The nipples on George Clooney’s Batman and Robin costume were at one time just the icing on the imaginary cake of discontent. Critics and fans were annoyed by the overall exaggeration of the film, the stupid story and also the weak acting in the fifth Batman film.
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Change of directors and actors. It wasn’t the nipples that caused the box office flop
1997’s Batman and Robin was followed two years later by Joel Schumacher’s Batman Forever, which took over from Tim Burton and changed directors and actors. After two Burton films, Michael Keaton did not agree with the new vision of the hero and lightening the story. He wanted to focus more on the character of Bruce Wayne, so actors Val Kilmer and George Clooney donned the mask and hood for two of Schumacher’s films.
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However, the new director did not get to see his third planned work. The second and overall fifth picture in cinemas took off worldwide only $107 million, the least of all. And he didn’t even pay his own budget of 125 million. The audience rated it as one of the worst films, and this even made Schumacher to apologize. Allegedly, he succumbed to the demand of the studio Warner Bros. to make the image as childish as possible to sell themed merchandise and toys.
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Apology for the suit? On the contrary. And Clooney is grateful for the role
But the director never apologized for the infamous nipples – quite the contrary. To this day he says he’s happy, that they made the costume like this with them. He became “an important cinematic artifact“. At least this is stated by the Texas auction house Heritage Auctions, which has now auctioned off the famous suit for 57.5 thousand dollars, i.e. 1.38 million crowns. The starting amount was 40 thousand dollars.
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Over time, the perception of the film itself has changed. The film, once condemned for its inappropriate flamboyance, is now often celebrated as a particularly colorful piece in the whole pop culture puzzle. A change in fan tastes confirms even Clooney himself. He previously criticized his own acting performance and even joked that he banned his wife from watching Batman and Robin. Now he admits that the role was one of the biggest turning points in his career.
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And the famous suit, in turn, marked a turning point for the entire evolution of the Bat hero’s costumes. He mostly made the designers and directors do what Keaton wanted: to shape the attractiveness of Batman through the character of Bruce Wayne and adapt the suit to his characteristics.
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Inspiration in Greece and medicine. The auction has the best time
Costume designer Bon Ringwood and illustrator Miles Teves designed the costumes for Batman and Robin. Immediately after the release of the film, the “fundamental” question of why the suits of the masked heroes had such prominent nipples began to be addressed.
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The contours and shapes of the muscles and nipples were sculpted by Jose Fernandez from latex, vinyl, leather, resin and other materials. They were inspired supposedly with Greek statues in medical anatomy as well and wanted the suit to be as true to the comic book design as possible while also feeling like a second skin rather than some sort of rugged body armor. It is complemented by a cloak with two buckles, a hero’s symbol on the chest, gloves and high boots.
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George Clooney’s tiny initials GC are also said to be engraved on the hood with bat ears and the cloak. In addition, the entire suit is folded on a mannequin allegedly with a hyper-realistic bust of the actor’s head. She is over 190 centimeters tall.
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Apparently, the time for the auction at Heritage Auctions was not chosen by chance. A month ago, it was 25 years since Batman and Robin premiered, and this weekend marks the climax of the biggest gathering of comic book fans in the world: San Diego Comic-Con.
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The auction house also offered and sold the famous, almost iconic suit of the character Joker, played by Jack Nicholson in the first Batman film by Tim Burton from 1989. He auctioned it for 125 thousand dollars, i.e. three million crowns. At the same time, his starting amount was 67.5 thousand dollars.
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Batman is a master at auction. But they are ruled by an iconic blonde
Items related to the bat hero always attract attention in auctions. This May Goldin Auctions in New Jersey auctioned one of the rare surviving issues of the 1939 comic in which Batman appeared for the very first time. An anonymous buyer paid $1.74 million for it.
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When it comes to film props and suits, the record holder is Marilyn Monroe, or rather her iconic white dress, which made her famous in the film The Straw Widow in 1955.
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In June 2011 it was also auctioned by an anonymous buyer after 20 minutes of bidding for $5.6 million – 3.6 million more than California Auction Co’s estimate. Even Agent 007’s Aston Martin DB5 with Sean Connery’s face from Goldenfinger and Thunderbolt sold for a million less.
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