Propstore Auction: Los Angeles 2024
In conversation with Brandon Alinger,
Chief Operating Officer of Propstore
by CHAD KENNERK
Propstore’s Brandon Alinger with Peter Fonda’s motorcycle from Easy Rider (1969). All images courtesy of Propstore.
Memorabilia auction house Propstore is gearing up for their first entertainment memorabilia live auction of 2024 with over 1,700 rare and iconic lots set to be sold during Propstore’s three-day event from 12th-14th March. All combined, the items offered in Los Angeles are expected to fetch over $8 million. Registration is now open and absentee bidding has begun.
Historically, Propstore’s Los Angeles auction has taken place in June, but this year the decision was made to host two separate events, with the first taking place in March and a subsequent sale arriving in August. The annual London entertainment memorabilia auction is also set to return in November. The decision for more frequent offerings means that collectors and consignors won’t have such a long wait between sales. Rather than one annual Los Angeles mega auction, the new format seeks to create a better overall collecting experience.
Last year Film Review talked to Alinger about the 2023 Los Angeles sale, as well as his own collecting background and how he initially became involved with Propstore. The top three sales from last year’s auction include a screen-matched evil clown doll from 1982’s Poltergeist which sold for $656,250, the spider-like head monster from another 1982 horror classic, The Thing, which sold for $587,500, and Industrial Light & Magic’s original Praxis optical printer, which was used to composite every visual effects shot in 1977’s Star Wars, sold for $337,500.
Day one of the 2024 auction will be hosted as an in-person bidding event at the Petersen Automotive Museum in Los Angeles. Bids can also be placed online, over the phone, or via absentee bidding. The three-day auction can also be enjoyed via the online livestream. In advance of the sale, Film Review chats with Propstore COO Brandon Alinger on the most coveted lots and treasures available this March.
Film Review (FR): Anthony Daniels is a class act. What has your partnership been like working on this auction?
Brandon Alinger (BA): It’s been really great working with Anthony. Obviously he’s such a legendary figure in the world of Star Wars. Hearing his memories about the artefacts, his stories and reminiscing about what all these things were: it’s very much the fun part of the process. We love that discovery process of seeing what’s in a person’s boxes so to speak. With Anthony Daniels, he had a lot of materials stored in different places around his home. Not everything was out on display, a lot it had been packed away. They were things he had saved along the way because they meant something to him, but not necessarily things that he was actively doing anything with. He liked the idea that these things would go on to Star Wars fans, collectors, and people that would really cherish them and enjoy them.
Aside from the obvious things, the C-3PO head and hands — which are absolute treasures in my opinion — he had a lot of fascinating smaller ephemera, including things like the diary pages relating to his first meetings with George Lucas. He also had a lot of paperwork related to his ADR (Automated Dialogue Replacement) sessions. Being in that helmet, they couldn’t use any of the live dialogue from set, so he had to ADR everything. There are lots of ADR pages with handwritten notes all over them that provide a fascinating look at the production process. It’s material that we just haven’t seen elsewhere, like his director’s chair backs that Star Wars collectors are very excited to see. It was a real privilege and a lot of fun to work with Anthony Daniels. We did an auction last November where we sold part one of his collection, this is part two and there are some fantastic pieces here again, the most prominent of which is the screen-matched C-3PO head from Return of the Jedi.
(FR): This head screen-matches to several of the scenes on Endor, including when Luke reunites with the group after the speeder bike chase and as the Rebels scout out the shield reactor. Daniels also frequently posed with this particular head for publicity purposes over the years. In terms of authenticity, it doesn’t get much better than a screen-matched item offered directly from the actor.
(BA): Absolutely right, the provenance is one hundred percent. What I love about this specific one, is that it’s literally in the condition it was in when they stopped filming in 1982, 42 years ago now. It still has all the weathering on it, all the dulling spray, the acrylic paints and such that were added to give it that great texture and weathered look. It’s really a wonderful piece, without question one of the best Star Wars pieces that we’ve ever handled at Propstore.
(FR): Propstore does an amazing job of photographing each item so that buyers can see every angle and detail on an object before bidding. It’s great to see how the mechanics were rigged on the inside Threepio’s helmet, as well as the Lucasfilm ‘Blue Harvest’ production label inside the Return of the Jedi Imperial Stormtrooper helmet.
