‘Casablanca’ Piano Heading To Auction

One of the world’s most famous movie instruments will be going up for auction next month in New York. The piano used in the 1942 film Casablanca is expected to fetch more than $1 million win it hits the auction block at Sotheby’s on December 14.

According to Yahoo News, the Casablanca piano is being offered by a Japanese collector for the film’s 70th anniversary. The collector purchased the piano in 1988 for a $154,000. Sotheby’s estimates that the piano will fetch at least $1.2 million when it hits the auction block next month.

Sotheby’s writes:

“Over the past seventy years (Casablanca) has become one of the most beloved movies ever made and the song so deeply entwined with it, As Times Goes By, has reached a similar immortality. The song becomes an orchestral leitmotif through the movie, coloring Rick and Ilsa’s romance –played, of course, by Humphrey Bogart and Ingrid Bergman – but it’s most important appearance is when it is sung by Dooley Wilson at the piano.”

The piano, and the song As Time Goes By, played a central part to the movie. It’s also where Bergman utters one of the movie’s most famous lines (except she actually doesn’t say it) “Play it again, Sam.”

Do you think the Casablanca piano will fetch more than $1 million?