Tragic Alan Rickman’s romantic £3m home plan

AS THESPIaN friends pay tribute to the late alan Rickman, a further poignant detail emerges. I can reveal the acclaimed actor, who was reportedly unaware of the severity of his illness until shortly before Christmas, was in the final stages of buying a multi-millionpound London flat.

according to my source, the star was in the process of exchanging contracts on a £3million-plus duplex in Marylebone, overlooking one of London’s most beautiful garden squares. ‘It was very much a deal about to be completed,’ I’m told.

If the actor had exchanged contracts, property law dictates that his solicitors would have had to complete the sale.

Rickman’s proposed purchase came with three bedrooms, a terrace, a patio and the keys to the garden square.

The ‘stunning’ property was offered to the market in ‘excellent condition’, according to the estate agent’s marketing literature, and was described as ‘a perfect home for discerning buyers’.

It is unclear whether Rickman planned to relocate from the West London home he shared with his wife Rima Horton, whom he married in a secret ceremony last year, or to buy the flat near the fashionable Chiltern Firehouse restaurant as an investment.

Rickman’s agent declined to comment on the purchase, and the current owners of the property said they ‘couldn’t say anything’, when I asked about the transaction.

But Rickman, best-known for his roles in Harry Potter, Die Hard and Robin Hood: Prince of Thieves, would have been a popular neighbour, as well as an entertaining host to friends such as Emma Thompson, Stephen Fry and Richard E. Grant.

Locals on his street called him a ‘lovely man’, and were ‘very saddened’ by his death. ‘He always smiled and said hello when I saw him,’ said one.

Rickman told a select few friends that he was battling pancreatic cancer during a visit to New York last month, and kept an upbeat demeanour even weeks before his death.