Frank Zappa’s Home For Sale

There’s no doubt about it, Frank Zappa proudly and assertively let his freak flag fly right on up until his death in 1993. So it seems fitting that this iconoclastic musician’s home in Los Angeles is now for sale in a unique way: on Kickstarter, where some of the funds will go toward a film about Zappa’s life.

Last year, filmmaker and actor Alex Winter (almost certainly best known as Bill from the stoner classic “Bill & Ted’s Excellent Adventure”) was given rare access to the vault of media files in the basement of Zappa’s home. But since turning these crumbling archives into a movie will require buckets of money, Zappa’s surviving family members agreed to sell the home for $9 million and put an undisclosed portion of the proceeds toward Winter’s documentary.

Measuring 8,000 square feet, the house has a rooftop tennis court, backyard swimming pool, guest cottage, and (not at all least) the infamous Utility Muffin Research Kitchen where Zappa had recorded songs, starting in the ’80s. With all that, the home is a bargain, Winter explained to The New York Times.

“In the Zappa family, the kids are all grown up and have their own lives. With [Zappa’s wife] Gail no longer here, there’s nobody there. So we proposed to them that if this thing is going to get sold anyway, why don’t we make it part of our campaign?” he explained. The Kickstarter page is also collecting donations for the film, but since accumulating funds that way takes time, the home sale would let his team start the movie immediately. Offered at $9,000,000   Guest author Judy Dutton / Realtor.com