(BA): That’s a great piece, I’ve never seen another Stormtrooper helmet that has that Blue Harvest Productions label inside of it. It’s also very complete – it has its original eye lenses, its rubber trim, what they call the mic tip on either side of the chin, the paint on the ears. All the original details are there and it’s in really nice condition. That’s a really lovely example, I think one of the best examples of a Return of Jedi Stormtrooper helmet that we’ve handled.
(FR): Lucasfilm adjacent items include an Indiana Jones screen-matched stunt leather jacket from Indiana Jones and the Temple of Doom. This jacket was custom-made specifically for use by stuntman Vic Armstrong, including one memorable gag where Armstrong dives under the closing door of the spiked-ceiling room and reaches back for that signature fedora.
(BA): Vic is a legend in the world of stunts and in the world of filmmaking in general. He was involved in some of the biggest movies ever, like the Indiana Jones films and the Superman films where he doubled for Christopher Reeve. This jacket has his name in it and was made specifically for him. It was used by him for filming on location in Sri Lanka, at Elstree Studios, and was also used in California by American stuntman Dean Ferrandini, who did the work going down the mountain on the inflatable raft. The jacket even has some yellow stains from that raft, a transfer of the raft’s surface onto the jacket. So the jacket is pretty used and abused, as you would expect a stuntman’s jacket to be. There’s some tears in the leather on the sleeve. It’s just a wonderful piece and a wonderful piece to look at. I think it’s the only screen-matched Indiana Jones jacket that’s ever come up for public auction.
(FR): ‘Captain America’ Wyatt's (Peter Fonda) Panhead chopper motorcycle from Dennis Hopper's Easy Rider is another big item in the sale. Stuntman Tex Hall gifted this bike to Grizzly Adams star Dan Haggerty, who helped maintain the bikes during production.
(BA): That’s a big one for us. I think it’s the first piece we’ve ever had from Easy Rider, obviously a very significant film in the history of Hollywood. It’s fully restored, so it's a gorgeous thing to look at and it’s the only known motorcycle that exists from that film. The others that were used in production were stolen shortly after the movie was released and the theory is that they were broken down for parts and no longer exist. We also have a Peter Fonda shirt from the same film in the auction, which is screen-matched.
(FR): In terms of other big franchises, you also have Gimli's (John Rhys-Davies) double-headed axe from The Lord of the Rings trilogy, which was subsequently used to create licensed replicas.
(BA): Right, so this was sent as a reference piece over to Sideshow, which is a company that makes consumer products like prop replicas and statues. It’s an original axe from the film trilogy, but then was given to Sideshow specifically for reference. What I really love is the detail. If you look at the photos closely, you’ll see all the Dwarven engravings on the axe head and the leather wrap of the handle. Everything that comes out of Wētā Workshop is really high quality and this being a main character piece is no exception. It’s a beautiful piece to behold.
(FR): There are also some incredibly iconic classic film pieces in the sale, specifically from Paramount films like Sabrina. Propstore has a screen-matched embroidered silk-organza gown worn by Audrey Hepburn — one of our former Film Review contributors. The gown is a real transformation moment in the film, where the chauffeur's daughter Sabrina (Hepburn) returns from culinary school in Paris and wears this gown to the Larrabee’s party.
(BA): We think that it’s a one-off, meaning that they only had one for the film. It screen-matches exactly. All the embroidering is incredibly intricate and detailed. You can go through photos of Audrey Hepburn from the production and the film itself to match the detail on the embroidery exactly. It has a label in it for Audrey Hepburn and originated from the legendary Debbie Reynolds’ collection, one of Hollywood’s most famous collectors and actors. Anything that has provenance to her collection is always revered within the collecting community, but an Audrey Hepburn dress is just all the more special.
(FR): We have Debbie Reynolds to thank for saving and collecting so much of Hollywood history.
(BA): She was absolutely a pioneer in this world and cared about memorabilia at a time when no one else would. There’s a lot of stuff that still exists today solely because of her.
(FR): Other Paramount Pictures’ classic film items in the sale include Moses' (Charlton Heston) tablets from The Ten Commandments and Olivia Newton-John’s drive-in costume from Grease.
