Screenwriter and film director M. Night Shyamalan, best-known as the brain behind supernatural thrillers such as “The Sixth Sense,””Signs” and “The Village,” has found a buyer for his 7,000-square-foot, four-bedroom penthouse at 45 Walker Street, according to public records filed with the city this past Friday.
The duplex penthouse, which was listed with Raphael De Niro of Prudential Douglas Elliman, sold for $9.5 million, records show. It had been on the market since September 2010, when it was listed with Brown Harris Stevens’ Margaret Velard and Stewart Clarke for $18.5 million. Velard and Stewart two months later dropped the price to $16 million, after the property failed to attract enough attention from prospective buyers. BHS marketed it for a total of six months before De Niro took over the listing.
The apartment, the highest of six in the Tribeca condominium renovation by Extell Development between Church Street and Broadway, has keyed elevator access, a floating limestone staircase and glass mosaic tiled floors. It also features a gym, a wet bar and a planted terrace.
Shyamalan purchased the property in 2003, according to public records, paying $6.3 million.
The director is currently in preproduction on “After Earth,” a sci-fi adventure film in which a boy navigates an abandoned earth 1,000 years in the future to save himself and his estranged father, news reports said. He is working with the actors and father-son duo of Will and Jaden Smith on the film, which is slated to begin shooting in March and has a scheduled theatrical release date of June 7, 2013.
De Niro was boarding a plane at press time and couldn’t comment. A representative for Shyamalan was not immediately available for comment and Velard declined to comment.