Home: A Boy’s Life: Auction Hero

A stunning peek inside the selling off of a celebrity estate

Walking inside, I had imagined I’d see a bevy of designer-clad swells, each wearing estate jewelry and that expression of dull surprise all rich people seem to own. What I get instead is something that looks like an airplane hangar with worse lighting. At the front of the room is the auctioneer’s stand, where co-owner David Rago will wield his gavel to politely sell 246 “lots” from Sidney’s Palm Springs home. On either side of him two flat-screen monitors hang above, each with a suitably bored-looking model-type underneath, the Carol Merrills of Rago (hey, don’t hate on the ’70s!). “Oh, no, they don’t actually bring the items out,” Miriam Tucker, Rago’s prim CEO, told me the day before. She had seemed almost as disappointed as I was. “That only happens in the movies.”

I quickly discover that isn’t the only erroneous image I have from the movies — or Sidney’s novels, for that matter. The crowd filtering in seems less Thurston and Lovey Howell and more the people who would do their ironing, a lumpy crowd sporting fleece jackets and munching soft pretzels. Thumbing through the 332-page catalog of auction items, my heart sinks: not a Picasso (or Patty Duke script) in the lot. Instead, Sidney’s widow, Alexandra, is unloading what the catalog breathlessly describes as “the finest and rarest furniture forms” from the Arts and Crafts style: lamps, vases, figurines, dishes, chairs, tables and cabinetry. Miriam had told me collecting Craftsman styles — handmade pieces from the early 20th century, fomented through a backlash against industrialization — really took off in the 1980s, though now mid-to-late-20th-century design is all the rage. Nonetheless, there will always be something rich people have to have, and today that appears to be stuff that looks, to my untrained eye, like it came from Sidney Sheldon’s attic.

In my wild imagination the auction would be a heady affair, akin to the ones for Jackie Kennedy or Princess Diana. But in the few hours I stand watching David Rago deftly negotiate the bidding, any sizzle factor evaporates. It’s standing room only here — more than 200 people have come, with another 200 plugged in by phone, not to mention those online and absentee — and Rago co-owner Suzanne Perrault has told me, “The more people you have in the room, the more drama you have in the room.” Unless, evidently, the room is filled with people wearing fleece, eating pretzels. Aside from a spirited bidding war for a 25-inch-tall Tiffany table lamp — estimated between $50,000 and $75,000, it goes for a whopping $144,000 to suitable oohs and aaahs — the day dissolves into a seemingly never-ending parade of vases and knickknacks that to me all look like they could be in the window of Pier 1 Imports.

My mind drifting, I find myself looking over at Suzanne. With her chic short blond hair, creamy white skin and pencil-skirt style, she’s one of those women you can’t help but stare at. I also like the fact that she uses adjectives like “fussy” to describe Rookwood pottery. And I especially like the fact that when I asked her how she would characterize today’s turnout, she said, without hesitation, “F___ing great.” I’ve come to the conclusion she could have been a heroine in one of Sidney’s novels, if Sidney had ever bothered to write Rage of Auctions.

As the day plods on there are some slightly electric moments, such as a feisty battle among phone bidders for a Quezal vase (“2,100 with Sandy, 22 with Mandy. 23 with Denise. 24 with Sandy. 25 with Jeffrey. New bidder at 2,500! 26 with Sandy, I have 26 with Sandy. 27 — are you bidding, Jeffrey? 28 with Sandy. Last call with Sandy!”) and sit-up-and-take-notice furniture from Gustav Stickley and Frank Lloyd Wright. Murmurs usually reserved for courtroom verdicts on Perry Mason accompany the sudden withdrawal of Lot 92, a Greene and Greene armchair discovered, just before the auction, to be a fake. (Scandal!) In the end, the two-day sale, which includes Sidney’s holdings and some others’, grosses $4.2 million — a record for a Craftsman/early-20th-century design sale.

Alas, as I trudge back out into torrential rain — I have just discovered that one of these bidders has stolen my best umbrella from the communal coat rack — I do it empty-handed. No bidding for me. But that’s the thing about auctions, I’ve learned: There’s always another one, because there will always be another dead rich person with too much stuff. So as I unlock my car, I can’t help but wonder: What is the likely life expectancy of Jaclyn Smith?