Filming in New Orleans

NEW ORLEANS DOESN’T need to shout
to be heard; it attracts enough attention just being itself, thank
you. Even so, portraying it as merely a backdrop seems somewhat
of an injustice, a misallocation of talent. Perhaps more than any
place, save for New York, L.A., Paris, London, and a few oddities
like Vegas, this city exerts its influence on a movie’s storyline
without even trying.

Ask a true local, though, if any movie has ever gotten "N’ahwlins" (199
sq. mi.,  pop. 500,000) "right," and chances are your
query will be met with a resounding "Nope." Features
shot here seem mostly to have been directed by outsiders who don’t
know the difference between "Cajun" (Acadian French/Louisianan)
and "Creole" (French, Spanish or Portuguese /Louisianan),
and so just don’t have the "lagniappe" (that little something
extra) that might transcend the Gumpian clichés so often present
in New Orleans film productions.

"It’s ironic," notes John Desplas of The
New Orleans Film and Video Society, "because on one level
you have the problem that films don’t come here to shoot unless
they feel the city is going to be a character in their film, but
when they do come here and want the city to be a character, location
they play it as cliché and for caricature—Mardis Gras, Cajun accents,
and so forth. A great opportunity exists for someone to portray
New Orleans in a non-stereotypical way." One director who
has the potential to "do" New Orleans right is Francis
James, who grew up here, went to school in Philadelphia, came back
on an NEA/AFI grant to make the award-winning film Moon Blue
Traces, and wound up starting his own company, Perception Films.
His latest is the feature Tony Bravo, filmed entirely in
New Orleans, which he hopes to screen at next year’s Sundance Film
Festival.

James, who started out as a fine artist, calls this
city his "perfect palette." "There’s a feel here
that’s a balance between Mardis Gras and Lent," says James. "It’s
the only place where the streets of piety and desire intersect.
You can’t stop life here because life rules this city. Some people
get in trouble with all the distractions here, but I can work my
butt off ’til four in the morning and afterward still meet friends
and have fun," enthuses James, comparing the late night scene
to New York’s.

Francis James may represent the future, but there’s
also plenty of celluloid history in New Orleans. Seminal features
that have filmed here include Five Easy Pieces; Easy
Rider; The Big Easy; Live and Let Die; Angel
Heart; Forest Gump; JFK; Dead Man Walking,
and Elia Kazan’s version of Streetcar Named Desire, to name
but a very few. But those major productions were by no means the
city’s first forays into cinema. This is where William "Pop" Rock
opened Vitascope Hall, the first movie house in the U.S., in 1896,
which only slightly preceded the city’s first silent film studios.

"New Orleans offers one of the most diverse
and attractive landscapes in the world," said Kimberly Carbo,
Director of the New Orleans Film and Video Commission. "It’s
a place where creative people seem to flourish. And we have an
approach that addresses a filmmakers’ needs in-house. The Film
Office here is part of the Mayor’s Office, so we can cut out a
lot of the red tape that filmmakers have to go through in other
communities.

"We also work with a lot of young filmmakers
to make their projects cost effective," Carbo said. "Our
New Orleans Film and Video Resource Guide lists fees for certain
services, but we tell them they don’t always need to spend money.
We’ve gotten the Mayor to agree to a rate release on fees for city
services. We structure the city’s involvement to suit the budget.
We want to embrace the industry."

The Commission is a great place to get started if
you want to shoot here. Their guide provides most of the requirements
for filming here, as well lists of potential crew. The Commission
also provides photos and/or video footage to guide you in choosing
loca­tions. On the state level, Louisiana is a "right to work" state,
so producers can expect rea­sonable per diem rates for crew. Louisiana
also provides a four percent rebate on sales and use taxes if your
company’s production spending tops. $1 million for the year. (Canada,
by comparison, offers an up to 35 percent rebate, in addition to
its favorable currency exchange rates).

