eMoviePoster.com

What are the objects in the corners of some images? Learn More

Tony Curtis was born Bernard Schwartz in The Bronx, New York City in 1925, the son of Hungarian Jewish immigrants. He had a crappy childhood, and in WWII he served in the Navy. He got out in 1945 when the war ended, and went to acting school, and he was signed to a contract at Universal in 1948, where he changed his name to Anthony Curtis. His first movie was a tiny one in Cross Cross, but it was notable because that movie starred Burt Lancaster, with whom Curtis would later co-star in two very memorable movies. In 1951 he married Janet Leigh (he later admitted he primarily married her to advance his career), and in 1953 they co-starred in Houdini together. In 1956 he co-starred with Lancaster and Lollabrigida in Trapeze, and the following year he co-starred with Lancaster in Clifford Odets and Ernest Lehman's masterpiece, Sweet Smell of Success. In 1958 he was memorable in The Defiant Ones (nominated for the Best Actor Academy Award for this film) opposite Sidney Poitier. In 1959 he had his best role ever, as the cross-dressing star of Some Like It Hot. In 1960 he took a supporting role in Spartacus. In 1968, with his career fading, he took the lead role of Albert DeSalvo in The Boston Strangler. But it did not do much to revive his career and over the next 40+ years he made many lesser movies and had many appearances on TV shows. In his later years, he pursued art, and had a successful business selling his artwork, no doubt many of them to fans who wanted a "Tony Curtis original". He passed away in 2010 at the age of 85. Curtis had six wives, and six children, the best known being actress Jamie Lee Curtis. He had well documented troubles with his families, and with drugs. Tony Curtis was in many of the most memorable films of the 1950s and 1960s, and even his lesser movies of that period are pretty entertaining. Perhaps his best move was his willingness to take secondary roles to other great actors, even though he could have solely played leading roles. I highly recommend seeing all of the movies noted above!

Important Added Info: Note that this still has been personally autographed (signed) by Tony Curtis, who signed his name "Anthony Curtis", which was how he was billed in the movie this still is from, which is "City Across the River" (which was based on the novel "The Amboy Dukes" by Irving Shulman). The still has an inscription to Sid Marks, who was a fascinating character from this time. He was a former lightweight champion boxer, and he served in World War II, and he had been a newsboy as a child, and he had the idea of creating a "Newsboy Hall of Fame", and over the next few years, he spent over $55,000 trying to get it going, and he enlisted the help of many celebrities, including Tony Curtis, who was at the start of his career, and who gave Marks this signed still, which obviously hung on the wall (judging by its borders). What a wonderful very early Tony Curtis autograph with a fantastic provenance! Our consignor is a longtime dealer who acquired this signed item among many other purchases in his inventory, and he does not have a certificate of authenticity, but we believe the signature to likely be authentic.

As is true of all the signed items we are currently auctioning, we give every buyer 30 days in which to review what they purchased and they can return any item as long as it is within 30 days of the end of the auction. On non-signed items, we give a "lifetime guarantee" on everything we auction, but on signed items, we give the above modified guarantee of 30 days after the auction closes.

Our address for UPS or FedEx only is:
Bruce Hershenson,
306 Washington Avenue, West Plains, MO 65775