Jane Austen’s iconic novel Pride and Prejudice was adapted on countless occasions over the years, and many fans still swear by BBC’s 1995 version. Colin Firth played Mr. Darcy in this TV series, and his wet shirt from the iconic lake scene has been sold for $25,000 at an auction in London.
Mr. Darcy’s wet shirt was sold at an auction hosted by Kerry Taylor Auctions in London on Tuesday, which included over 60 costumes from John Bright’s costume house Cosprop. The list of costumes sold at the auction also included Madonna’s Christian Dior ball gown from Evita ($50,000), Johnny Depp’s Ichabod Crane costume from Sleepy Hollow ($30,000), and Drew Barrymore’s dreamy dress Ever After: A Cinderella Story ($20,000).
Firth’s Mr. Darcy shirt was definitely the most significant piece of TV history sold at this auction, and the backstory behind it is quite interesting. It was featured in the iconic scene that shows Mr. Darcy having an impromptu swim in a lake before running into his Elizabeth Bennet, and it wasn’t originally featured in Jane Austen’s novel.
Collin Firth recalled the iconic moment on the auctioneer’s website and explained how the idea of the “wet shirt” was born.
“Mr. Darcy’s ‘wet shirt moment’ was never scripted. It came about in discussions between myself and the late Christopher Prins who was then head of menswear at Cosprop. In the scene Mr. Darcy is spied emerging from a lake having taken a cooling swim on a hot summer’s day,” recalled Firth.