$40,000
Near Life-size Magician Automaton from the Film Sleuth , possibly by Decamps , c. 1925-30, with defined features, articulated lower lip and brown glass eyes, standing behind blue-painted wood table carved with arcane symbols, a velvet-covered cone in his left hand, a wand in his right, his body terminating in papier-mache skirt which contains eight-cam electric motor causing the magician to look from side to side and down at the table, his eyes glancing to the left or the right and his lower lip moving as though mumbling spells, as he waves his wand four times and then lifts the cup with a flourish, accomplished by articulation at shoulder and wrist, to reveal a series of four changing items, in the original silk robes and turban, ht. 56 1/2 in., (missing fingers tips on right hand, head and wrist movements need adjustment), eight movements. Note: Based on Anthony Schaffer's screenplay, the original version of "Sleuth" (1972) is a two-handed thriller, starring Sir Laurence Olivier and Michael Caine, that plays on the conventions of the traditional English "Whodunnit" made famous by authors such as Agatha Christie and Dorothy L. Sayers. The film is set in Cloke Manor, the rambling country residence of a detective fiction writer, Sir Andrew Whyke (Olivier), whose wife Marguerite is proposing to leave him for fashionable hairdresser, Milo Tindle (Caine). Sir Andrew's disdain for Milo's working-class family, and Milo's resentment of Sir Andrew, sets the scene for a compl Read more…
Auctioneer:
Skinner
Date:
2008-08-23
