For Sale: “Citizen Kane” Oscar
Posted October 17, 2007 12:00 pm.
This article is more than 5 years old.
For sale: one Oscar, only slightly used.
Original owner: Orson Welles.
The movie involved: what some call the greatest film ever made.
If you have more than a few spare bucks lying around, you may want to make a bid for a prize that centres around what may be Hollywood’s most legendary flick. The Academy Award given to wunderkind Orson Welles for his “Citizen Kane” is going under the hammer in December. It’s expected to fetch between $800,000 and $1.2 million.
The golden statue is almost as steeped in lore as the 1941 classic that won the industry’s most coveted prize for Best Original Screenplay. Welles is said to have somehow lost it over the years, but it mysteriously turned up in 1994. It then got involved in a legal tug of war between the late actor-director’s family and the finder, a cinematographer who once worked with the sometimes cranky filmmaker. He claimed Welles gave it to him as a payment.
The family sued to get it back and won. But that wasn’t the end of this bizarre tale, which wound up being almost as strange as a movie plot itself. When Welles’ daughter tried to sell the prized possession to a charity in 2003, the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences stepped in to stop the sale. The organization has a policy that all of its awards up for sale must first be offered back to the group for $1. But that rule was only brought into effect in 1950, and because the film predates that year, it can be legally put on the market.
And that’s how the Oscar wound up in the hands of the Dax Foundation, which is now hoping to raise money for its worldwide good efforts. The Academy admits it won’t be blocking the sale, although it’s not pleased about the impending vending. “We’re never happy to see Academy Awards go on sale,” agrees spokesman Bruce Davis.
“Citizen Kane,” reportedly about the life of publisher William Randolph Hearst, was voted the greatest film of all time by the American Film Institute in 2007. It earned similar accolades in 2002 from the British Film Institute.
Experts at auction house Sotheby’s admit they’re not sure just how much the icon will go for. The all time price for an Oscar was netted by the Best Picture statue for “Gone With The Wind.” It fetched $1.5 million in 1999.
Photo credit: Gabriel Bouys/AFP/Getty Images
