Hugh Grant can be forgetful sometimes.
He's admitted he had no idea what happened in his film Love Actually, and he can't really remember making the decision to buy one of Andy Warhol's famous paintings.
Tons of celebrities have bought ridiculously expensive things for their own personal collection. But Grant is a part of the group of celebrities who use their wealth to invest in art, like Angelina Jolie. Thankfully, he's not a part of the group of celebrities like Nicholas Cage, Leonardo DiCaprio, and Johnny Depp, who all collect some bizarre things.
The story of how he purchased a $3 million Andy Warhol painting is, however, interesting.
He Made The Decision On A Whim
Only celebrities and the rich can make the decision to buy an Andy Warhol painting on a whim, and that's exactly what Grant did.
When Grant purchased Andy Warhol's painting of the icon, Elizabeth Taylor, people were surprised to hear Grant was investing in art, and that he was able to secure such a famous painting.
But Grant isn't quite an art connoisseur. Buying the painting had nothing to do with a love of art or be interesting in becoming an art collector.
Grant confessed that he was drunk on the night he bought the painting in 2001. According to The Daily Mail, Grant was on a two-day drinking spree when he told his assistant to go out and put a bid in for the piece of artwork at Sotheby's auction in New York.
"And to my horror, she did, and even worse, got it," Grant said.
"It all began with drink. I'd been having a drunken dinner with my father the night before, and I said, 'We ought to go see my brother Jamie. You know, the Concorde's amazing.' And he said, 'I hear it is.' So I bought him a Concorde ticket and we went. We had lunch, drank a lot of beer.
"And I was thinking about some stuff in the Sotheby's auction and I saw the Liz Taylor."
At the time, Grant was already a household name from starring in some of the '90s best rom-coms, like Notting Hill and Four Weddings and a Funeral. The year he purchased the piece he was starring in Bridget Jones's Diary.
He Sold It Six Years Later
If Grant's $3 million purchase of the piece was unexpected, his sale of it is even more unexpected.
Warhol had painted a total of 13 pictures of the famous actress in the sixties. In 2005, the highest price ever paid for any of the other copies was only about $12 million, by jeweler Laurence Graff. But Grant was able to sell his for a whopping $21 million.
"I slightly regret selling it now, even though it made me rich," Grant said.
"Money and art is a funny story, not a sad one," The Guardian wrote at the time. "It's a joke that such inane sums have been paid. It's a farce, not a conspiracy. Good old Hugh Grant for telling it like it was."
Other publications like The Telegraph thought the final price of the piece was disappointing.
Apparently, the print of Liz turned Grant into an art collector in the end. According to Amy Cappellazzo, who ran Christie's auction which helped sell the piece, Grant was going to use his earnings on more art.
"The seller of the Liz is taking advantage of the strength of today’s market and turning his attention to work by younger artists," she said.
In 2011 another portrait of Liz was sold for what The Hollywood Reporter projected to be $30 million.
The money from the sale of the print no doubt had a hefty effect on Grant's net worth. This year his net worth has reached $150 million. According to Celebrity Net Worth, Grant's salary is about $10 million, making him one of the highest-paid actors in Hollywood.
So that would mean the actor received double his salary in the sale of his Warhol print. In other words, Grant basically cashed out, selling it at the perfect time.
Ironically, Grant's father wasn't impressed by the Concorde's flight to New York. "Halfway across the Atlantic, he's saying, 'Well, it's all very nice, but frankly I prefer Air Kuwait'- his usual way of getting to New York," Grant concluded.
The flight to procure the print might not have been worth it for Grant's father, but Liz turned out to be a great investment, albeit a drunken one, for Grant. We wish we could randomly bid on a famous piece of art, win it, and eventually maybe sell it, but we can't all be Hugh Grant.