How A Lost Star Wars Prop From 1977 Made Its Way Into The Mummy 22 Years Later
There is a moment in "Star Wars: Episode IV — A New Hope" when Luke Skywalker (Mark Hamill) has been knocked out. R2-D2 is hiding, and all seems lost ... until a figure in a brown monk-style robe appears and pulls back his hood to say, "Hello there." It was, of course, Obi-Wan Kenobi (Sir Alec Guinness), Jedi, war veteran, and protector of the young son of his lost friend Anakin Skywalker (David Prowse/James Earl Jones/Sebastian Shaw). He's comforting, wise, and unassuming in his robe. That robe is later left as the only remaining evidence of his existence after his fight with Darth Vader. It's a piece of movie and sci-fi history, yet somehow it was lost for many years.
While you would think this is a costume the production would protect, you have to remember that no one could possibly have foreseen the juggernaut this franchise would become. Now we have tons of them, shows, books, video games ... very few places in the world contain people who wouldn't know what a Jedi is. In the meantime, however, the robe was lost. Not only that, but it popped up in another film decades later: 1999's "The Mummy." Here's where it ended up, how it found its way to another film, and where it is now.
Hidden in plain sight
According to a 2005 article in "The Age" (via SYFY Wire) the iconic piece of movie history ended up being stored and later rented out from the UK costume shop Angels and Bermans, now Angels Costumes, which has been around since 1840. Company Chairman Tim Angel was interviewed by the publication in '05 and said that no one would have thought to preserve it:
"The robe would have come in just after filming on Star Wars finished and before it was released. It didn't get any special treatment because at that point Star Wars was just another sci-fi film. No-one knew how big it would become."
That takes care of the "why." It was simply that no one knew how iconic it would end up being. In fact, the costume was rented out for other things, including "customers wanting to hire a monk's outfit for a fancy dress party" and even the 1999 film "The Mummy" starring Brendan Fraser, in which it was worn by an extra. (Angels Costumes supplies costumes for TV, film, and theater productions.) So how was it found in the first place?
The robe went on an adventure, from a certain point of view
Angel explained that it was one of his staff who figured out what they had in their possession. He said:
"One of the guys was sorting through this pile of monks' robes and saw this brown one with an odd-shaped hood. He put it on and the manager said, 'Oh my God, it's Alec Guinness's cloak from Star Wars'. It's unmistakable, an iconic piece."
The robe then ended up on display at Harrods department store in London in 2005 as part of a British film costume exhibition. It then landed at the auction house Bonhams, where it was listed alongside other costumes like a dress from Madonna's "Evita." It was estimated to be worth £25,000, according to Deseret News. Bonhams sold it to an anonymous bidder (who bid over the phone) for £54,000 (US $ 65,538), according to their listing and confirmed with them over email. As for where the robe is now, we don't know who bought it. This mystery person, like a Jedi-turned-hermit, has not revealed themselves.
If you want to experience that robe in action, "A New Hope" and the rest of the Star Wars films and shows are currently streaming on Disney+.