Antiques Roadshow guest in will row after ‘eying | TV Shows

An Antiques Roadshow participant persuaded his buddy to hand over a treasured puppet, Madame from the 1980s sitcom Madame’s Palace, which interestingly had been bequeathed to him in his will.

During the episode shot at Omni Mount Washington Resort, the guest recounted acquiring the iconic wood-carved figure originally brought to life by entertainer Wayland Flowers: “Well, when Wayland Flowers was first starting out, one of his first jobs was in Provincetown at the Pilgrim House and my friend Dana found out that it was Wayland Flowers’ birthday, so he threw a surprise birthday party.”

He elaborated: “So Wayland Flowers gave Dana one of his Madames. I don’t know how many he had but he had enough so that he never had to do a costume change.”

The guest went on, explaining Flowers’ clever tactic: “He did a puppet change because each one had a different costume on.”

Moving forward with his story, the gentleman added: “Well, Dana is a longtime friend of mine and I kept eyeing her at his house and I said: ‘Boy, Dana, I sure would like to have that Madame.’ He said: ‘Well, I’ll leave it to you in my will.'”

The guest was teased for being a “dirty-mouth girl”, with Weiss concurring that Flowers’ stage performances were “quite spicy” compared to his television appearances.

Weiss continued: “But he was a pretty impressive guy. He was one of the early actors who came out as openly gay which was a big breakthrough.

“And he did incorporate that into a lot of his humor as he went through his career. He made the puppets himself, Madame, I’m saying, is probably going to be circa 1970s.”

“And I’m sure you’re interested in finding out a value on Madame?”

“Yeah, I mean, she has a lot of value to me, but I don’t know”, the guest responded.

Weiss proceeded to explain: “So I have found records for two of them that have come to auction.

“One of his originals in the mid-1990s sold at a major auction house in New York City for around $4,500 but that’s some 20-odd years ago, or more actually.

“And another one sold fairly recently at an auction house on the West Coast for $12,500.”

The guest couldn’t hide his surprise and exclaimed: “Holy Moses”, before Weiss continued.

“And quite honestly, the way the market’s going now, with people striving to buy back their childhood, and looking to buy iconic pieces of memorabilia, at auction, I would probably estimate it somewhere between $15,000 (£12,000) and $20,000 (£16,000). So it’s a nice gift.”

The guest replied: “Holy Moses! Madame! You’re quite the girl”, with Weiss agreeing.

“Just walking in here, so many people came up and introduced themselves to Madame! Isn’t that something?”