http://www.detnews.com/article/20090618/BIZ/906180404/1001/Michigan-through-a-Hollywood-lens
Incentives boost state’s film industry; growth depends on production facilities, other support
Nathan Hurst / The Detroit News
West Hollywood — It’s a typical Southern California afternoon, with the sun-drenched mansions of Beverly Hills providing the million-dollar view from Gary Gilbert’s office, seven stories above Sunset Boulevard. But Gilbert, a Southfield native and University of Michigan grad, is more interested in the photos of Michigan’s Sleeping Bear Dunes just delivered by his assistant.
“See, you just can’t get this in California,” says Gilbert, who co-founded Livonia-based Quicken Loans with his brother, Dan, and rose to Hollywood prominence by bankrolling the 2004 surprise-hit indie flick “Garden State.”
“This is what I want Hollywood to see. We’re not just the tax credit state. We’ve got so much more.”
Gilbert is one of a number of Hollywood executives who are assessing the long-term viability of building a film, television and new media production industry in the Great Lakes State.
Michigan now offers the nation’s most lucrative tax incentives for film and television productions and is bracing for a wave of projects that promises a touch of Tinseltown to a state known better for manufacturing.
Hollywood is serious about setting up shop in the state, which is furiously seeking to diversify its economic base that has long been dominated by the auto industry. Michigan officials are working overtime to understand the needs and potential of studio work, a business where dreamy ideas often are bigger than tangible results.
For filmmakers and the financiers behind them, the initial impetus to move production to Michigan is a matter of simple economics: The state’s refundable tax break of up to 42 percent on the cost to produce movies, television shows and new media projects, enacted last year, is the equivalent of handing the film industry a fire sale coupon for expenditures on everything from the actors themselves to the hotels where they rest and the food they eat.
And the potential for the sector’s growth in Michigan is huge.
America’s film industry generated around $60 billion last year, equivalent to roughly 19 percent of Michigan’s entire dwindling economic output for 2009, according to recent estimates.
With the nation’s most aggressive industry tax break, a small but growing portion of that business has been marching against the grim grain of Michigan’s exodus of population and industry.
Last year, according to the Michigan Film Office, 28 productions filmed in Michigan, compared with three in 2007. Those productions spent more than $65 million last year, with an overall economic impact at least double that. Researchers at Michigan State University concluded that by 2012, the film industry could positively boost the state’s economy by an estimated $336 million.
Michigan’s interest in film making isn’t limited to actors, cameras and sound booms. Hollywood’s equivalent of the automakers’ supply industry — companies that perform post-production services such as film processing, for example — are key to development of a financially vibrant film industry.
The growth here — and in other jurisdictions vying for Hollywood’s business — comes at California’s expense. According to Film L.A. Inc., a group that promotes the entertainment industry in Southern California, the number of production days for feature films fell by 56.3 percent in the first quarter of this year, compared with the same period last year.
But for Michigan’s moviemaking boosters in California, the appeal isn’t just in the numbers.
They’re touting the attributes, both good and bad for residents, which make Michigan attractive to filmmakers: stunning natural beauty, a down-and-out workforce that’s itching for a paycheck, and oodles of unused or underutilized buildings and neighborhoods that are perfect for moviemaking.
“It’s a flexible state. Lake Michigan can be the ocean. Downtown Detroit can be any city in the world, if you’re shooting from the right angle,” said Gilbert, who recently wrapped filming for “Meet Monica Velour,” a comedy slated for release this year. It was shot in Detroit, Livonia, Romulus and Westland, and used sound stage space at Farmington Hills-based Grace & Wild, a well-established production conglomerate, as well.
Producer Rob Lorenz is another Hollywood big shot who’s touting Michigan to his California compadres. Last year’s critically acclaimed Clint Eastwood flick “Gran Torino,” he said, was originally scripted for Minnesota.
“When we started looking for places to shoot, Michigan wasn’t on the list,” said Lorenz, who’s looking at Michigan for upcoming projects.
“We looked at Chicago, but we took a look at Michigan because of the tax credits. When we ended up seeing Detroit, we knew we had struck gold.”
Lorenz said the rough-and-tumble, apocalyptic cityscapes of Detroit and Highland Park helped bolster the film’s appeal.
“Right now, I see myriad opportunities” for Michigan, said Michael Moore, chief executive of Raleigh Studios, an independent operation that’s home to big-name productions such as the CBS hit drama “CSI: Miami” and the “Iron Man” feature franchise.
“Michigan has a very strong tax incentive and a very valuable workforce that’s ready to be retrained … the state has shown its commitment,” said Moore, who is no relation to Michigan native Michael Moore, a controversial documentarian.
But for now, Michigan’s role is akin to a promising ingenue with a few lines in a summer box office hit: It’s getting noticed, but industry insiders say there’s a need for a better foundation before the state will really be a star.
The cornerstone of any potential growth is an in-state infrastructure that will allow Michigan to provide a full range of production and post-production facilities. This includes everything from consultants who coordinate the many moving parts of a production to sound stages to post-production facilities that will allow an entire film or television series to be created, from soup to nuts, in Michigan.
That will help change the state’s current status in the industry from what some have termed a “drop-in center” for filming into a place with year-round work providing formidable competition to California.
Already, a handful of endeavors, including two large-scale facilities slated for Pontiac and Allen Park, are seeking to start filling that need. And existing companies such as Grace & Wild, Ferndale’s S3 Entertainment Group and Holland’s TicTock Studios, in west Michigan, already are having success in luring high-profile projects to the state.
“Once Michigan has facilities like that in place, things can really get cooking,” said Gilbert, the financier and producer.
He also wants the state to start crowing about the resources it has that California doesn’t, including the beautiful landscapes — like those he keeps close by in photos.
“If we’re in this for the long-term, Michigan needs to toot its own horn,” Gilbert said. “I believe you can create long-term demand. If I could right now, I would send absolutely every project I could back to Michigan.”