Dr Dolittle's house for sale: medieval manor that was the setting for 2020 film with Robert Downey Jr is priced at £5m

The Grade I-listed manor house, on the border of Devon and Somerset, also featured as one of England's best houses in a 2003 book.
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Amira Hashish8 July 2020

The medieval manor that was a film set for Dolittle (2020), starring Robert Downey Jr as the doctor who can converse with animals, is on the market in Somerset.

Built around 1480, Cothay Manor portrayed the eccentric physician’s home in the movie, which made it into UK cinemas with weeks to spare before coronavirus lockdown.

The handsome Grade I-listed manor, set in 40 acres on the Devon border and unusually well-preserved, was described in Country Life as “the most perfect 15th-century small country house that survives in the kingdom” in 1927 by Christopher Hussey, the late expert on the nation’s great houses.

It also featured in the book England’s Thousand Best Houses (2003), by Simon Jenkins. Little wonder it caught Hollywood’s attention.

The nine-bedroom “medieval hall house”, restored to highlight its grand period features, is set in magnificent gardens with a lake and wildflower meadow, created by Colonel Reginald Cooper who bought the property in the Twenties.

Romantically, the rent payable in medieval times for the land around the house was a pair of silver spurs and a rose. These days, the price tag is somewhat more substantial – Cothay Manor is on Knight Frank’s books for £5 million.

Trains from Taunton to London Paddington take about 90 minutes.