Colin Firth's £25k wet shirt: Where does it rank among most expensive memorabilia?
The lake-soaked costume from scene that became an iconic TV moment has sold for £25,000, as 60 items worn by famous actors go under the hammer
The shirt worn by actor Colin Firth when he strides across fields dripping wet after a swim in the lake during the TV series adaptation of the classic novel Pride And Prejudice has been sold for £25,000.
Cosprop, a costume house founded by the Oscar and Bafta-winning designer John Bright, and Kerry Taylor Auctions put the shirt under the hammer on Tuesday alongside a number of period drama costumes.
It had originally been estimated to fetch between £7,000 and £10,000, along with more than 60 costumes from film and TV, with all the proceeds going to charity.
Outfits worn by Madonna, Margot Robbie and Johnny Depp were also auctioned.
But how does the iconic costume compare to other shirts that have gone under the hammer?
Eric Cantona - £15,350
Eric Cantona's final Manchester United shirt fetched £15,350 in a radio auction in May 1997.
Manchester-based radio station Key 103 sold the signed shirt to help raise testimonial funds for ex-Coventry City defender David Buust, who had suffered a career-ending injury against Manchester United in 1996.
Colin Firth's Pride and Prejudice shirt - £25,000
It could be argued that it is the most famous white shirt in television history. Worn by Colin Firth as Mr Darcy in the 1995 TV adaptation of Pride and Prejudice, it has been sold for £25,000.
Oscar-winner Firth played Fitzwilliam Darcy in the 1995 BBC adaptation of Jane Austen’s novel, opposite Jennifer Ehle as Elizabeth Bennet – who is surprised when she visits his estate, Pemberley, to find him wet and not properly dressed.
The moment has been re-imagined in Netflix series Bridgerton, when British actor Jonathan Bailey steps out of a lake, and was also referenced in Bridget Jones’s Diary, which stars Firth as another Mr Darcy, a nod to his portrayal by writer Helen Fielding.
Pele - £157,750
Pele's 1970 World Cup Brazil shirt sold for £157,750 back in 2002. At the time it was the most expensive ever football shirt.
The forward, who is widely considered one of the greatest players to ever play the beautiful game, wore the shirt during the final against Italy.
The final auction price of the shirt was almost three times the amount that experts had anticipated and the person who bought the shirt remains a mystery.
Audrey Hepburn's Ascot dress from My Fair Lady - £3.55 million
The next entry on this list comes from the costume collection of Debbie Reynolds, who after collecting Hollywood pieces for over fifty years, sold them all in 2011.
With costumes from The Wizard of Oz, Casablanca and Ben Hur, Reynold's hoard became the largest film memorabilia collection since the liquidation of Fox in 1970.
One of the pieces in her collection was Audrey Hepburn's Ascot dress from My Fair Lady, which sold for a massive £3.59 million back in 2017.
Marilyn Monroe's dress from The Seven Year Itch - £3.63 million
Easily one of the most iconic and recognisable scenes in Hollywood history, the dress worn by Marilyn Monroe in The Seven Year Itch is also the most expensive Hollywood costume to ever be sold.
The scene of Monroe's dress being blown upward by a subway grate from the 1955 film remains one of the most well-known and widely-produced images of the movie star.
Another feature of collector Debbie Reynolds' collection, it sold in 2011 for an estimated £1.6 million pounds. It was later sold for £3.6 million in a Marilyn Monroe memorabilia auction.
Diego Maradona 'hand of God' shirt - £7.1 million
The shirt worn by Diego Maradona when he scored twice - including the "hand of God" goal - to knock England out of the 1986 World Cup sold for a record-breaking £7.1 million at auction.
The Argentinian player, who died in 2020, described the opening goal in the quarter-final as "a little with the head of Maradona and a little with the hand of god".
It came as England goalkeeper Peter Shilton leapt for the ball, which touched Maradona's left hand and bounced into the net.
The referee did not have a clear view and allowed the goal to stand.
Minutes later, the Argentinian dribbled past much of the England squad to score again. A goal that was voted goal of the century in a 2002 poll.
His side later went on to win the entire tournament.
The shirt had been owned for the past 35 years by England midfielder Steve Hodge, who had inadvertently flicked the ball onto Maradona for the hand of god goal.
The two players swapped shirts at the end of the game, and it has spend the past 20 years on loan to the National Football Museum in Manchester.
Going under the Hammer at Sotheby's in 2022, it fetched £7,142,500, a new auction record for an item of sports memorabilia.
The buyer was not identified.
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