"Structurally, we need something done on a Federal
level, then we can do something on the state level so we’re competing
with other states instead of with Canada," says Louisiana
Film Commissioner, Peter Loop, who last year introduced a payroll
tax rebate for Louisiana residents and other pro­duction incentives,
but these were voted down by the legislature.

"We’re in that wake-up call mode," says
former A. D. Loop, who says it wouldn’t hurt if crew members would
take the time to write to their representatives. "Here in
Louisiana we’ve been especially hurt by runaway production," he
laments. Several productions set in New Orleans shot in Canada
last year, so even though those films didn’t actually look like
New Orleans, it apparently didn’t matter to those companies. Location
is becoming less and less important. It’s the bottom line that’s
the determining factor, so we’re trying to get to the point where
we can help people with their bottom line." Loop, qualifies
his argument by adding," I don’t think it’s right for us to
criticize Canada for doing something well. It would be a shame
if we didn’t look at how they do it and try to compete so we can
pull the industry back to the U.S."

SOMETHING NEW ORLEANS Mayor Mark H. Morial has done
to make pre-production less painful is to establish the Mayor’s
Office of Tourism, Arts and Entertainment (MOTAI) which provides
a "Production Opportunity Hotline," and acts as a liaison
between municipal organi­zations and production companies. And
Mayor Morial has also shown his support for the industry by establishing
the Mayor’s Film and Video Award, presented annually in recognition
of an industry professional deemed most supportive of the growth
and development of the New Orleans production community.

Local industry insiders are the first to admit to
the area’s lack of local crew depth when it comes to recruiting
for large scale productions. "We need to expand our pool of
people by expanding our school’s film programs," explains
Walter Wolf, of the New Orleans Film & Video Society. "We
also need to build more real and proper sound­stages so interiors
can be shot and bigger budget features will come here, which will
in turn grow our crew base."

For now, New Orleans offers the ability to recruit
from neighboring film communities such as Texas, Mississippi and
Florida to fill in the gaps, but most locals say they prefer the
smaller crew base, noting it makes for a familial bond that creates
a more patient attitude on the set. "My crew oper­ates as
a family," says Francis James. "We even bring our dogs
to the set and all break for lunch together. And we all have a
per­sonal interest in how the film does."

Locals also point out the added advantage of the
low cost of living, which drives down per diem expenses significantly.
Although activity this year is slightly down from ’96-’98, when
total direct production expenditures were $176 million and total
economic impact was $528 million, direct production expenditures
in New Orleans over the last eight-and-three-quarter years is an
impressive $355.2 million, which trans­lates to an average estimated
economic impact of $114.4 million per year.

"This year’s been a strange one, just like everywhere,
I think, because we’ve seen less feature production," admits
Kimberly Carbo. "A lot of our production dollars have come
from commercials, television, music videos and that kind of thing." Even
with these woes, the local industry has shown a certain resiliency,
hosting five "We’re documentaries and three features thus
far in ’99. Documentaries have included Music of the World for
Japan television, and Swingin’ with the Duke: Duke Ellington
Centennial, for Storyville Films, as well as Green Street Films’ Sympathy
for the Devil, and Perception Films’ Tony Bravo.

Tony Bravo producer Michael Arata is a former actor
turned producer. He, along with fellow actor, Mark Krasnoff and
local restaurateur, Glen Armantrout founded Circle in the Sky and
Wide-Eyed Films, financiers of locally written independent films.
Arata has been promoting New Orleans to foreign filmmakers and
is also working with several documentary filmmakers.

"It’s funny," says Arata of his original
intentions, "we thought we’d just produce films we could act
in. What we’ve done is create a ton of employment for local people
and obtained financing from local investors who would never have
thought about film as an investment opportunity. They can see the
excitement that the film industry brings, but more importantly,
they get to see film as an economic engine; they see the instant
economic impact that the industry has and they recognize the vitality
that it can bring to any economy."

