Welles Oscar for sale - Christies to auction July 25th

[jbrooks]

I was thinking more of something like a statement like "Gary, you've really worked hard for me on "The Other Side of the Wind" and everything else over the years. I really appreciate it. Why don't you take this Oscar as a gift. You've earned it."

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that is what i thought the daughter should have said.

[fantomas]

Gary Graver is not quite honest: Beatrice didn't come in to grap the Oscar before he tried to make money with it. He tried to sell it, and it is a big question if Orson would have liked it. So under these circumstances it was not so wrong to take it away from him and to give it to the daughter who claimed to keep it for her Orson Welles Archives.
When Beatrice now acts exactly the same way and doesn't care at all for the arguments she used in the battle with Gary Graver it's hard to believe that her "Orson Welles Estate" claim is more than a means to make money. Her announcement to help abused animals seems to be a very ridiculous excuse for her behaviour which blocks so many projects.
I don't understand why the other daughters (and maybe even some unknown other Welles children) don't claim to have at least some partial rights in the Orson Welles estate. Okay, Beatrice got the Paola Moro Estate, but in my understanding she is not the only heiress. The European law would give a legimite claim to every child even when the father didn't want to give anything to them.

[Jeff Wilson]

Beatrice is heavily into animal rescue, judging from the results when I've done online searches on her. Several results come up with her posting on mailing lists working to arrange for animals to be taken care of and so on. It doesn't mitigate her lying about wanting the Oscar for some mythical Welles archive, but she does work in animal rescue.

I would have thought the other two daughters would have contested things at the time of the will's probate if they so wished, but they were included in the will. What I've never understood, and what I wish someone would have asked Oja Kodar at the recent Welles screenings is, if she does indeed have full and clear possession of the unfinished work, why doesn't she pursue her legal options regarding them, and settle this crap once and for all? Either she does or she doesn't own this material, and if she doesn't why hasn't Beatrice moved to claim it? It's ridiculous.

[Oscar Christie]

What I've never understood, and what I wish someone would have asked Oja Kodar at the recent Welles screenings is, if she does indeed have full and clear possession of the unfinished work, why doesn't she pursue her legal options regarding them, and settle this crap once and for all? Either she does or she doesn't own this material, and if she doesn't why hasn't Beatrice moved to claim it? It's ridiculous.

Realistically, we the members of Wellesnet are unlikely to raise the $ 4 million for TOSOTW any time soon.

What I think is holding things up is Beatrice's determination to get back at Oja Kodar.

How much would we have to raise to get a well regarded legal opinion on Beatrice's legal right to hold up TOSOTW?

[Glenn Anders]

Dear Oscar: I think that most of the explanation is probably already in the public record. It seems to have turned on the death of Countess Paola Mori Welles. Obviously, under the terms of Welles' will, the Oscar should belong to Beatrice, but Welles had already given it to Gary Graver.

"Possession is 9/10 of the law," someone once said

If we are to believe the AP Release Jeff posted, however, the matter becomes more complicated than our often black and white discussions here:

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"Orson Welles' original Oscar surfaced in 1994 in possession of Gary Graver, a cinematographer who had worked with the director. Graver sold the statuette for $50,000 to Bay Holdings, which then offered it for sale through Sotheby's auction house.

"When Beatrice Welles heard of it, she sued to block the sale of the Oscar, which eventually was returned to her. After she offered the original Oscar for auction, the academy notified her she was obligated to return it under the agreement she signed for the duplicate statuette."

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In other words, in the end, for both parties, it was the money. By selling it to EBay Holding Company, Graver gave up the high moral ground.

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And sadly, it seems unlikely "we the members of Wellesnet are unlikely to raise the $ 4 million for TOSOTW any time soon." As long as we don't turn a finger.

Perhaps, we have become other figures in the wallpaper.

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Glenn

[Jeff Wilson]

Frankly, until someone wants to put together a solid, coherent plan for some kind of fund-raising scheme, and has the blessing of Kodar and Graver to do so, I'd consider it a pipe dream.

After some online searching, I found that Beatrice sued Oja in 1999; anyone know what it was in regards to? The info I found had only the docket material, not the actual meat of the case. I can provide the relevant case info if anyone in LA wants to get the actual records from the court. It looks to be something about copyright infringement, maybe.

