Star Trek TOS captain's chair, was it real?

apollo

Not to strange really when you consider What he had and how he got it.

I myself when I first heard of this was suprised the Mount did'nt try to reclaim it.

apollo

Like PIH has never been duped before or pulled Auctions!

Who is to say Matt was up to snuff when he examined the chair?

Time does terrible things to the mind believe me I know!

Look at some of the last questions that were asked of Wah , he did not remember a lot of things

exetor999

As I had said, Matt stated to me, that he knew nothing of the sale of this chair, which goes directly against what PiH stated in their auction. And, he seemed pretty lucid to me at the time. I have seen several auctions from PiH that I had my doubts about, considering that most of the replica junk that went into 'Planet Hollywood' allegedly came from them. AND Planet Hollywood maintained that all of their displays were original, including the Enterprise-A in Vegas that I know Greg Jein had made for them! He had told me how he got in trouble with 'the Mount' because of making copies, that one specifically.

Xenophon1

What Planet Hollywood does is irrelevant when discussing PiH--or would you want your own actions to be judged based on what others do? As for you stating that Matt Jefferies didn't know anything about the chair PiH stated he authenticated, basically what you're doing is implying that PiH outright lied about a piece and stated it had specific authentication from a specific individual which it did not. So please, let's not be covert about it: is that what you are alleging here?

As for your story, where is your proof that you talked with Matt Jefferies about the chair? I'm guessing you have none. Where is your proof that he denied authenticating it? I'm guessing you have none. Since the poor man was probably close to his death at the time, even if we take the above for granted and assume you're telling the truth (an assumption which you're unwilling to extend to PiH, so why should we extend it to you?), how can we assume he was more lucid and aware and mentally competent at that moment than he was when asked by PiH to authenticate the chair?

All you're offering here is a standard conspiracy theory, sans proof of any sort. Why would we believe that PiH was outright lying, but that you are telling the truth? Occam's razor, my friend.

As for PiH, we all know that they've sold some forged and misattributed items in the past--every auction company has. These represent a tiny fraction of the literally many tens of thousands of items which they've probably sold since the captain's chair. I don't have any figures, but based on the sheer volume of artifacts they've handled in the last decade or so forgeries are doubtless less than 1% of what they've handled. As someone who's consigned items to PiH and other major houses in the past, I can tell you that PiH's authentication process is as thorough as anyone's in the business. They don't want to sell fakes--no one does, because it harms buyer confidence--but every auction house gets fooled occasionally. That's life: nobody is perfect, and the bad guys sometimes win.

As for the captain's chair specifically: beyond standard conspiracy theory stuff lacking all proof, we have no reason to believe it's anything other than authentic. Unless you can provide proof that PiH is lying about what specific individuals say, we know that the item (or pictures and information about it) was examined by Matt Jefferies, Bob Justman, and Herb Solow, and deemed by them authentic (documentation of this would have been given to the auction winner by PiH, so why would they lie knowing the winner would expect documentation for these claims?). We know that the Technical Operations Director of CBS Television City states that he and a friend removed this item from the set after production wrapped. We know without a doubt that at least the Madison chair at the heart of the item is unquestionably authentic, because the woodgrain matches high-res publicity photos. We know that the materials and construction of the rest of the chair are consistent with the period and with studio construction standards. And IMHO even the panel alterations speak to the authenticity of the item because if you're capable of faking the rest so well, why not just fake the complete chair instead of stating that panels were missing and what was still present was reinstalled by the owner? Are you telling me that in 30+ years the owner couldn't source or fabricate the right parts to complete such an expert forgery, if that's what everything but the Madison is? With the balance of all of that evidence, we have every reason to believe the item is authentic.

