Movie props sale has sock value

Smelly socks worn by Ed Harris during the filming of Empire Falls were among the treasures snatched up by fans during a weekend sale of props and costumes from the HBO movie.

Around 300 people bought a variety of items used by Harris, Paul Newman, Joanne Woodward and Helen Hunt during last year’s filming in the Waterville-Skowhegan area of Maine.

The sale concluded on Sunday after the remaining items were marked down in price. Proceeds will help defray the costs of the film, directed by Fred Schepisi and also starring Philip Seymour Hoffman, Robin Wright Penn and Kate Burton.

The inventory included racks of clothes, shoes, car registration plates, jewellery, books, signs, gazebos, a couch, menus, a wetsuit worn by Woodward and a “fat suit” worn by Hunt.

“I’ve got Ed Harris’ socks, and they smell, but I’m not washing them,” said Bonnie Goodwin, pulling her loot out of a plastic bag. “I’ve got William Fichtner’s shirt and Danielle Panabaker’s earrings.”

The film, to air in the US in May, is based on Richard Russo’s Pulitzer Prize-winning novel about an economically-depressed mill town in Maine.

“One lady bought £1,200 (€1,700) worth of items,” said David Huard, who was staffing a special case of items, including ivory-coloured costume earrings worn by Woodward.

Among the bigger items were several large wooden signs, including one that says Empire Falls, and gravestones that look like granite but are made of wood. They were used in a cemetery scene in which Newman appeared.

“I just love Paul Newman,” said Marianne Miranda as sale attendants loaded her pick-up truck with the signs and gravestones. “He’s been my idol all my entire life. I never got to see him, but now I have some of his stuff.”