It was part party palace, part personal sanctuary, and all spectacle. Now, Jackie Gleason’s legendary estate in New York‘s picturesque Hudson Valley—better known as the Mothership—has reemerged for sale at $5.5 million with Corcoran’s Heidi Henshaw.
Commissioned by the late comedian and musician as a retreat from filming the groundbreaking 1950s sitcom The Honeymooners, the spaceship-like residence in Cortlandt Manor is one of the most unusual homes ever built for a Hollywood icon. Gleason, famously fascinated with UFOs and metaphysical theory, dreamed up the circular home that embodied futuristic ambition while showcasing old-fashioned craftsmanship.
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Completed in 1959, the copper-roofed Mothership was designed by architect Robert Cika.
Chris Kiely/Jump Visual
To execute his otherworldly vision, Gleason tapped architect Robert Cika, a protégé of Frank Lloyd Wright, who enlisted a Scandinavian shipbuilder to help realize the extraordinary design. At least some of the prefabrication work took place inside an airplane hangar before the copper-roofed house was assembled on-site. It took five years and a reported $650,000, partly underwritten by Gleason’s bosses at CBS, before the Mothership was completed in 1959.
The mid-century masterpiece is defined by its curving, organic architecture: there are no right angles anywhere in the 3,950-square-foot main residence. Banks of floor-to-ceiling windows flood the interiors with light, while the vaulted wooden ceiling evokes the hull of a ship and metal vents mimic stylized fish. Gleason even purchased an entire marble quarry in Italy to ensure the finest stone for the home’s flooring and massive fireplaces—some slabs so large they had to be delivered to the site by helicopter.
The circular home has no right angles and soaring boat-like ceilings.
James Gagliardi
The circular plan includes three bedrooms, two full bathrooms, one half bathroom, a curved stainless-steel kitchen, a dining room, a spacious living area, and a circular library and office. Many original details, including built-in cabinetry, closets, and bespoke furnishings, remain intact.
The home was conceived as much for entertainment as for solitude. Gleason’s late-night soirées reportedly drew the likes of Frank Sinatra, Marilyn Monroe, Joe DiMaggio, and even President Richard Nixon. Three dramatic swooping bars, a marble dance floor, and a game room with a shuffleboard table speak to its party-ready pedigree. Yet the Mothership also offers serenity, seclusion, and an intimate connection to the natural world, with panoramic views of its wooded 8.6-acre setting just an hour north of Manhattan.
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The three-bedroom home features curved walls of glass and massive marble fireplaces.
James Gagliardi
The estate includes two additional dwellings: a smaller, secondary “spaceship,” long used as a bunkhouse and glamping spot, and the Barracks, a charming (and far more conventional) 1930s stone Colonial Revival home that functions as a guesthouse. A cultivated vegetable and herb garden, plus a gardening shed, round out the retreat.
The estate last traded hands in 1976 for just $150,000, when CBS sold the property following Gleason’s move to Florida. It briefly surfaced for sale back in 2018 for $12 million but never sold.
Click here to see more photos of Jackie Gleason’s UFO-inspired home.
James Gagliardi
Authors
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Abby Montanez
