Former Douglas Elliman CEO Howard Lorber admitted before he abruptly retired last month that he’d had “intimate relationships” with two brokers at the real estate giant – including a former actress who was the mother of Jack Nicholson’s estranged love child, according to a report.
The exit of Lorber, who retired on Oct. 22 under a cloud of sexual harassment accusations against former employees, “was not due to any disagreement with the company on any matter relating to the company’s operations, policies or practices,” the company said in a regulatory filing at the time.
But lawyers for the company had grilled the longtime chief executive on his personal life and the allegations swirling within the firm during a five-hour-long video call in October – just two weeks before his retirement was announced, according to Bloomberg.
Those included questions about the 76-year-old Lorber’s relationship with Jennine Gourin, a now 51-year-old broker at the firm. The pair have appeared in numerous photos that were snapped at glitzy banquets and dinners over the years.
Lorber’s attorney told Bloomberg that Elliman had no policy prohibiting consensual relationships between employees and independent brokers
Lorber and Gourin — who is credited by IMDB as playing a “schoolgirl” in the 1982 movie “A LIttle Sex” starring Tim Matheson and Kate Capshaw — were spotted together at a Hamptons horse show in 2013, according to Page Six archives.
In 2013 and 2014, Jennine netted more than half a million dollars in commissions, according to data provided by Douglass Maynard, a lawyer representing Lorber, to Bloomberg.
“When asked, Mr. Lorber on occasion recommended Ms. Gourin, as he has done with hundreds of other agents, both male and female,” Maynard told Bloomberg, noting that developers and customers sometimes seek advice on which agents to use.
In the 1990s, Jennine, then a waitress, reportedly had a fling with “The Shining” film star. Tessa Gourin, a dead ringer for Nicholson, was born in 1994.
Lorber’s revelation comes as Douglas Elliman has faced increased scrutiny after two of its former star brokers, brothers Tal and Oren Alexander, were accused of sexual assault in incidents dating back to their start at the firm in 2008. The pair have not been charged with any crimes and left the firm in 2022.
Bloomberg reported that the company’s inquiry into Lorber was launched in the wake of sexual allegations against Oren and Tal Alexander.
Lorber also claimed he had a relationship with Jessica Cohen, an award-winning agent at the firm, the source told Bloomberg. Cohen is one of the women who stepped forward against the Alexander brothers over the summer.
She told The New York Times that in 2010, she had a drink with Tal, Oren and their third brother Alon at a birthday party in Manhattan. She does not remember anything from the next five hours – only waking up after midnight at Mount Sinai West Hospital, she told The New York Times.
Time-stamped photos taken by a friend and reviewed by the paper reportedly show Cohen passed out on Tal’s shoulder with their hands intertwined. Cohen said she told Lorber during a game of chess two years later about the incident and begged him not to tell anyone.
Cohen’s lawyer said she was a victim and did not benefit in any way from Lorber’s alleged relationship.
“Any notion that Ms. Cohen had a ‘romantic’ relationship with Mr. Lorber, or that any such relationship made it easier for her to become a top broker is categorically false,” her attorney, Michael Willemin, told The Post in an e-mailed statement.
“Cohen was a top broker long before she met Mr. Lorber, and the treatment that she suffered at his hands and that of Douglas Elliman have had a profoundly negative impact on her life and career.”
But Lorber’s lawyer, Maynard, said: “The statement by Ms. Cohen’s lawyer is false and is flatly contradicted by what she told numerous people both orally and in writing over many years.”
Lawyers for Tal Alexander told Bloomberg that “anyone who investigates these matters will determine what we have — that Tal has done nothing wrong.”
Lawyers for Oren and Alon and a representative for Douglas Elliman declined to comment. Jennine and Maynard did not respond to requests for further comment.
As for Gourin, Nicholson has never publicly acknowledged that Tessa is his daughter, but his paternity is considered “an open secret” in Hollywood, according to The Daily Beast.
“My mom wanted me to have a relationship with him, but he said he wasn’t interested,” Tessa said last year.
As a child, Tessa said her mother instructed her not to tell anyone that she had a famous dad.
“I knew he was powerful and Daddy Warbucks-level rich, so I kind of equated my life to being like Orphan Annie’s,” she told The Daily Beast.
Meanwhile, in 2018, TheRealDeal reported that Lorber had purchased an $11 million Park Avenue apartment for his wife, Thea Hallman – with whom he had not lived for at least 10 years.
After directors ruled a review of Lorber’s conduct by his longtime lawyer Marc Kasowitz was inadequate, the board’s special committee took a closer look at Lorber and decided his behavior — including two affairs — had been inappropriate, a source told Bloomberg.
Maynard told Bloomberg that the idea that Lorber was ousted after the special panel deemed his behavior inappropriate is “false and contrary to what the company disclosed.”
Douglas Elliman has been a standalone public company since its 2021 spin-off from Vector Group. The real estate company has a market capitalization of $178.6 million.
When Lorber left the firm, he forfeited unvested shares that would have been worth about $4.3 million when they were canceled, according to regulatory filings obtained by Bloomberg. He also forfeited his right to severance payouts, which would be worth about $6.4 million, the report said.
