The axe Jack Nicholson swung through a bathroom door in The Shining is heading to auction, one of hundreds of items from Stanley Kubrick’s personal archive that will go on sale for the first time.
Bonhams will sell the collection in London on Feb. 3, with online bidding running until noon the next day. The special effects axe, the weapon Nicholson’s Jack Torrance wields as he roars “Here’s Johnny!” in the 1980 horror film, carries a guide price of £30,000 to £50,000.
The estimate may prove cautious. A different axe from the film sold in 2019 for more than $200,000, four times its estimate. Earlier this year, McTear’s in Scotland listed another effects axe at around £100,000, noting it was one of only three built for the production, with the other two believed to belong to Kubrick’s estate. The Bonhams axe appears to come from that estate.
Other Shining lots include two sky-blue dresses worn by twin sisters Alexa and Alexie Grady, who appear in the film’s most chilling corridor scene as they invite Danny Torrance to “come play with us” while he pedals his tricycle through the Overlook Hotel.
The top estimate belongs to a different film. The “star child” prop from 2001: A Space Odyssey could fetch up to £800,000. Kubrick’s annotated copy of the story treatment for that film, titled Journey Beyond the Stars, carries an estimate of £30,000 to £50,000, while his director’s chair is expected to bring between £8,000 and £12,000. The sale also includes his personal script from Spartacus (1960) and annotated scripts from Lolita and other titles, which Bonhams says offer a window into his creative process.
Claire Tole-Moir, the auction house’s head of popular culture, said Kubrick’s influence “cannot be overstated.” She argued that other directors’ collections have reached the market before, but none matches his in depth and quality. Kubrick’s stepdaughter Katharina Kubrick said his life and work remain among the most studied in cinema, and the family hopes buyers will treasure the pieces and pass them to future film lovers.
Public exhibitions of highlights will precede the sale. Kubrick died in 1999.
