Alan Cumming purchases £3m Manhattan home

Scottish actor Alan Cumming has reportedly spent almost £3 million on a four-storey townhouse in New York months after being told he was not eligible to vote in the independence referendum because his Edinburgh flat is not his main address.

Cumming: denied his Yes vote. Picture: Robert Perry

The Hollywood actor bought an £80,000 property in the capital’s Polwarth area ahead of this year’s historic vote, saying he did not “want to miss the opportunity to make an independent Scotland a reality”.

But electoral officials told him he would not be able to vote Yes because he spends most of his time at his New York address.

Cumming has reportedly opted for a property in New York’s trendy East Village. His new home is said to boast seven bedrooms, four bathrooms, a “forest-like garden”, balcony and a roof deck. He will be neighbours with, among others, Friends star David Schwimmer.

Last year, revealing that he would not be allowed take part in September’s referendum, the 48-year-old wrote on his blog: “At the beginning of this year I sold my flat in London and bought a home in Edinburgh. I wanted a base in Scotland again, I wanted to be nearer my mum.

“I had been registered to vote in London and now registered in Edinburgh. I looked forward to being able to vote in the independence referendum next year.

“Unfortunately I’ve since discovered that I can’t. Because my main residence is in New York and I will be working there on Broadway for most of next year I am ineligible to vote and have had to come off the electoral roll.”

Estate agents describe his new flat as a “country house in the city on nicest east village. Exceptionally charming. Only one sale of property in seventy years”.

Cumming, originally from Aberfeldy, has been a high-profile supporter of Scottish independence. He appeared with First Minister Alex Salmond and a host of other A-listers when the Yes campaign was launched last May.

Cumming, who has appeared in films and TV shows including X-Men, Eyes Wide Shut and Taggart, hit out last year at critics. “Over the past month I have been accused of trying to buy a vote, as though I had no intention of ever using my flat in Edinburgh,” he said. “I am actually writing this from its living room.”

He added: “Whilst the No Campaign will be happy that I am not indeed able to vote in the referendum next year and they appear to have won by their media bashing of me, it is a Pyrrhic victory, for they have only spurred me to use the voice I have to reach out further and louder to express my views.”