Now, let's look at the counterbalancing scale: what evidence is there of the chair's inauthenticity? We have...vague stories from third parties that someone somewhere whose identity we don't know claims he saw the chair dismantled 30+ years ago. Very good evidence, that. We have a claim with no corroboration at all that Matt Jefferies didn't know anything about the sale of the chair he was said to have authenticated--and even if we accept that that claim is true, which without evidence we should not, then we know Jefferies was 80+ years old and near death so why can he be counted on to remember anything about it? And even if we discount Jefferies' authentication, we still have all the other evidence outlined in the previous paragraph.

Basically we're left with evidence of authenticity vs. a proofless conspiracy theory of inauthenticity. I sure know which side of the scale I think weighs more...

SciFiMuseum

Thank you. I believe the same thing. Unless there is some proof that it isn't authentic...like someone comes out of the woodwork and says "No it isn't, I have the actual chair (or parts from it)"...which for that much money-they would-or just to say Paul Allen was ripped off-then we have to assume it is the real deal. Like I said I have taken a good look at it and believe it is the chair.

I own the second best TOS Captain's chair IMO and have taken an interest in that prop, I know the guys at the EMP and have gone out to dinner and discussed all kinds of sci-fi with them including the chair. I still believe it is what they say it is. Everyone is entitled to their opinion and for some it will always be an prop x-file no matter what anyone says.

exetor999

Didn't mean to start a war, xeno, not at all. However, by your own position, we would HAVE to accept that the chair is 10000000% real, since there is no proof to the contrary.
And, by that same reasoning, there is no PROOF that Jesus ever walked the Earth. None whatsoever, nor Noah, nor Moses, any of them. No proof that anything in the bible ever took place, just some vague historical points here and there.
We can be a bunch of ostriches, and jam our heads in the sand when we see something that we cannot handle, or we can question and probe.
I am willing to go into a court of law and testify to the FACT of the conversation between Matt and myself, and his widow Mary will back me up. I'm sure that we could track down this "wes" person to tell his story, in court as well. What would it prove?
NOTHING.
Even if Rod Roddenberry himself got up and said that the chair was a fake, I doubt that you would believe him, since he had nothing to do with the original production, and wasn't even born at that time, so his opinion would be moot as well.
So, end of topic. Let this thread die a horrible death.
Silent and cold.

apollo

Nothing wrong with a little healthy debate exetor.

You have your opinion and Xeno has his.

Some new stuff has been discussed here and that's a good thing.

I would have loved to have met Matt!

bsj1701

Congratulations on owning this!

SciFiMuseum

Thank you! We love it, it came with a section of the bridge railing used in the episode as well.

exetor999

Well, I am pleased to know that I am not the only one who thinks that this chair auction was bogus!
Yes, Matt was a great person, I loved talking with him, and also Fred Phillips. They were both really friendly and down to Earth people, not big headed or egotisical at all. I also liked visiting with Lynwood Dunn, who took
over the effects about halfway thru the second season. He had a ton of mattes from the show, at his house, along with a ton of models and set pieces that really belonged in a museum somewhere (God, I sound like Indy)
It was really great getting to know all three of them, I will treasure that experince all of my life.

apollo

Being an old Cameraman, I would have loved to talked to Dunn.

One of the true old school Masters of his Art.

I was fortunate to talk with Fred Phillips and he was another Great in his field.

They don't make them like those two anymore

exetor999

Yes, I was surprised to find out that Lynwood Dunn had created, and had a copyright on a new process for bluescreen matts, or something like that. I'm not really up on the tech side of film making, but he did get a academy award for new technical processing back in the fifties, I think it was. I saw his name on the internet about 10-12 years ago, and was surprised that he never told me about his award. I was one of about 20 people, mostly film studuents that he wanted to straighten out his collections. I wanted to just get pictures of some of the matt paintings, and wanted to scan some of the artwork and memos, but he would not allow any of that. He got sick and died before any work could be done. Now, all that stuff was possibly sold to a private collector, who will never let it see the light of day, either that, or the studio picked up all the matt paintings, and destroyed them, as they have done with so much art.

sad, very sad.