(BA): More great pieces. They did have a few sets of tablets for production, but this is the first set that we’ve handled. This set was gifted to a publicist by Paramount executive Bernard Serlin. I love the detailing on those and the lettering on the front. One of them has evidence on the back of some mounting brackets having been installed in the past, so you can just imagine it was on an executive’s wall at some point. The Grease costume is great, because that remains such a beloved film. It’s something that we get asked about regularly; it’s a title that people are looking for. We expect a lot of interest in that one.
(FR): Disney tends to be the caretaker for much of their history and memorabilia, but one piece that’s really fascinating to see here is the Cherry Tree Lane mailbox, which was made for and prominently featured in Mary Poppins and then later appeared outside the post office in Bedknobs and Broomsticks.
(BA): That’s really cool. It’s a prop build, so it’s made out of wood, probably by a carpenter shop on the studio lot. It features a wooden sign marked ‘17 Cherry Tree Lane’. That came out of the Disney prop department in 2001. They were liquidating assets and downsizing and it was sold at that time. Mary Poppins is another beloved title and you don’t see a lot of content from it.
(FR): There’s also pieces in the auction from modern classics like Get Out. You have the Missy Armitage (Catherine Keener) screen-matched hypnosis chair.
(BA): I love the Get Out chair. It comes with the leather straps and when you look at the hand rests, you can see they’ve been picked apart, which is a story point where Daniel Kaluuya is taking the stuffing out of them and putting it in his ears. That’s a great piece from a beloved modern horror title that I haven’t seen anything else from. That chair is actually on one of the posters from the movie, so that tells you it’s a really significant piece.
(FR): Do you have any favourites in this sale that we haven’t highlighted yet?
(BA): There’s a collection of matte paintings by a very famous matte painting artist named Matthew Yuricich, which is a wonderful collection. There are paintings from Blade Runner, Ghostbusters, Masters of the Universe, Star Trek: The Motion Picture, and Logan’s Run. Those are wonderful and we don’t see matte paintings very often. We’ve handled a few in the past, but they’re very rare. Matthew Yuricich is known as one of the top matte artists of all time. That’s a really exciting collection for us to have, especially the Blade Runner painting.
That stands out to me because it’s such a pivotal movement in the film where Harrison Ford is hanging off the edge of the building, right at the climax, and you don’t know how this film is going to end. That’s a real seminal moment of film history. I just love those pieces as artwork. I love staring at them and digesting the painted detail in them — and what is not in them. There’s a whole art form around using matte paintings effectively for the cinematic illusion. It’s rare that you get to study those in person, so it’s been a lot of fun to have those in our facility.
(FR): It’s a lost art form. Matte paintings brought a scope and presence to film, especially fantasy films.
(BA): It’s a completely lost art form. As far as I know, no one is doing matte paintings at all at this point, anything like that would be digital. They bring a lot of production value, because they open a scene up, they give you shots and vistas that you could never build in a studio or get on location. It’s a tool and when done properly, a very effective tool at helping to tell the story.
(FR): For budding collectors, the third day of the auction provides items without reserve.
(BA): Day three is our no reserve day. Everything starts at a low starting bid of $100, and the bidding will take it from there. Most of the items in the auction on day one and two do have reserves, meaning there’s a certain price the piece must reach in order to be sold, but that’s not the case on day three. For collectors who are new and people who are looking for items at a more accessible price point, day three has some great content.
BRANDON ALINGER is the COO of Propstore and has been with the company since establishing the U.S. division of the business alongside Stephen Lane in 2007. Brandon manages the U.S. division of Propstore directly and works with the London team on global operations. He also works closely with many of Propstore’s longest-standing consignors and customers. Widely known in the collecting community as a treasure hunter, Brandon has located many pieces of film history that were previously thought to be lost. Prior to joining Propstore, Brandon was a collector, researcher and aspiring film historian. He founded one of the first online prop research communities, the RPF, in the late 1990s. His knowledge of film history led him to author or co-author several books including Star Wars Costumes: The Original Trilogy and Star Wars Art: Ralph McQuarrie; total print distribution on his works is over 40,000 copies. Brandon is based in Los Angeles.
Learn more about Propstore and register for Entertainment Memorabilia Live Auction: Los Angeles 2024 at: propstoreauction.com.
