Brady pad is snagged

By Carol Beggy & Mark Shanahan, Globe Staff  |  June 5, 2007

Tom Brady is selling the three-bedroom, 3 1/2 - bath Back Bay condo he's called home for nearly three years. The Boston Courant will report in its June 9 edition that the Patriots QB's swank condo, complete with parking spaces, is under agreement to be sold for more than $5.9 million, according to the paper's publisher, David Jacobs. High-end residential broker Tracy Campion, whose agency Campion and Company has the listing, confirmed for us yesterday that there's a deal pending on the Commonwealth Avenue abode, but she was mum on the details. No. 12 paid $4.1 million for the 3,422-square-foot, 10-room unit in the beaux-arts-style building in July 2004. The condo came with two parking spaces, but city records show he's since added at least two more spots. (A car collector of sorts, Brady's most recent ride is a blue Audi S8 -- with Michigan plates.) He won't be hunting for a new Boston home, though. A little over a year ago, the three-time Super Bowl champ paid $6.7 million for a 5,000-square-foot building on Beacon Street. He'd lived in the Comm. Ave. condo while work on the Beacon Street building was completed. Yesterday, Brady, who's spent much of the offseason in New York, was in Bolton, playing in the Pats' annual charity golf tournament. (Hardly a duffer, he hit the day's longest drive -- 307 yards.) Brady was in the Big Apple over the weekend, where he was snapped walking around with his supermodel girlfriend, Gisele Bundchen. Wisely, our hometown hero ditched his Yankees hat and sported a Red Sox cap.

Aerosmith report is same old song and dance

For the second time in less than a week, Aerosmith's reps are denying a report that the Boston band is no more. Publicist Mitch Schneider gave us the good word yesterday after RollingStone .com posted a pic of singer Steven Tyler at an airport in India with the following caption: "Steven Tyler touches down at the Bangalore airport only to announce that Aerosmith has broken up." Not so, according to Schneider, who called the cutline "an error." Last week, the New York Post reported that Tyler's daughter Liv had told friends her dad's unhappy with his bandmates and is planning to quit. Schneider worked overtime to knock down that innuendo, too. Reached yesterday, Rolling Stone flack Beth Jacobson insisted that the intern who wrote the caption was kidding , playing on last week's item in the Post. "Really, it was an intern who didn't do a good job," Jacobson said. "It's got a breaking news feeling, but it's inaccurate." If Tyler's in turmoil, he's not talking. Before the band's two-hour show in Bangalore Saturday, the 59-year-old frontman told the Times of India "Aerosmith has never sounded better."

The play’s the thing

Jennifer Garner and husband Ben Affleck attended Sunday night's performance of "Present Laughter" starring Victor Garber, who played her dad on the series "Alias." After the show, the couple and Affleck's mom, Chris, caught up with Garber and the rest at the Huntington Theatre Company. Affleck came to town to help out at the Greater Boston Food Bank and take in a Sox-Yankees game. Yesterday Garber used his day off to visit the Museum of Fine Arts, where curator Carol Troyen gave the actor and some of his castmates a tour of the Edward Hopper exhibition. Joining Garber in checking out the art and for lunch at Bravo were Lisa Banes, Pamela J. Gray, James Joseph O'Neill, Nancy Carroll, Marc Vietor, and Brooks Ashmanskas, who is up for a Tony Award .

Damon digs on the block; is he next?

Complain, if you must, about the excessive contract given to J.D. Drew -- a.k.a. DL Drew -- but how smart were the Bosox to jettison Johnny Damon? The formerly hirsute center fielder's looking pretty feeble in pinstripes, and word is the Yankees would dump Damon if they could. Hmm. Maybe that's why Johnny and his wife, Michelle, are selling the sweet Upper East Side spread they purchased a year ago. (The couple bought the plush, three-bedroom pad with commanding views of Central Park for $5.5 million and are now asking $8.2 million.) So why sell? The listing agent told the Wall Street Journal that Johnny wants a swimming pool and plans to buy a house in the 'burbs after the season. That is, if he's still in New York then.

He has designs on New Jersey

David Josef, a 30-year veteran of the city's fashion scene who has dressed Barbra Streisand , Dionne Warwick, and several local news anchors, is closing his South End showroom and moving to New Jersey. The 50-year-old designer said yesterday that he was offered the in-house designer position at Hartly , a specialty store in Westwood, N.J., that sells special-occasion gowns and designer sportswear. "I still love designing clothes, and I love working with clients. I don't love managing employees and dealing with taxes," said the Providence native, whose clothing was once carried at Saks, Neiman Marcus, and Bloomingdale's. Jay Calderin, executive director of Boston Fashion Week and an instructor at the School of Fashion Design, called the move a "big loss" for Boston. "He's an institution here. He was one of the pillars," Calderin said. Josef said he will stay in Boston until September. "I have 200 sketches," he said. "I'm ready to go."

It was cool when Pats coach Bill Belichick appeared on "Rescue Me" last year, but even better was seeing Belichick protege Eric Mangini pop up on Sunday's episode of "The Sopranos." The Jets coach was ID'd by name as he dined at Artie Bucco's Italian restaurant. Tony Soprano was so impressed that he got up and introduced himself to "Mangenius," as Jets fans like to call their coach.

Ellen Pompeo's wedding won't be all that. The "Grey's Anatomy" star, who grew up in Everett, tells People magazine that when she and fiance Chris Ivery finally wed, the affair will be more low-key than lavish. "There will be no 'big' anything," Pompeo, 37, told the mag at this weekend's Chrysalis Butterfly Ball, a benefit for the homeless in Brentwood, Calif. "It's going to be very small. . . . We were thinking about going away and getting married."

The shapely Celtics dancers did their thing at Sichuan University in China the other day. As you might expect, college kids lined up to watch the leggy ladies, who performed under the watchful eye of team director Marina Ortega. Anyone interested in joining the green team's dance troupe should show up at the TD Banknorth Garden Saturday at 7:30 a.m., where a panel of judges will rate your moves, showmanship, and so-called "court-appeal."

'In both the fields, in order to survive and triumph, you need focus and to be highly disciplined and determined.' Mike Tyson, on boxing and his desire to star in a Bollywood movie.

Suzanne Ryan of the Globe staff contributed to this report. Names can be reached at names@globe.com or at 617-929-8253.