A great way to find lasting value and increased returns with your collecting is to start at the top.
Go for the greatest.
It’s simple and it's obvious.
Isn’t it?
Let’s have a look.
James Dean. How would you define him? A great actor? Star? Legend? Click through to own this magnificent signed photograph of him.
Who is the greatest movie star of all time?
Nobody knows do they?
What's your definition of star? What's your definition of greatest? Are you talking globally or in one language?
Is every great actor a star? Do they mean box office records? Or how many Oscars they won?
But in collecting and in what you might call the Court of Public Opinion, you can find agreement of a sort.
Sale values and popular perception might not be science and they’re certainly not art.
But they’re a measure of a sort.
Why collect the greatest?
There’s a simple equation of supply and demand here. Nothing succeeds like success.
Who are the most collectible music artists? The Beatles.
British politician? Winston Churchill.
Scientist? Albert Einstein.
Military leader? Napoleon Bonaparte.
And I think it's a safe bet that many people would answer these names if I asked who the "greatest" rather than the "most collectible" was.
Your first instinct is probably the best guide. Greatest might usefully be replaced with, “who do you first think of”.
Try it - and see if you agree with our list, compiled with an emphasis on the highly collectible Golden Age of Hollywood from the 1920s to the 1960s.
Buy these around these names for items that will still have value in decades and probably generations to come.
Collecting the Greatest
The greatest movie star: Marilyn Monroe
Marilyn: a single-name star, a legend, and there's a fascinating story to this image. Click through to discover it.
The figures don’t lie.
Andy Warhol’s Shot Sage Blue Marilyn sold for $195 million in May 2022. Warhol is a great artist and everything he does attracts huge prices.
But this was a Marilyn sale.
The most expensive dress in history is the dress Marilyn wore - once as far as we know - when she sang Happy Birthday Mr President to John F Kennedy.
Other movie stars aren’t in this bracket.
AI says: From a long list, Marlon Brando, Bette Davies and Humphrey Bogart stand out.
The greatest Western Star: John Wayne
Wayne in 1947's Angel and the Badman with Gail Russell. Click the image to explore documents from the archetypal action hero's life and career.
A John Wayne gun - shot by perhaps his most famous character Rooster Cockburn - made over $500,000 at auction.
The Duke’s autograph goes for around $1,500.
AI says: John Wayne, with Clint Eastwood and Gary Cooper coming in next.
The greatest movie actor: Marlon Brando
Marlon Brando broodingly ready for his role in the movie One Eyed Jacks in 1961.
When a New York sale of Brando’s personal property raised over $2 million in 2005 by far the most valuable item was a tool of his trade: an annotated script for the Godfather.
Last year, a tuxedo he wore rather briefly in that masterpiece made over $100,000.
Brando’s a big deal and still taken incredibly seriously by any actor worth their salt. He was also a star, like Marilyn, but is in a class of his own as a thespian.
AI says: The machine agrees that it’s Marlon, adding modern Hollywood star Robert De Niro. Golden age actor Humphrey Bogart also figures.
The greatest musicals star: Judy Garland
An excellent signed photograph of the very great Judy Garland. This one was valued at £1,250 and it sold. She still has a huge, dedicated fanbase.
A personal story does no harm to a star’s legacy, even if - perhaps especially if - the story is tragic.
Like Judy’s.
She has a huge cult following, especially in the LGBTQ community.
And, in 2024, the Ruby Slippers she wore in the Wizard of Oz sold at auction for $28 million to become the most valuable movie prop ever.
Now, that’s a great story with great songs, but the idea that the Wizard of Oz would be what it is without Judy’s performance is a joke.
AI says: Judy, adding Gene Kelly, Fred Astaire and Barbra Streisand at the top.
The greatest screen comic: Charlie Chaplin
Chaplin in his later role as M Verdoux, a wife murderer based on a real-life French serial killer. It was not popular at the time but is now recognised as a fine film. Click through to own this signed photograph.
The shoes Charlie Chaplin wore as his trademark Little Tramp character just sold for over $150,000.
Humour is notoriously subjective and can be very chronologically specific.
Chaplin is different though. He inspired a Beatle-like fan mania at his height and is a huge reason why Hollywood became the global behemoth it did.
His first movies are well over a century old now, but posters for them go for for $120,000 today. They resonate.
He transcended his comedy roots to become a great all-round film figure, whose popularity survived the political witch-hunt that exiled him from the USA for much of his life.
Our own PFC Autograph Index rates him as the top comic name with good quality photos with his signature going for around $6,000.
AI says: Cary Grant, and as a firm with a Bristol office we’re always happy to see Archie Leech credited. Charlie is listed at number nine of 10.
The greatest movie: Citizen Kane
Citizen Kane, Welles' first film (he wasn't yet 30) and an always timely warning about rich men with political ambitions.
Rosebud, one of the greatest movie reveals of all time, is for sale right now.
It - it being a small wooden sledge - has no estimate but has already attracted a bid of $250,000. It will sell for much more on July 16. Other models have sold for $60,500 as long ago as 1982 and $233,500 in 1996.
The Oscars won for the film by director Orson Welles and co-writer Herman J Mankiewicz made $861,542 and $588,455, respectively.
Costumes have gone for over $100,000.
Tastes change, but Kane has remained a fairly constant choice of critics and fans.
AI says: The Lord of the Rings, The Fellowship of the Ring, which is wrong - and out of our time period. The most acceptable answer for our period is 1972’s the Godfather, which is really a New Hollywood movie, but has a stellar critical reputation.
Buying valuable memorabilia from the greatest Hollywood stars
Hollywood used to be called the Dream Factory, and collecting is all about dreams.
I think the best advice for any collector is to follow their dreams. Buy what you are passionate about and you’ll get a payback come what may.
But add in popular acclaim and you’re likely to have a surer bet on value too.
We have a big collection of movie memorabilia here.
Yes, you can get this close to the greats with these highly personal items:
