Much like the classic “Attic Find,” dreamt about by many sports card collectors, Propstore Founder and CEO Stephen Lane is no stranger to his own exciting moments uncovering a treasure trove of material for the film and television memorabilia auction house he founded in 1998.
Ahead of next month’s live auction in London, Lane received word from a costume house in Rome called Costumi D’Arte. The company had been in business for more than a century, having produced highly detailed and bespoke costumes for blockbusters such as 1963’s “Cleopatra.”
Looking for ways to reinvest in their business, Costumi D’Arte, which had found less and less interest in new productions renting its old wares due to the changing demands of modern films, wanted to look deep into its archives to see if it had anything of value.
After two days in Rome, speaking with the costume house about which films it worked on, as well as collections it had purchased over the years, Lane realized there might be some significant pieces among the inventory.
“We went digging,” Lane recalled to cllct. Using “copious amounts of reference screen grabs,” the industry veteran and his team were able to confidently match costumes to some of the biggest films in the costume house's résumé, dating back to the 1960s.
Lane found a few dozen lots never before offered publicly, including items from “Cleopatra,” such as the costume donned by Richard Burton as Mark Antony (estimate: $32,700 to $65,500) and Clint Eastwood’s Duster Coat from “The Good, the Bad and the Ugly” (estimate: $105,000 to $210,000) — both of which will be joining the upcoming auction.
This thrill, while always a joy for Lane, is nothing new. For years, he has been at the forefront of this type of hunt, fueling thousands of consignments for Propstore over the years as one of the leaders driving the category’s growth from a small niche to major collectible category.
When first founding the auction house, Lane, who began collecting around 1991, beginning with figures then film props, would set up at church halls and parks to swap and mingle with fellow collectors.
Eventually, Lane found himself turning his passion into a business. “We were sort of the first mover in the category,” Lane said. “There was nobody else who was dedicated and solely focused on film and television memorabilia.”
The other biggest name in the industry, Julien’s, wasn’t founded until 2003.
Much the same way other collectibles can be found forgotten in storage lockers or warehouses, Lane found the owners often not understanding the value of what they owned. Costume houses similarly had little notion their work for films or television would be of interest to collectors, instead opting to frequently offer them for rent for later films.
“It's crazy to us today, but if you think about it back then, there was no considered value outside of it being a part of the filmmaking process,” Lane said. “Once the film was done, what do they need the props and costumes for? As far as they're concerned there was no real memorabilia market, and that had been going on for decades.”
One item from the upcoming auction, a blaster from “Star Wars,” was originally found nearly 25 years ago, when Lane visited the team contracted to be the armorers for films such as the “Alien” franchise, “James Bond” and “Star Wars.” Lane recalls seeing a group of blasters just sitting on their shelves.
Over the years, Lane has found many of Propstore’s “Star Wars” props from that same armory. The franchise has become one of the most significant film series in the prop world, with many of the top lots in previous and upcoming Propstore auctions featuring items from one of the films.
One of the leading lots in next month’s auction includes a screen-matched Stormtrooper (Sandtrooper) helmet from “Star Wars: A New Hope” (estimate: $327,000 to $655,000).
Past highlights from “Star Wars” sold by Propstore include a screen-matched ILM Red Leader X-wing model (miniature) from “A New Hope,” which sold for $2.38 million in 2022 and a screen-matched light-up head used by Anthony Daniels as C-3P0 in “Return of the Jedi,” which sold for more than $840,000 earlier this year.
The market for film and television memorabilia provides a fascinating insight into the tastes and preferences of its fans, whether hardcore Marvel collectors or "Star Trek" obsessives.
“You have those passion collectors who have been collecting for years, decades maybe,” Lane explained. “But then you have a lot of people who are buying into content as it becomes available from some very recent productions as well.”
That interest in the more recent releases is a newer phenomenon, Lane says, which his team has helped facilitate and match with partnerships with modern studios such as Netflix, organizing auctions around specific TV shows like “A Series of Unfortunate Events” last year and “The Umbrella Academy” in February.
Lane credits so much of the auction house’s success and the overall growth of the category to an emphasis on education. And it has paid off.
“For decades, I've been educating, going to shows and conventions showing people that they really can own the real artifacts that were used in the film and TV shows,” Lane said, recalling a recent conversation with a friend of a friend in which, after Lane explained what he did for a living, they had already heard of it and were familiar. “Ten years ago, I'd never had somebody I didn't know who wasn't in the circle of collectors say that to me, that sort of degree of awareness.”
Lane remembers first starting out and speaking to collectors all over the world while the market was still incredibly niche. These days, it’s a much broader audience, according to Lane, with far more people excited and understanding of what it means to own pieces from these productions.
As far as how the preferences of the industry have evolved over the years, Lane says he’s constantly surprised.
There have always been the big franchise films, which Lane says some refer to as “blue chip” within the industry, such as “Star Wars” or “Indiana Jones” — Propstore set a world record when it sold Harrison Ford’s iconic Fedora for $630,000 in August. But that same auction had the Ghostface costume from “Scream,” which Lane said was a surprise when it sold for nearly $300,000. “Horror is a hugely popular, very passionate client base,” he said.
“This is a really emotive hobby. People engage with the content, and it tells them stories,” Lane said. “So it’s very tough for us to predict.”
Some of the more eye-catching lots from the upcoming auction include a screen-matched “Move Along” Sandtrooper Helmet from “Star Wars: A New Hope” (estimate: $328,000 to $656,000), Tom Hanks’ costume from “Saving Private Ryan” (estimate: $20,000 to $40,000), poster art from “James Bond: Diamonds are Forever” ($200,000 to $400,000) and Yoda’s cane from “The Empire Strikes Back” and “Return of the Jedi” (estimate: $26,000 to $52,000).
Lane has had plenty of thrilling “finds” over the years, but one that stands out to him goes back to around 2004, when he was working with famed makeup artist Stuart Freeborn, known for his work on “Star Wars” as he looked to downsize.
Inside Freeborn’s three-story house, full of his old memorabilia from films, Lane walked into the attic, where he believed they had already found all the good stuff. “We’re going through everything and then see this black plastic bag. I was on my hands and knees and I pulled it out. It had a bit of weight to it and I was like, ‘Oh, maybe there’s something in there’,” Lane recalls. “I just tore it open and then there is Chewbacca’s head.”
It was the full mask for Chewbacca. Expecting Freeborn to be thrilled he had found such an important piece, he excitedly alerted its owner, who replied kindly “Oh, I’m so happy you found that, Stephen, that’s great. Well done.”
It became one of the hallmarks of Lane’s collection, before he sold it to a fellow collector to help fund the business.
“I had bills to pay, so I sold it about 10 years ago,” Lane said. “I know the collector well and still, to this day, he loves it and it’s not going anywhere.”
Will Stern is a reporter and editor for cllct.