Broadway star Laura Bell Bundy opens a wooden gate and steps inside a muddy pen to pet a group of donkeys. She’s dressed in a wrinkled, loose-fitting linen shirt, brown cargo pants, and beige boots with red laces—an outfit to ward off ticks. Her signature long, blond locks are tied back in a low ponytail. Getting dirty isn’t of concern as she enthusiastically walks the grounds of her farm, one of two in New Jersey that she owns with her husband, Thom Hinkle, to show off the cows next.
It’s a stark contrast to the image audiences probably have of one of Broadway’s most endearing—and funny—leading ladies, who has been charming theater lovers since her breakout role as Amber Von Tussle in the 2002 musical Hairspray. Bundy, who went on to originate the role of Elle Woods in Legally Blonde: The Musical in 2007, has taken the literal meaning of her iconic character’s name all the way to the actual woodlands of Hunterdon County.
Laura Bell Bundy and Thom Hinkle are raising their son, Huck, on their Tewksbury farm. Photo: Chris Buck
During the pandemic, Bundy, who grew up on a lake in Lexington, Kentucky, and Hinkle, an executive producer for television who was raised in Union County’s Roselle Park, decided to leave California, where they’d been living for the past seven years.
After briefly considering farms in Kentucky near Bundy’s family, they decided to head back to the East Coast. Bundy missed working on Broadway, and Hinkle wanted to experience four seasons again.
First, they looked at properties in Connecticut and New York, then expanded the search to New Jersey, where they are now raising their 5-year-old-son, Huck, on a farm in Tewksbury. In the midst of huge renovations, they bottle maple syrup, plan to open a boutique membership winery in a few years, and even expect to host farm classes and events.
“I’ve fallen in love with New Jersey—I can’t believe how much it looks like Kentucky,” says Bundy.
The farm’s goats were rescued when they were 10 days old. Bundy bottle-fed them for three months. Photo: Chris Buck
The Hunterdon County farm they settled on in 2021 is about an hour’s drive from midtown Manhattan. “I’m not interested in living in suburbia. If I’m going to be outside of the city, I might as well be outside the city,” Bundy says, explaining why they picked a home so far west on Route 78, when their jobs are mostly in New York City.
Right now, she’s filming the movie Miracle on 74th Street there. When I meet her for a farm tour, she holds up her long nails, which are part of her look as an “Eastern European lady,” she says in the character’s accent before stepping away to take a call related to the project—also starring Drew Barrymore, Gwyneth Paltrow, and Dan Hedaya as her husband. Last fall, during her run of The Cottage on Broadway, Bundy would drive into the city, leaving home between 4:30 and 5:30 pm to make it in time for a 7 pm curtain. “The only traffic we have here is you could get behind a tractor,” she says.
“Or a cow,” adds Hinkle. “I never thought we’d move back. The farms we saw here were nicer than the ones we saw in Kentucky.”
The welcoming community has made them feel right at home. There’s a neighborhood Facebook page, a town Christmas tree lighting, and Fourth of July festivities with potato-sack and relay races.
“People wave to you,” Hinkle points out.
“It’s the most neighborhoody feeling I’ve ever had in my life, even though the properties are fairly spread out,” Bundy adds.
Buy our September 2024 issue here. Photo: Chris Buck; Hair & makeup: Dylan Silver
The only downsides? It takes three days to mow the lawn, and it’s an almost 20-minute drive to the nearest ShopRite, where Bundy does her own grocery shopping. “But now, with Whole Foods Amazon delivery, my life is much easier,” she adds. “I also buy from local farms, and we have a few small general stores.”
Their property boasts a barn, pond, creek, sheep, goats (which were rescued at 10 days old, and Bundy bottle-fed them for three months) and maple trees. Hinkle collected sap from 80 trees over two months and boiled it down to 60 8-ounce bottles of delicious syrup, which he’s been gifting to friends.
Hinkle makes maple syrup from trees on the farm and bottles it for friends. Photo: Chris Buck
There’s no cell phone reception, which Bundy feels is a blessing. Not being plugged in to the internet all the time helps clear her mind and allows for more creativity. “I would much prefer to be on a bicycle all day and jump in a creek—that’s my happy place,” she says, offering carrots to feed the goats.
Perhaps it worked. It was their bike rides that inspired the couple’s next great adventure. In September 2022, they purchased another farm that they always passed on their excursions. It cost $1.2 million, and nearly every building was in disrepair. The best part about the deal was that the state offered them money to preserve it as part of its efforts to maintain open space, support local agriculture and protect the environment. “We felt it was win-win,” says Bundy. “We preserved 58 acres through the State Agriculture Development Committee, who were a joy to deal with. Although selling off lots could have been more financially lucrative, we decided to preserve the land to benefit Tewksbury, the town we deeply love, and to respect our neighbors and the community.”
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Now, the couple secures their helmets and hops on electric bikes to show me just how close in proximity the two properties are. It’s an impressive two-mile ride weaving through the woods. I follow in my car. “Having a project like this farm appeals to us,” Bundy explains, who is leading on the design concept. “We are idea people. We like birthing a concept and seeing the concept through.”
