UK: TWO LONDON SHOWS OF SHOWBIZ MEMORABILIA AUCTIONS TAKE PLACE

Record ID: 388772

  • Title: UK: TWO LONDON SHOWS OF SHOWBIZ MEMORABILIA AUCTIONS TAKE PLACE
  • Date: 19th August 1999
  • Summary: LONDON, ENGLAND, UNITED KINGDOM (AUGUST 17-18, 1999) (REUTERS) WIDE SHOT OF ITEMS GOING UNDER HAMMER AT BONHAMS AUCTION HOUSE VARIOUS OF POSTERS TO BE AUCTIONED VARIOUS OF PEOPLE LOOKING AT ITEMS THE KEY TO CLARK GABLE'S DRESSING ROOM AT MGM'S STUDIOS WHILST FILMING 'GONE WITH THE WIND' VARIOUS OF GABLE'S KEY BEING AUCTIONED OFF (SOUNDBITE) (English) TED OWEN OF BONH
  • Embargoed: 3rd September 1999 13:00
  • Keywords:
  • Location: LONDON, ENGLAND, UNITED KINGDOM
  • Country: United Kingdom
  • Topics: Entertainment,General
  • Reuters ID: LVA9RLGWYYBZL75HCRM2XMTH9AVM
  • Story Text: One star's cast-offs is another fan's treasure.An old dressing gown, a second hand guitar, and a lambs wool hat are just some of the items coming under the hammer at two London sales of showbiz memorabilia.The auction at Bonhams catered for keen collectors of anything and everything to do with rock 'n roll and film.
    You've bought the video, the poster and perhaps even the t-shirt, now buy the key.Most fans of Clark Gable want the key to the Hollywood legend's heart, but at Bonhams auction on Wednesday it was the key to Gable's dressing room that was up for grabs.It was expected to reach up to four hundred pounds sterling, but its closing price was five hundred and fifty.
    Ted Owen of Bonham's Auction House says collectors are eager to buy a piece of fame, whether it's in film or rock and pop.
    "People are realising this is not trivia any more, this is serious market stuff and to be taken seriously.I think because of the publicity the sales have had like Jimi Hendrix, Elvis Presley, a sale held in Tokyo which was only Beatles, have attracted a lot more people into the collecting field and it's fun it's interesting and all the porters like setting these auctions up because they find things they can relate to.
    Whereas you might not be able to relate to an ashanti spear, you can relate to a rock and roll record, it crosses over and because of that it is popular."
    Get even closer to Gable with the MGM studio jacket he wore as Rhett Butler in 'Gone With The Wind' for a mere one thousand five hundred pounds.
    Owen says: "This is Clark Gable's jacket and it's fully labelled there is some great labelling in it.Studio ticket in here from MGM and what is particularly nice is that it actually has his name in it and Metro Golwyn Mayer and the set number.And apparently he liked it so much that he had problems finding a jacket he liked, if you look at 'Gone With The Wind' he wears about 15-16 jackets that he wore and they all look so similar."
    But not all memorabilia enthusiasts will have to break the bank to take home some entertainment history.
    Psychedelic concert posters, autographs and Christmas cards are at the cheaper end of the scale starting at about fifty pounds.But rarities from certain artists command top prices, such as this one thousand four hundred pound monkey fur jacket, owned, and occasionally worn by Marilyn Monroe.
    "Here's another quite pristine jacket, a fur jacket that was given by a male friend of Marilyn Monroe and apparently she only wore it when he came round because she hated it, because it was a fur jacket," Owen says.
    Among the more valuable items is a velvet silk dressing down that Bette Davis slipped into at two hundred and sixty pounds.
    Another magnet that made a killing is a 1960s dalek from the British children's television show 'Doctor Who', which went for nearly six thousand pounds.
    "And a rare collections that we've just taken in for the sale is this 'Doctor Who' collection, which we've got various sea monster cyberman heads and various costumes from characters in Doctor Who and a surviving dalek, which is very, very unusual, there aren't many that exist and that one's in pretty good shape and it's one of the original early ones which is made top to toe from wood, later on they were made from fibre glass, but this one is made from all wood with metal fittings...and the old loo plungers," Owen says.
    But if old metal isn't your hearts desire, there was the original script of the 'Lawrence of Arabia' movie, the prothesises of 'Planet of the Apes' and a persian hat worn by Omar Sharif in 'Dr.Zhivago'.
    Competition is likely to be fierce between top collectors for the old guitar of former Beatle George Harrison, which is to be auctioned off later this week.It is expected to fetch around two hundred thousand pounds.
    "It is one of the most famous guitars that have ever come up for sale because it was so well documented.It was in the film 'Let It Be', it was in the last concert they played on the Saville Road roof-top.It was also in the Abby Road Album.So there hasn't been a guitar with that much prominence, where you can sit through millions and millions of film clips with George, ever to appear on the market.And it is Beatles they are the top of the tree as far as collectibles and it is one of the major pieces to come out, and for any Beatles collector, for a guitar to come out for sale, because the Beatles have kept their instruments, they haven't given them away, they weren't like Elvis, who gave away guitars left, right and centre and cars, left right and centre," Owen says.
    One thing for sure, collectors won't be letting it be at Thursday's (August 19) rock and pop auction.
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