42” Head on body
SCREEN MATCH!
SCREEN MATCH!
SCREEN MATCH!
CURATOR’S NOTE: “I met Marty Kro ff t, the creator and executive producer of H.R. Pufnstuf, Lidsville, Sigmund & The Sea Monster and other essential 1970s Saturday morning kids’ shows. He sought out my opinion on the value of objects he had saved from his TV productions, road shows & branded theme park. Marty was working out of an estate in the swanky Hancock Park area of Los Angeles, and he wasted no time getting down to business. I was handed a list of what he sequestered away in storage, and as I began to read it, he said: ‘Funny story. The very first Pufnstuf head used to live right there on top of the filing cabinet until my dog got it down and chewed it to pieces. Crazy, right?’ This seemed more like a cultural crime than something to share a giggle over, and I knew straight away this guy was going to rub me the wrong way. He barked his biased thoughts on why his pieces should be worth ‘a million bucks,’ and I shared that TV memorabilia (in the mid-1990s) was a new market and even materials from shows like Star Trek and I Love Lucy did not yet command the kind of prices he hoped to realize. But Marty knew better. In the months that followed, he approached every auction company that handled Hollywood memorabilia, and in turn, nearly all of them called me for my opinion on values…and to confirm ‘this guy is a handful, right?’ In the end, the only entity that could e ff ectively work with Marty was an industrial liquidator, the kind that sells desks & bookcases after a company closes down. They did a fine job setting up an auction in the same ballroom where the Golden Globes take place in the Beverly Hilton Hotel. Thanks to CitiCard and my $25,000 spending limit (that could be paid down at just 15.99%), I managed to win incredible pieces from most of the beloved Kro ff t shows. Sid Kro ff t, the boundless creative energy in the two-brother team, was in attendance, exuding a bright life-force and much gratitude. He was very happy to meet, hug & take photos with every fan—and was excited to know someone would shell out nearly $15,000 for a H.R. Pufnstuf or Witchiepoo costume (in both cases, that would be me). Then there was Marty, standing by the checkout table. He barely made eye contact, as he professed he was ‘thrilled’ that I won so many of his pieces—that, as it turned out, sold for very close to the prices I estimated for him in our first meeting. He exclaimed he didn’t stage the auction for the money, but rather ‘for the fans.’ In the months that followed, I approached Marty because I knew there were objects I read on his original list that weren’t included in the auction, and I made a couple of private purchases from him. But each time, he would call just as I was driving over to say some version of: ‘Jimmy, it’s Marty. I just can’t do it. I need another grand to make the deal happen,’ to which I would respond with something like: ‘Marty, I’m turning the car around and never coming back.’ TV creators can be as colorful as the characters they bring to life, and I count myself as lucky to have worked with so many of them.” - James Comisar
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