Arata works with Baton Rouge-based producer Pat Ballard,
who has been instrumental in plugging him into the big industry
players." He’s been a valuable commodity to the area," says
Arata who, like so many other indie producers, has looked to Austin,
Texas as an example of a community to emulate. Arata and company
recently took their case to the state capitol to show Governor
M J. "Mike" Foster, Jr. legislation passed in Texas to
create incentive for filmmakers there.

"We got him behind the idea of passing legislation
next year to create incentives for people to invest in Louisiana
productions. It’s a pun," says Arata, "but if they get
the picture, we can get the pictures.” Walter Wolf agrees. "We’re
beyond taxiing, we’re hurtling down the runway and we’re just looking
for enough lift and momentum to really take off," he says
in frustration of the potentially huge film scene in New Orleans.

No one’s enthusiasm seems dampened by the struggle
to find answers. “New Orleans is terrific,” exalts Arata.  “There’s
a great blend of cultures— white, black, Hispanic, Central American,
North American, Canadian, Italian, whatever, and the neigh­borhoods
(dubbed "Parishes" in native lingo) aren’t just `one
side of the tracks’ and ,the other side,’ but literally house-by-house-by-house," he
says, explaining that this creates a sense of community not present
in many other cities.

Louisiana, as a whole, also has a lot of other unique
offerings. Jazz, of course, is king here, but sometimes tips its
brown derby to the blues. This is where Buddy Bolden invented the
genre, and Jelly Roll Morton and Louis Armstrong both spent time
expounding upon it down in the city’s old Storyville District.
Today, the Marsalis family passes the New Orleans musical tradition
on to a new generation by teaching and per­forming at Louisiana
State University.

A lot of performing is also done at venues all over
town. Places like Preservation Hall certainly need no introduction
… nor do some of the industry people who have con­nections here,
including Ellen DeGeneres, John Larroquette and Francis Ford Coppola,
who recently purchased a home in the French Quarter.

THE FACT THAT filmmakers are so comfortable here
has been a boon to the Annual New Orleans Film & Video Festival,
sponsored in part by MovieMaker, which takes place
for 10 days each October. More than 7,000 showed up for last year’s
festival, which describes itself as being "Closer than Cannes,
too fun for Toronto," and "not knowing the meaning of
taboo,"’ and features regional premiers of new works by some
of the most provocative filmmakers in the world. The festival is
about as filmmaker-friendly as is possible, and pretension just
isn’t in style here.

"We’re here in part to nurture the local industry
by showcasing our talent and providing opportunities for national
and international industry professionals to meet our local people," says
Carole Gnaidy, Festival Director. "We present very comfort­able
settings for film screenings. There’s not a lot of the `I’ve gotta
make a sale and find a distributor’ pressure here. We encourage
informal networking in a relaxed, fun atmosphere, and our exotic
location makes people love to come here. Our staff and volunteers
work around the clock to show visiting filmmakers beyond the typical
French Quarter/Bourbon Street locations and introduce them to other
filmmakers. We make sure they have a wonderful time-and the nightly
after hours bar tours are worth the price of admission alone, Gnaidy
adds with a wink in her voice."

Festival co-founder and artistic director John Desplas
reports that with the growing number of festivals, New Orleans
has had to distinguish itself as being different in order to continue
to attract top films. One example is the festival’s effort to position
itself as a top venue for foreign filmmakers. "Other festivals
aren’t as receptive to them, so we’ve been encouraging entries
from abroad, and we’ve gotten a lot." Foreign filmmakers aren’t
so caught up in the "let’s wait until we see if Sundance accepts
us first" syndrome, Desplas said.

Some substantial prizes were awarded at the 1998
Festival. Ruth’s Chris Steak House $5,000 award went to the top
film, My Country, Milos Radovic’s comedic portrayal of tragic
events in Serbia, while the MovieMaker Magazine Breakthrough
Award, a prize package worth $15,000 in goods and services, went
to Jodie Markell for Why I Live at the P.O., based on Eudora
Welty’s classic story. The opening Gala honored Francis Ford Coppola,
who was in attendance.

