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James Cagney’s original tap shoes for his sole Oscar-winning performance in Yankee Doodle Dandy

Currency:USD Category:Memorabilia Start Price:8,000.00 USD Estimated At:8,000.00 - 12,000.00 USD
James Cagney’s original tap shoes for his sole Oscar-winning performance in Yankee Doodle Dandy
Condition Reports: If you wish to obtain additional information on a particular lot, or cannot appear at the viewing, Profiles may provide, upon request, a condition report. We remind prospective buyers that descriptions of property are not warranted and that each lot is sold “as is” in accordance with the terms of the limited warranty. Condition reports, as other descriptions of property, are not warranted; they are only provided as a service to interested clients.
(Warner Bros., 1942) Black leather laced tap shoes with cap toe and built in 1 ½” heel lifts, likely custom-cobbled for Cagney specifically as they bear no maker’s marks or labels. Well-worn Continental #2 heel and toe taps attached, worn down in places to rivets and to heel edge. This remarkable and iconic slice of film history originated from James Cagney’s estate, and was previously sold here in 1996 along with a number of his other personal treasures. Though a respected and admired force in the film business from the beginning of his career to the very end, Cagney was not the typical sort of screen character which the Academy members tended to honor. Hence it follows his one and only Oscar win for best actor would be for this thoroughly patriotic biopic of the great stage entertainer George M. Cohan, in which Cagney literally danced his heels off, and in these very shoes to boot. Both shoes have small separations at Achilles heel, and show general signs of screen use, yet remain beautifully preserved and perfectly displayable as is.