Personalities / There’s No Place Like Home

There’s No Place Like Home

When her career isn’t keeping her busy on the opposite coast, Kim Raver likes to retreat to the quiet, “hippie” Bridgehampton of her youth.

BY JO PIAZZA

ABOVE: Shirt, Urban Outfitters. Roosevelt Field Mall, 630 Old Country Road, Garden City; urbanoutfitters.com. Jeans, True Religion Brand Jeans. TangerOutlets at the Arches, Deer Park; truereligionbrandjeans.com. BELOW: Shirt, BCBG Max Azria. 20 Main St., East Hampton; bcbg.com. Dress, Joie. Intermix, 64 Main St., Southampton; intermix online.com. Vintage bracelet, Chanel. Singer22, 441 Glen Cove Road, East Hills, NY; singer22.com. Necklace, Raver’s own

Judging her by the characters she plays on television, you would think Kim Raver is a very complicated woman.

First she was Jack Bauer’s love interest Audrey Raines on 24, the married interagency liaison for the Department of Defense who was implicated in a series of ongoing terrorist attacks. Then there was Nico Reilly of Lipstick Jungle, the successful but tortured editor in chief of Bonfire magazine who had an affair with a sexy young boy toy as revenge for her inattentive husband’s affairs. Now she’s Dr. Teddy Altman on Grey’s Anatomy, an Iraq war surgeon who finds herself working in the same hospital as her old flame (who happens to be in love with another woman).

But in real life, Raver lives an amazingly uncomplicated—if currently busy—life.

Growing up in New York, Raver spent a lot of her time in what she describes as the Bridgehampton of the past, “a quiet, hippie, country town.” “We had a tire swing out front; there was our house, and the rest was fields,” Raver says. “We could literally go out and collect leftover potatoes and throw them in the water. I told people that the Hamptons I grew up in was the country, because it really was.”

Today, when she visits her parents and sister in Bridgehampton (with husband Manu Boyer and sons Leo and Luke), the 41-year-old actress remains nostalgic for some of the trappings of that country town—particularly the old drive-in movie theater, something she aspires to bring back. “We could all get in the back of a pickup truck and throw a mattress in the back and watch some great movies,” she says. Still, with or without the drive-in, the Hamptons are where her heart is. “The minute I take a walk on the beach, I immediately feel like I’m at home.”