THE FILM FEST isn’t the only indie scene in town,
though. New Orleans has a slew of organizations set up specifically
to assist moviemakers. One is The New Orleans Video Access Center
(NOVAC) which functions like most public access cable studios do,
except NOVAC is unique in that it also serves as a workshop and
networking center. Another bearing indie fruit is "Short Story
Theater," which airs locally written and produced half-hour
dramatizations on New Orleans Access Television.

"Our Access people, including some of our best
independent filmmakers, are producing quality pilots on Digital
Beta that might eventually get picked up by major production companies," says
Kimberly Carbo. "It’s become a fountain for the local independent
community. I know of nowhere else in the country where free TV
is being promoted and handled through commercial means."

Potential pilots and jazz improv is great, but if
structure is what you need, there are a multitude of architectural
gems to choose from here, including wrought iron balconies, cornstalk
fences and shuttered French doors. There are also several period
railway stations to choose from, streetcar lines which still run,
and stern-wheeling steamboats that continue to paddle down the
Mississippi River. There’re also beaches, pine forests, lush vegetation
and four major lakes nearby. Geographically and architecturally,
Louisiana offers far more than one might think. The tendency is
to only consider the French Quarter, or the shrimp boats, or the
sprawling, Spanish moss-covered plantations, or the bayous and
cypress swamps. But there’s a much wider mix of locations, which
include grain elevators, brick sugar mills, crawfish ponds, flooded
rice fields, working docks and wharves, and a warehouse district
with restaurants, and galleries that spent their former lives as
factories.

The state lists some 450 structures in the National
Register of Historic Places, and more than a fair share of them
are located in New Orleans and the surrounding environs. Add French
Colonial antebellum-style mansions, Greek Revival buildings with
neoclassical town squares, Creole cottages, and you’ve got an impressively
diverse lot. Moreover, the city’s geographic versatility is astounding.
Moviemakers have had it double for New York, Boston, Paris, Havana,
Southeast Asia, and French Colonial America, among other places.

And while Paris has the stately statues of Pere le
Chaise, the Big Easy’s aboveground graveyards offer a rustic alabaster
look or, if you prefer, run-down Roman temples in miniature. The
psychedelic love-in scenes in Fonda/Hopper’s Easy Rider used St.
Louis Cemetery to great effect, showcasing the irreverent-yet-pious
mix this city is famous for. That’s why people flock here to visit
or to make films. As W. Kenneth Holditch put it, New Orleans is "a
uniquely diverse city more Mediterranean than American, more Latin
than Southern." This is a place that has never had to fret
about loyalty. Writers, for instance, love New Orleans passionately,
even while satirizing it. The city is well docu­mented in literature,
having been the muse of such writers as Mark Twain, Sherwood Anderson,
William Faulkner, Tennessee Williams, Walker Percy, and Anne Rice.

If you get here, perhaps you’ll wind up at St. Louis
Cathedral, singing gospel with the parishioners, or at some French
Quarter watering hole where hard drinkin’ wiseguy attorneys suggest
you check out Madame Tinkertoys House of Blue Lights on Toulouse
Street. Just don’t call whining if you wake up the next morning
in a state of confusion with someone’s stereo blarin’ "Voodoo
Chile" an’ tha hair an’ tha dawg pippin’ at ya brain an’ tha
Ol’ Testyment unda’ ya’ pillah…you’ll only be proving you’re
human like everyone else here. That’s what makes this place such
a piece of work-it’s driven neither by industry nor idea-but by
its very humanity. And though New Orleans may never shirk the bonds
of tension between the order and decency of its proper folk and
the raunchy revelry of its more loose-cut denizens-perhaps it has
no desire to. Sometimes underlying tension is the best thing, for
it begets an undeniable spark of energy-a flame that ignites the
creative passions of the heart. MM