The (sadly dry) shirt, went beneath the hammer at a charity public sale in London late Tuesday, promoting for a complete of £25,000 (practically $32,000) — greater than doubling its estimated sale worth, in response to Kerry Taylor Auctions, which ran the bid. The public sale home estimated it might promote for as much as £10,000 kilos ($12,700).
The 1810s-style shirt includes a deep collar, loosely buttoned neck opening and a label inked with the actor’s identify, whereas the remainder of the costume included “buff moleskin fall entrance breeches” and “a waistcoat of ribbed velvet,” in accordance to an outline of the lot by the public sale home.
Different costumes a part of the charity sale included outfits from the British interval drama “Downton Abbey” and films equivalent to “Sherlock Holmes” and “La Vie en Rose” — though none of them have reached fairly the identical iconic standing as that translucent moist shirt.
“The costumes vary in fashion from fantasy Renaissance creations to extra wearable twentieth century silhouettes and can enchantment to severe Hollywood and television interval drama costume collectors,” Kerry Taylor Auctions mentioned in an announcement.
The memorable scene involving the shirt depicts the repressed heartthrob taking a dip in a lake to chill off after a horse journey earlier than he’s noticed by heroine Bennet as she unwittingly excursions his lavish Pemberley property. Talking with palpable embarrassment as she comes throughout him soaking moist, she exclaims, “Mr. Darcy!” earlier than he awkwardly enquires about her household’s well being (twice) and hurriedly excuses himself — a lot to viewers’ amusement.
“Mr. Darcy’s ‘moist shirt second’ was by no means scripted,” costume designer Dinah Collin mentioned in a assertion in regards to the public sale. “As a result of on display male nudity was not permitted,” because of BBC broadcasting guidelines, “the thought of the ‘moist shirt’ was born,” she mentioned, including: “The scene precipitated one thing of a sensation on the time and reworked Colin Firth from a revered classical actor to one thing of a intercourse image in a single day!”
Regardless of the hearts it set a-racing, the scene was in truth by no means written by Austen.
“‘Delight and Prejudice’ doesn’t embrace a scene through which Darcy jumps right into a lake,” Sandie Byrne, professor of English on the College of Oxford, advised The Washington Submit by electronic mail.
There’s a reference within the 1813 revealed guide to “a stream of some pure significance,” defined Byrne, which Darcy invitations Elizabeth Bennet’s uncle Mr. Gardiner to fish in.
“There’s a lot to get pleasure from within the BBC and different diversifications, however watching them is a fairly completely different expertise from studying the novels,” Byrne mentioned. “For me, the diversifications lose a lot of the qualities for which we worth Austen’s work. The writing is extra refined and nuanced and on the identical time extra revolutionary than the TV collection and movies.”
Heather Thomas, a trustee of the Jane Austen Society, which goals to foster appreciation and research of the work and lifetime of Austen, mentioned in an electronic mail: “We can not guess what Austen would have manufactured from ‘the shirt,’ however her novels comprise loads of seductions and elopements, so she understood the pressure of sexual attraction as she understood all points of the human coronary heart. The Society needs the public sale effectively in its fundraising.”
The lake scene has since impressed others, together with within the Netflix collection “Bridgerton” and the film “Bridget Jones’s Diary,” which sees Hugh Grant’s character fall right into a lake as Firth’s character appears on, in a cheeky homage to the BBC collection.
The charity public sale included 69 heaps in complete from the costume home Cosprop, based by Academy Award-winning costume designer John Vivid. In addition to the Darcy shirt, it featured outfits from fashionable dramas equivalent to “Peaky Blinders,” and “Poldark,” in addition to these worn by actors Margot Robbie (“Goodbye Christopher Robin”), Julie Andrews (“Victor/Victoria”) and Eddie Redmayne (“The Danish Woman”).
Others embrace a Christian Dior ball robe worn by Madonna within the movie “Evita,” a swimsuit worn by Johnny Depp within the film “Sleepy Hole,” and costumes worn by Gwyneth Paltrow in “Emma” and Kate Winslet in “Discovering Neverland.”
The funds raised by the “Lights Digital camera Public sale” public sale occasion might be donated to the Vivid Basis, an arts schooling charity based by costume designer Vivid.
“We’re past grateful for the large generosity of Kerry Taylor Auctions who’re internet hosting the occasion,” the charity mentioned in a assertion, including that the proceeds will “present free entry to theater reveals, museum excursions, visible and efficiency arts workshops for youngsters who may not in any other case have the prospect to take action, in addition to supporting inventive profession pathways for younger folks.”