USA Today Article by LMCullen

USA Today Explores Why Louisiana Was Chosen For Filming Breaking Dawn!

by LMCullen on August 3, 2010

USA Today has a new article explaining the incentives, and the reasoning why Louisiana has been the go to place lately to have movies/TV shows filmed. The Expendables, The Green Latern, The Last Exorcism, The Curious Case of Benjamin Button are among some of the movies that have been recently filmed in Louisiana. The extremely popular HBO show True Blood is also filmed in Louisiana.

Here is what they had to say about Breaking Dawn, and the tax incentives Louisiana is offering to gain such huge films -

Breaking Dawn, the fourth installment in the hugely successful Twilight series, films this year in Baton Rouge.

We’re way ahead of the curve in the New Orleans region,” says Katie Gunnell, interim director of the city’s Office of Film and Television. “The city has seen an incredible bump in applications for 2011 as well.”

Across the state, work is consistent and year-round, despite hurricane season and blazing summer temperatures. “We’ve maintained 20 to 25 productions at any given time during the year,” Stelly says. “We’ve doubled for New York City, Los Angeles, the Northwest, basically Anytown, USA.”

Read more after the break!

“You can get an 1800s look, you can get a Parisian look,” says Todd Lewis, producer of The Chaperone. “You can get suburbs, you can get the country. It’s got a little bit of everything.” His movie, out next year, is one of several Louisiana-based films funded by World Wrestling Entertainment and featuring wrestling stars, in this case Paul “Triple H” Levesque.

The state offers the most competitive economic and tax incentives of any in the country. A system of financial perks was enacted after Hurricane Katrina destroyed $81 billion in property and killed 1,836 people in 2005.

“We approached it like a business, and it keeps (filmmakers) coming back, based on our reliability and stability,” Stelly says. “For every dollar you spend in the state, we’ll give you 30% back (in rebates). And we give you an additional 5% for hiring Louisiana residents on productions.”

Tax incentives can be sold as credits or used to offset personal or corporate income tax, he says.

“As things get more expensive, you have to go wherever you get the budget relief,” Lussier notes. “You can no longer use Mulholland Drive for your backwoods road movie.”

There is also the sense among filmmakers that they are helping an area that sorely needs a hand in bouncing back from one of the worst natural disasters in history.

“Louisiana has been through so much, and I’m glad to be able to make a film there,” says Nicole Kidman, who is shooting the 2011 film Trespass in Shreveport this summer with Nicolas Cage.

“The economy desperately needs the film business,” Lurie says. “And it’s fantastic watching people get employed. We hired a thousand people to be extras and put a couple of hundred bucks in their pockets, and that’s helpful to the economy. The film commission is among the most proactive I’ve ever seen.”

It is great to see Louisiana doing well, and attracting huge films! Especially after the devastation they have gone through over the past few years.