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New update for Connecticut Film/TV tax incentives
posted by
shoeshoe14
on
August 24, 2007 at 9:45 am
Back in May, I posted on here the new law that Connecticut offered filmmakers to attract film and television to the state. It consists of a 30 percent tax credit for productions costing $50,000 or more and is one of the most generous in the country. Credits cannot be granted to actors making more than $10 million to anyone working on a production or their representatives. This past July, the State Legislature extended this credit to any production company doing commercials, etc.
Since this passed one year ago, we have had 36 productions filmed in Fairfield and New Haven Counties, with “Revolutionary Road” (Winslet and DiCaprio) filming in Bridgeport, Bethany, etc as well as “Sisterhood of the Travelling Pants 2”, filmed at Western CT State University in Danbury and most recently, John Travolta, Kelly Preston, Robin Williams and Seth Green in Disney’s “Old Dogs” in Redding. They filmed at the Redding Community Center and for 5 days at Putnam Park, where the crew camped each night. The stars rented houses in Greenwich, because they were shooting in Redding and New York City. (They paid $5,000 for the community center and a very generous $8,000 for the state park.*)
The problem is Connecticut has only one production facility but no soundstages or infrastructure. If all these mediums keep coming here, we need a system in place.
On August 16, Gov. Rell gave a press conference with special guest, John Travolta, at Putnam Park in Redding. It dealt with a new chapter in the tax incentives – to offer greater tax incentives to production companies that film here. The new law creates jobs and “establishes new, transferable credits against the corporation and insurance premium taxes for investments in film and digital media infrastructure projects and digital animation productions. It also directs our Office of Workforce Competitiveness to establish a training program to supply employees for our state’s burgeoning film industry.”
Comments (3)
“The problem is Connecticut has only one production facility but no soundstages or infrastructure. If all these mediums keep coming here, we need a system in place.”
They are currently setting up a building in Norwalk, CT just for that. It is supposed to be used for movies and tv.
Yep. I forgot to mention that. The Redding Pilot online version differed from the fuller print version.
Also, I wrote that 3 productions were happening, I meant it to say 36. Before the law was in effect last year, Connecticut received $1 million in taxes but now has received $450 million in revenue!
Oh yeah, that * I put in. I thought the $8,000 was too little but then after talking to the head of the CT State Parks/DEP, he told me it was more than generous. I thought it was too little because of the 5 full days of closure, 24/7 and camping. If they gave money to the Parks System, it would get spread out statewide, so they gave directly to the park itself. I wanted to see if Hollywood did their homework. I also asked how much Putnam Park received in a year and then to divide that by 52 weeks and see if the $8K was adequate but he was unable to provide numbers since money is split in this region between Putnam Park in Redding, Paugusett Forest in Newtown and Kettletown in Southbury. He told me not to worry, it was very generous.