“She just vomits creativity. She’s a producer’s dream, the amount of ideas that she comes up with—I love it,” says Hinkle, who does a lot of the manual labor, along with hiring contractors. There are several tractors on site, too, some of which have seen better days, with Hinkle at the wheel. He works on the farm from 9:30 am until about 12:30 pm, and then goes back home to work on his TV projects on L.A. time.
“We’ve really become New Jersey loyalists and want to continue to spread the message that Jersey really is a beautiful place,” says Hinkle of his and Bundy’s attitudes about the Garden State. Photo: Chris Buck
The 300-year-old farm boasts five outbuildings, one of which will ultimately become a wine-tasting room and is one of the first things you see as you drive up the gravel road. “We’re uncovering things probably built in the 1700s-1800s and bringing back to life, things that have been hidden on this farm,” Bundy says as the couple points to the newly repointed stone walls that were covered up by the previous owner’s garbage. They are the fourth family to hold the deed to the property.
“This could be France. This could be Spain. This could be Italy, and it’s right down the road from us,” Bundy says, imagining the possibilities as they map out their plans. Bundy outlines with her arms where custom glass doors will go to store the wine. The heralded Ironbound Farm and Ciderhouse in Asbury was a sort of inspiration to them in terms of operating a farm-to-table business.
[RELATED: Forget Napa Valley! NJ Wines Are Better Than You Think]
A short walk uphill leads to the main barn on site. They envision live music, educational classes and dining events—all related to farming, due to local ordinances associated with the sale. Once covered floor to ceiling with hay, it will be the primary focus of restoration next year.
Across the way, Bundy shows off her future “she shed,” a tin barn. She wants to add a dance floor.
Bundy gets into the back of a Polaris ATV as Hinkle steps into the driver’s seat to show off the rest of the property. I take the front passenger seat. They point out three homes: one they plan on moving into this fall after selling their current house; a second one they updated, where Hinkle’s parents now live; and a third cottage, a Dutch Colonial built in the 1700s, stripped to its bones, the architectural plans still in the works. Bundy walks through it with ease, noting the irony that she was renovating a cottage while performing in The Cottage on Broadway. Once it’s ready, she’ll hang up a photo of her from the show as part of its decor.
The cottage overlooks an acre of white pinot grigio and grüner veltliner grapes, which were planted this summer and will take roughly three to five years before they can be bottled. Until then, they’re allowed to import grapes and bottle the wine under their name—which they haven’t decided on yet. The goal is to have the tasting room—though probably not wine—ready for a soft opening for Memorial Day weekend of 2025.
Hinkle aptly named the 73-acre farm the Hardscrabble, after the first home Ulysses S. Grant built with his hands, and “because Hardscrabble was already taken,” Hinkle explains of his affinity for the 18th president who summered in Elberon. Hardscrabble is also a term that means hard work, and they feel it couldn’t relate more to them. “That’s us,” Hinkle says. “It’s like we do a lot of hard work, but we’re also kind of a mess.”
Along the ATV tour, we take a look at five apple trees that were once part of an apple-processing facility on-site, according to records the couple researched. One of the historic apple barns was damaged by the earthquake earlier this year, since the farm is three blocks from the epicenter.
Inside, an elevated platform stage has performance-space potential that Bundy can’t help but demonstrate with a little shim-sham. “We’re going to sing ‘Little Lamb!’” she kids, referencing Gypsy, a show she did at the Paper Mill Playhouse back in 1998—staying true to her musical theater roots along the tour.
Some might wonder how entertainment professionals know how to revive a farm. “Thom is one of those people that figures out how to do everything quickly,” Bundy says.
“We’re kind of doing it as we go—flying the plane as we learn how to fly,” Hinkle says jokingly, adding that the state offers grants, loans and calls with experts to help them. “There’s this network where we dial in once a month and ask a question to all these experts that have been doing it forever. They give you free advice. It is like the most supportive environment we’ve ever been in.”
On top of renovations, Bundy and Hinkle are filming their own mostly unscripted reality show about bringing the farm back to life. They plan to release the 22-episode show themselves as soon as they can—Hinkle’s experience as an executive producer will certainly come in handy. “We are about to approach brands to see if someone wants to sponsor the show,” Bundy adds.
They’ll also show their family life. Audiences can expect to see the family’s late bulldog, Polly, being exhumed from their current home address and reburied at the Hardscrabble. “We buried her at our current farm. About a month later, we decided we’re moving here,” says Hinkle. “And so what do you do? Do you leave the dog buried with strangers, or do you take her with us?”
“Partly why we’re doing this show is to familiarize people with this area and try to get more young people out here. We’ve really become New Jersey loyalists and want to continue to spread the message that Jersey really is a beautiful place,” Hinkle says of their mission, before handing me a bottle of his homemade maple syrup to take home. “We want a place where people can come together.”
Leigh Scheps, who grew up in Holmdel obsessing over Broadway, is a full-time senior reporter for Inside Edition Digital and freelance writer with bylines in Rolling Stone, Vanity Fair and more.
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