Talent agency group buys office building.

Investors linked to one of the biggest names in Hollywood - Creative Artists Agency talent representation firm - have acquired a long-vacant Century City office building and are expected to renovate and lease it entirely to another major entertainment icon, the ultra-successful Ziffren Brittenham Branca & Fischer law firm.

That firm, now based in Century City's Fox Plaza highrise, declined to comment on the pending lease transaction, nor would its brokerage firm, Beitler Commercial Realty Services, confirm that negotiations are in progress.

The man behind the investments by CAA executives, former executives and clients, CAA Chief Financial Officer Bob Goldman, said the new owners don't have a detailed renovation plan in place, nor are they close to signing a key tenant.

"I wish I could tell you we do," Goldman commented.

Bill McGregor, principal of the Beverly Hills-based McGregor Co. real estate firm, would only say that he'll be involved in a "great" renovation project.

McGregor helped a Goldman-headed partnership known as Beverly Hills Ice House Investments L.P. - whose address is CAA's Beverly Hills headquarters - renovate the historic 50,000-square-foot Ice House building on Civic Center Drive and lease it to PolyGram Filmed Entertainment.

The property now slated for the renovation and lease - at the southwest corner of "little" Santa Monica Boulevard and Century Park West - has variously been known as the Carlsberg, CBS Records and Sony Music building. Its street address is 1801 Century Park West.

Carlsberg refers to Carlsberg Financial Center Ltd., the affiliate of Santa Monica-based Carlsberg Management Co. that owned the 48,000-square-foot property until late January. The building's latest occupant was Sony Music, which had been known as CBS Music before Sony Corp. acquired the operation. Sony Music moved to a custom-built headquarters within Santa Monica's Arboretum development in 1992.

Taking over

Title records show that a California corporation called SFSBMA Inc. purchased a defaulted Aetna Life Insurance Co. mortgage on the Century City building in December, scheduled a trustee's sale and took title through foreclosure in late January.

While records show outstanding debt on the Aetna note totaled just over $3 million, sources familiar with the negotiations said SFSBMA paid about $600,000.

John Bertram of Westmac Commercial Brokerage Co., who represented the buyer group in its negotiations with Aetna, wouldn't discuss the price his client paid or any tenant negotiations.

But he did note further expenditures will be required to prepare the building for occupancy: paying off City of L.A. bonds against the property aimed at financing fire sprinklers and such fire/life safety improvements; repairing earthquake damage; and completing an asbestos-abatement program.

Bertram noted the building is actually on a long-term lease from the landowners, a group of individual investors residing primarily in Northern California. But while the broker wouldn't comment on his client's strategy with respect to the ground-lease, other sources said the 1801 building's new owners will most likely endeavor to buy the "fee" interest in the land as well.

And presumably, the new owners would also spend liberally to build out interior improvements befitting an acknowledged power player such as Ziffren Brittenham.

Linking the entertainment business with the rest of corporate America as new media technologies emerge, the 14-partner deal-making firm founded by Kenneth Ziffren and Harry "Skip" Brittenham has reportedly brokered at least $15 billion worth of corporate business over the last two years - generating fees exceeding $50 million. Forbes magazine recently reported that the firm boasts three of the nation's four highest-paid attorneys.

Expiration nears

Sources said the firm's lease of about 35,000 square feet at Fox Plaza is set to expire some time next year. Sources also noted the firm's representatives previously proposed a deal with the Carlsberg group that would have entailed a renovation and sale to Ziffren Brittenham's partners.

Some of the investors behind the Carlsberg building's new ownership are likely just as well compensated. Sources said investors probably include some of CAA's executives and principals, big-name Hollywood star clients and former CAA chief Michael Ovitz.

Goldman confirmed that he heads another group that is a "passive investor" in the high-profile Westwood Village property developer Ira Smedra is planning to redevelop into a major mixed-use property.

And yet another CAA-affiliated group is also in the process of purchasing the lease on the famed Bistro Gardens restaurant, on Canon Drive in Beverly Hills, and moving Wolfgang Puck's equally famous Spago to the site.

CEO Herb Piken of Studio City retail property firm The Piken Co., who is representing that Goldman-headed group as well as Bistro Gardens' longtime operators Kurt and Chris Niklas, said the Goldman team is in escrow to purchase the lease.

The buyer group is also negotiating a new 20-year lease arrangement with the property owner, Beverly Hills-based Leisure & Carpenter Property Ltd., added Piken, who is likewise helping the Niklases find a new Westside restaurant site.