About This Stamp
With these stamps, the U.S. Postal Service honors four great filmmakers who captured the many varieties of the American experience. These extraordinary directors — Frank Capra, John Ford, John Huston, and Billy Wilder — created some of the most iconic scenes in American cinema. They gave audiences an unforgettable (and in some cases, deeply personal) vision of life.
The stamp art combines a portrait of each man with a scene from one of his most iconic works.
The background art for the stamp honoring Frank Capra shows a scene from It Happened One Night, a comedy in which a runaway heiress (played by Claudette Colbert) and a reporter (Clark Gable) compare their hitchhiking skills.
For the John Ford stamp, the background recalls a scene from The Searchers, an influential Western starring John Wayne and making Ford’s characteristic use of the American landscape.
The Maltese Falcon inspired the background art for the John Huston stamp. In this classic mystery, gumshoe Sam Spade (Humphrey Bogart) goes up against various unscrupulous characters (among them Mary Astor, Peter Lorre, and Sydney Greenstreet).
And for Billy Wilder, the background artwork was inspired by Some Like It Hot, a farce about two male musicians (Jack Lemmon and Tony Curtis) who seek refuge from gangsters by posing as members of an all-girl band featuring luscious singer Sugar Kane (Marilyn Monroe).
These four filmmakers received multiple Academy Award nominations, 15 Oscars, and numerous other honors during their lifetimes. But their greatest accomplishment lies in the vitality and artistry of the stories they told through film.
Art Director Derry Noyes designed these stamps using art by award-winning illustrator Gary Kelley, who created the images using pastels on paper.
The Great Film Directors stamps are being issued as Forever® stamps in self-adhesive sheets of 20 (5 of each design). Forever stamps are always equal in value to the current First-Class Mail one-ounce rate. At the time of issuance, the Great Film Directors stamps are being sold at a price of 45 cents each, or $9.00 per sheet.
The John Wayne name and likeness licensed by John Wayne Enterprises, LLC. Newport Beach, CA. All rights reserved.
Humphrey Bogart ® Bogart LLC. Licensed by Licensing Artists, LLC. All Rights Reserved.
The use of the name and likeness of John Huston by permission of the Huston Family.
Some Like It Hot © 1959 Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer Studios Inc. All Rights Reserved.
“IT HAPPENED ONE NIGHT” © 1934, renewed 1962 Columbia Pictures Industries, Inc. All Rights Reserved. Courtesy of Columbia Pictures.
THE SEARCHERS © C V Whitney Pictures, Inc. Licensed By: Warner Bros. Entertainment Inc. All Rights Reserved.
THE MALTESE FALCON © Turner Entertainment Co. A Warner Bros. Entertainment Company. All Rights Reserved.
Stamp Art Director, Stamp Designer
Derry Noyes
For more than 40 years Derry Noyes has designed and provided art direction for close to 800 United States postage stamps and stamp products. She holds a bachelor of arts degree from Hampshire College and a master of fine arts degree from Yale University.
Noyes worked as a graphics designer at Beveridge and Associates, a Washington, D.C., firm, until 1979 when she established her own design firm, Derry Noyes Graphics. Her clients have included museums, corporations, foundations, and architectural and educational institutions. Her work has been honored by American Illustration, the Art Directors Club of Metropolitan Washington, Communication Arts, Critique magazine, Graphis, Creativity International, and the Society of Illustrators.
Before becoming an art director for the U.S. Postal Service, she served as a member of the Citizens' Stamp Advisory Committee from 1981 to 1983.
Noyes is a resident of Washington, D.C.
Stamp Artist
Gary Kelley
Renowned illustrator Gary Kelley has created award-winning images for many of America’s major publications and corporations including Time, The New Yorker, Rolling Stone, the National Football League, and Google.
Educated in his native Iowa at the University of Northern Iowa, Kelley received an honorary doctor of humane letters from his alma mater in 1995. His work — honored by the Society of Illustrators as Best in Show as well as with gold and silver medals — has been exhibited throughout the U.S., as well as in Tokyo and Paris. Kelley has illustrated nearly 30 picture books. He has lectured or taught at the Smithsonian Institution, the Chicago Art Institute, the Rhode Island School of Design, and the Art Center College of Design, among others. In 2006, Kelley was inducted into the Society of Illustrators Hall of Fame.
In 1998, the U.S. Postal Service issued his designs for four stamps celebrating Gospel Singers as part of the Legends of American Music series. In 2010, Kelley illustrated the Oscar Micheaux stamp and in 2012, four Great Film Directors stamps. Most recently, Kelly illustrated the stamp art for the 2020 Voices of the Harlem Renaissance issuance.