The Marietta Daily Journal
Strand, Square sites for movie
by Jon Gillooly
November 09, 2011 11:59 PM
MARIETTA – Disney will be shooting scenes for the made-for-TV movie “Until We Meet Again” by the Glover Park fountain in Marietta Square this evening, Parks Director Rich Buss said.
The movie is a modernized retelling of the story of Cyrano de Bergerac with a musical twist, Brian Albertsman, the film crew’s location manager, told Marietta business owners in an Oct. 19 letter.
“In our story, Cyrus Debarge, a shy young teen, is full of self doubt about himself and his musical talents,” Albertsman wrote. “This doubt prevents him from expressing his love for his long time, close friend and rising musical star, Roxanne.”
Mayor Steve Tumlin said he heard that movie star Bette Midler was acting in the movie, but the Journal could not confirm this because neither Albertsman of GWave Productions in Atlanta nor Disney returned calls for comment.
The film crew rented out the Strand Theatre, where they spent last week preparing an interior set and this week filming scenes inside the theater with several hundred teenagers. They rented the parking lot of First United Methodist Church to use as their base camp, where they have parked a number of trailers and have been feeding the cast and crew.
“There’s plenty of weekday parking there, so I don’t think it’s been a problem,” said Tumlin, a member of that church.
Buss, who charged the crew $500 for the use of Glover Park tonight, expects the filming to start there after 5 p.m.
“Their primary shot is going to be at the fountain,” Buss said. “I don’t know what all else the director’s got cooked up, but basically they’re shooting through the park with the fountain in the background and that type of thing, so it’s not like the whole park is going to be visible in the scene ”¦ but they do need to be able to control pedestrians from walking through the middle of the scene when they’re shooting it.”
A few parking spaces around the Square have been rented to set up cranes that carry the lights and cameras, he said.
Dave Reardon, owner of the Shillings on the Square restaurant, said he had four crewmembers in for lunch on Tuesday. Reardon said a crewmember told him that although he only lives four miles from the Square, he hasn’t had to leave Georgia in three years because there are so many local filming opportunities with the passage of state entertainment tax exemptions.
“He said, ”˜they used to keep me on the move, I’d be flying everywhere,” Reardon said. “He said that thing’s just been a boon. Some people have been opposed to it, saying we’re losing millions of dollars, but he said, ”˜man, they’re making millions of dollars because our crews that are here just doing this film are here for two weeks. It just brings lots and lots of people.’”
Reardon said while the Disney cast for the most part has kept to itself by eating over at the base camp in the church parking lot, he was flooded with people last month, who turned out to catch a glimpse of actors Vince Vaughn and Ben Stiller, who were in town filming a Twentieth Century Fox production called “Neighborhood Watch.”
“That was a huge weekend for me when they were filming,” Reardon said. “I was covered up until about midnight.”
Scenes for “Neighborhood Watch” will also be filmed tonight at Campbell High School’s football stadium, according to the school district.
Gov. Sonny Perdue signed The Georgia Entertainment Industry Investment Act in 2008, which provides an income tax credit of 20 percent to qualified productions, and an additional 10 percent tax credit to productions that embed a Georgia promotional logo in the titles or credits, or as product placement within the content of the production, said Stefanie Paupeck, spokeswoman with the Georgia Department of Economic Development.
The tax credits may be awarded not only to feature films, television series, commercials and music videos, but also to new industries such as video game development and animation. In Fiscal Year 2007, the state had a combined number of productions at 279 with a total value of all production budgets at $132.5 million and an economic impact of $241.5 million. For FY11, Georgia had 327 productions with a total value of all production budgets of $683.5 million and an economic impact of $2.4 billion.
I’m pretty sure the mayor just confused that Disney movie with Parental Guidance
Probably so