RICHARD CONTE - DOCUMENT DOUBLE SIGNED 06/26/1947 - HFSID 288894

RICHARD CONTE
Consent form authorizing the Motion Picture Relief Fund to reproduce Richard Conte's signature and likeness for a series of stamps raising money for needy film industry veterans. The form is signed twice by Richard Conte, once as an autograph sample and again to grant permission. A remarkable, perfectly verified example!
Document signed twice: "Richard Conte", 1 page, 8½x11. No place, 1946 June 26. Richard Conte grants to the Motion Picture Relief Fund, Inc., its successors and assigns, the exclusive right, to use [his] name, autograph, photographic likeness, or artist's sketch of the likeness, for reproduction on engraved, embossed or printed stamps, and in stamp albums, and in connection with the advertising and exploitation of these stamps and stamp albums for sale throughout the world. Fox built up the intense, brooding Richard Conte (1914-1975) as the "New John Garfield" upon signing him to a contract in 1943. His best parts during his Fox years included the wrongly imprisoned man who is exonerated by crusading reporter James Stewart in Call Northside 777 (1947) and the lead role as a wildcat trucker in Thieves' Highway (1949). Among Conte's many TV assignments was a co-starring stint with Dan Dailey, Jack Hawkins and Vittorio De Sica on the 1959 syndicated series The Four Just Men. Appearing primarily in European films in his last years, he directed the Yugoslavian-filmed Operation Cross Eagles. Conte's most important Hollywood role in the 1970s was as rival Mafia Don Barzini in the Oscar-winning The Godfather (1972). The Motion Picture Relief Fund was founded in 1921 to assist ill and needy film industry veterans, as expressed in its motto: "We take care of our own." The fund raised money through voluntary payroll deductions and celebrity events. As President of the Fund from 1939 until his death in 1956, film and radio star Jean Hersholt conceived Hollywood Star Stamps as a fundraising method. These stamps, 468 in all, were sold at dime stores after World War II in sheets of 6-12, at 10 cents per sheet, and were an immediate hit with collectors. Now called the Motion Picture and Television Fund, the non-profit organization funds its own hospital and retirement home. It confers the Jean Hersholt Humanitarian Award annually at the Academy Awards ceremony to "an individual in the motion picture industry whose humanitarian efforts have brought credit to the industry." Three filing holes at left. Staple holes at top left. Pencil note (unknown hand) next to signature at bottom. Fine condition.