[Jeff Wilson]

Yet more on this, from E! Online (I know, quality source):

But Academy attorney David Quinto said the organization planned to appeal, believing the 1988 agreement forbade her from selling both statuettes.

"We think there's a question of credibility that a jury should have decided," Quinto said. "We think in 1988, believing the Oscar was lost, she would have signed away any rights. She has also refused to return the replacement so she's having her cake and eating it too."

Quinto says the Academy is also chaffing because Beatrice Welles is the only non-member ever to receive a replacement Oscar, which essentially allowed her to wriggle free from the terms.

"The language of the agreement actually said that it would apply to any Oscar previously received by a member. And of course, when the Academy sent her the right of first refusal, nobody looked at the agreement to modify it to say that it would apply to a non-member," Quinto explained. "It was the Academy's position that Beatrice had a made a mistake and that she had not revised it [in her deposition]. She even testified that she did not want an Oscar of the Academy to become an article of commerce."

Quinto said the Academy is so keen on keeping the Oscar off the market that it made Welles an offer. "We found a private buyer willing to pay six-figures to bring it back to the Academy but she declined," he said.

[Glenn Anders]

It all seems shabby to me, given the larger question, but obviously the concerns of most of us here would be better served if Graver and Kodar won.

Glenn

[Hannaford]

Talk about legal technicality's - Beatrice Welles is now the proud owner of two "Citizen Kane" Oscars, so she can sell the original, and still keep the duplicate!

The March 4th ruling by Los Angeles U.S. District Court Judge Dean Pregerson held that the right-of-first refusal agreement Beatrice Welles signed in 1988 did not apply to the original "Kane" Oscar, (which at the time was thought to be lost) but only to the duplicate she received from the Academy. Beatrice Welles testified she also thought the contract covered only the duplicate Oscar, which she still has in her possession.

Academy attorney David Quinto's response:

"We are very disappointed. This is the first case involving the sale of an Oscar that the Academy has ever lost. The court accepted her statement that she would not have agreed to the right of first refusal had she known that it extended to the original Oscar, as well as the duplicate. But we think Ms. Welles' credibility raised a triable issue, and that a jury should have decided whether she understood that the Academy intended to protect all Oscars from becoming articles of commerce.

Quinto explains that since all Oscar winners are members of the Academy, the position taken by the Academy is it's members are bound by the right of the first refusal agreement - even if they won their Oscar before 1950.

Unfortunately, due to the wording of the first refusal agreement that was signed by Ms. Welles, Judge Pregerson found in her favor, since Ms. Welles is not an Academy member. In fact, according to Quinto, Ms. Welles is the only non-member of the Academy to ever receive a duplicate Oscar.

Quinto explained the technical reason that Welles was able to prevail in her court battle: "The language of the agreement she signed, said that it would also apply to any Oscar previously received by an Academy member. But when the Academy sent her the duplicate Oscar, and she signed the right of first refusal agreement, nobody looked at wording of the agreement to modify it, so it would also apply to a non-Academy member."

[TheMcGuffin]

The Academy seems pretty POed over the Kane Oscar fiasco. I think it is a great time for them to support Oja's and Other Side of the Wind's legal trouble agains Beatrice. Wouldn't it be great if they got mad enought to pay Oja and OSOTW's legal fees just to get back at Beatrice...but I am jus an optimist....kinda

[Jaime N. Christley]

http://groups.yahoo.com/group/a_film_by/message/8321

[blunted by community]

beatrice wrote:
......a good and responsible man who was very ill advised by his lawyers, who had their own agenda....

.....to spend copious amounts, as it has in this case, is irresponsible and unnecessary to the point of stupidity. Worst of all, its behavior was harmful and morally unacceptable. I was abused and publicly humiliated.....

i almost choked when i read this.

notice she didn't say she ripped the oscar out of the hands of her father's most loyal friend, that for 15 years almost never got paid for the work he did. graver stuck with welles longer than any one else ever did.

[blunted by community]

beatrice wrote:
....... With the immeasurable help and guidance of my advisor,
Thomas A. White, and my attorney, Steven Ames Brown, I have been able to protect much of his work....

oh, i choked again

[Johnny Dale]

education in humane animal control
in addition to funding individuals and small organizations, many
from Third World countries, that have no resources in the work
they do for abused and abandoned animals.

Let me see if I understand this correctly.
She has slefishly thwarted almost all attempts to enhance her father's legacy in recent years not for her own spending, but for the critters?