One bid managed to stun even a room full of theater nerds into silence.
, which, while estimated to sell for a max of $1,200, actually sold for a final price of $16,640. But, due tofrom artist and X user Sarah McGonagall, most of the buzz about the auction was diverted to two lots that each received $20,000 bids. No, they weren’t rare, signed manuscripts ofjust two nights earlier. Instead, the two lots that, per the auction house’s website, “drew loud gasps from the audience,” were two sets of books—thesauruses and dictionaries, to be exact.
To get the inside scoop on the auction that stunned a whole room of theater nerds, Slate spoke with one of the auctioneers who presided over the event: Peter Costanzo, a senior vice president at Doyle, the prominent New York–based auction house that hosted the auction. This conversation has been edited and condensed for clarity.This auction combined items from Mr. Sondheim’s Manhattan townhouse and his Roxbury, Connecticut, home, here at Doyle Galleries in the Upper East Side of Manhattan.
At the start of the auction, we were having very competitive bidding on every lot up to that point. The prices were coming out just phenomenal. So there was a customer on the phone who said something along the lines of “Just throw out $20,000,” and reported to our staff member to shout that out into the room. And boy did it work, because the first time it came up, it stunned the room and silenced the room. There were gasps and there were laughs, and it was really a wild experience.
, because they came in a box, and people would’ve put them together, and the boxes would’ve gotten separated from the puzzles. So those seem to be really rare. Thefor an invitation to the Party of Life, of course, is very ephemeral, and people would’ve put it together.was a vintage one-man band. That was a fun moment in the sale. It was just a funny novelty thing that he owned, and that sold for over $4,000., the Fabergé billiards table.
Celebrity-oriented auctions are always a lot of fun, because they bring out a lot of fans and anything can happen in terms of the bidding. So I was very lucky to work on the estate of Elaine Kaufman, who owned Elaine’s restaurant, in 2011. Elaine’s was an Upper East Side staple. The surprise lot there, which was so much fun, was that we sold. We set up a table with a tablecloth, the plates and martini glasses, and some of Elaine’s stuff, and that brought, I want to say, $7,500 to $10,000.
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