Michele Morgan and 10050 Cielo Drive. Photo by George E. Smith
Beautiful French actress Michele Morgan, now living in Hollywood decides to build her dream home with the money she had made from her hit movie "Joan of Paris." Michele hired Architect J.F Wadkins, in 1941, he builds her dream home, now famous, on Cielo Drive in Beverly Hills, California.
In her autobiography "Avec Les Yeux-là", Michele Morgan, tells an ominous anecdote about moving to Hollywood during WWII. Once she arrived, she had a house built at 10050 Cielo Drive, slightly isolated from the other star mansions. She was really scared at the thought of staying alone at the place and claimed that she often heard "sinister" noises. She initially hired some domestics to keep her company, but eventually sent them away when they turned out to be drunkards and thieves. For a while she kept living there with a friend, but, once she married William Marshall, he demanded that she sell the mansion and move in with him because, in his family's conservative views, it was dishonorable for a man to live at his woman's place.
Once upon a time, there was a beautiful house built by a beautiful movie actress named Michele Morgan. The house was designed by architect J.F. Wadkins in 1941. This French country style house was located on three acres at the end of a cul-de-sac on Cielo Drive in Benedict Canyon, an area west of Hollywood in the Santa Monica mountains that overlooks Beverly Hills and Bel Air. the hillside house faced east and featured stone fireplaces, beamed ceilings, paned windows, a loft above the living room, a swimming pool and a guest cottage.
Past residents included...Michele Morgan, William Marshall, Lillian Gish, Henry Fonda, Rudi Altobelli, Samantha Eggar, Mark Lindsay, Olivia Hussey, Terry Melcher, Candice Bergen, Roman Polanski & Sharon Tate, Trent Reznor.
In 1993 the house was demolished and replaced with a new mansion called Villa Bella with a new street address of 10066 Cielo Drive.