Bruce Lee's iconic yellow jumpsuit in the martial arts film ‘Game of Death’’ will be for sale in an auction to be held in Hong Kong on Thursday.
 |
| Bruce Lee in a scene from the movie "Game Of Death". The yellow jumpsuit he wore became a cultural trademark of the legend of martial arts. |
The polyester suit, custom made by a Hong Kong tailor, is one of 14 items related to Mr. Lee — including film memorabilia, kung fu training equipment and personal sketches — that are being sold by a private Hollywood collector.
Spink China, the auction house conducting the sale, expects the suit to fetch up to 300,000 Hong Kong dollars, or about $39,000, and has already received e-mailed and faxed bids in excess of the reserve prices for about half the items going under the hammer on Thursday.
The yellow and black suit is one of at least two such outfits made for Mr. Lee for the filming of ‘‘Game of Death,’’ which he died before completing (the film was released posthumously in 1978 using archive footage and stand-in actors.)
Although he produced only a handful of films before his death in 1973, at age 32, Mr. Lee, who was born in San Francisco and raised in Hong Kong, remains an enduring presence in popular culture globally — but especially so in Hong Kong and China.
On July 20 of this year, the 40th anniversary of Mr. Lee’s death, Hong Kong’s Heritage Museum launched an exhibition of his life and career that will run until 2018. That exhibit includes one of the other known versions of the yellow jumpsuit.
The vice chairman of Spink China, Anna Lee, no relation to Bruce Lee, said Mr. Lee designed the suit to demonstrate through his clothing how he was not affiliated with any traditional martial arts style but his own system, known as Jeet Kune Do.
The suit has taken on a life of its own in popular culture. In the director Quentin Tarantino’s 2003 film ‘‘Kill Bill,’’ the actress Uma Thurman plays a martial arts expert who wears a yellow and black bodysuit reminiscent of Mr. Lee’s.
At the same time, Real Kung Fu, a chain of fast food outlets in mainland China with more than 500 locations, uses as its logo a man in a yellow and black jumpsuit striking a martial arts pose.
The Bruce Lee Club, a fan group based in Hong Kong, has made posts on its Facebook page questioning whether the suit and some of the other items to be auctioned were really Mr. Lee’s.
Ms. Lee, of the auction house, says the items all come with certificates of authenticity issued by the friends and former students of Mr. Lee’s. She declined to identify the current owner, except to say it was someone in the American film industry who has a large collection of Bruce Lee memorabilia.
 |
| The famed jumpsuit, expected to sell for $39,000, gets ready for auction in Hong Kong. |
Showing the suit and other memorabilia to a reporter at her offices in Wan Chai on Wednesday, Ms. Lee noted how the zipper at the back had been damaged.
Ms. Lee said this probably happened during the filming of ‘‘Game of Death,’’ in a scene in a pagoda where Mr. Lee battles Han Jae Ji, a Korean martial arts expert.
She also pointed out that the suit appeared to have shrunk because of washing. It is without logos or other markings except for Chinese characters written in red marker inside the back of the collar that say: ‘‘Property of Golden Harvest Studios.’’
‘‘I’m surprised at the interest in the suit,’’ Ms. Lee said. ‘‘I guess the yellow suit is a stunning or kind of iconic item so a lot of people are concentrated on it. I can’t say that it’s ugly.’’--Source: The New York Times