to reports it has 7 bedrooms and 9 washrooms.
One would hope it has a kitchen bigger than Mary's though.  ;)