For the “Breakfast at Tiffany’s” opening on Broadway this week, the production tried to bring in one secret surprise guest: the ashes of late author Truman Capote.
Reps for the show — starring “Game of Thrones” star Emilia Clarke, and based on Capote’s 1958 novella — even offered complimentary first-class round-trip airfare for the ashes and their owner, Johnny Carson’s ex Joanne Carson, to travel from Bel Air to New York and appear at an Edison Ballroom after-party.
But given people’s past predilection for trying to steal Capote’s remains, it was too risky.
“[Joanne] Carson was Capote’s closest confidante in his later years,” said a source, “and she keeps a portion of his cremated remains in an urn in her Bel Air home, in the room in which he died in 1984.”
The ashes were infamously stolen from Carson’s house during a 1988 Halloween party — along with $200,000 in jewels — and then the remains were just as mysteriously returned in the middle of the night. Meanwhile, Capote’s late, longtime lover Jack Dunphy openly disputed whether the ashes Carson kept were even Capote’s at all.
Adding to the intrigue, the same ashes were the target of another thief years later, when Carson brought them to a bash she hosted for a play about Capote, “Tru.” That culprit, says a source, was caught “before he could make it out the door” with a piece of the acclaimed novelist.
“We did try to get him here,” confirmed a “Breakfast” rep of Capote’s ashes. “Joanne says he always wanted to [see] Holly Golightly open on Broadway, and we thought it would have been poignant for the entire company. I think ultimately the risk of theft was just too high, but he was certainly there in spirit.”
Joanne has said of Capote, “His ashes were my sanity for . . . years. Truman often referred to me as his very own Holly Golightly come to life. He always told me you could be anything you wanted but, whatever happens, never be boring.”
The star-studded black-and-white-themed after-party for “Breakfast” was hosted by Debbie Harry and Interview magazine.