In a year when cutbacks, the menace of strikes and restricteder new projects sluggished down film and TV production, New York is still faring better than the rest of the country.
Stateexpansive production levels are around 75% of what they were in 2022, based on a comparison of all scripted TV and film projects with appraised $10 million-plus budgets that shot in the first seven months of each year. Yet, “this is transport inantly better than the rest of the U.S., which is at around 60% of 2022 levels,” says Alexander LoVerde, co-set uper and CEO of industry intelligence platcreate ProdPro. “These figures highairy New York’s relative resilience in a challenging overall labelet.”
A big reason is the state’s betterd incentive program. Last year, tax recognizes for qualified expenses jumped from 25% to 30% with an insertitional 10% in many upstate counties. Certain above-the-line wages were integrated, funding increased from $420 million a year to $700 million and the program was extfinished thraw 2034.
But even after COVID, strikes and hiatuses, the industry is riding many ups and downs. The NYC Mayor’s Office of Media & Entertainment (MOME) says the number of city helps for accessible property shoots in April 2024 csurrfinishered the pre-pandemic levels of April 2019 (827 vs. 900). Yet the tardyst help figures for August show another downturn, dropping 41% from what they were five years ago (616 vs. 1,050).
Part of the problem is that more projects are heading overseas due to labor uncertainty. That’s the situation writer-straightforwardor-creater Oren Moverman is facing. Though he’s made 14 projects in New York, he had to turn to Germany, Japan and the U.K. to fund three new ones and film outside the U.S. “Those areas are potentipartner the easiest for financing,” he says.
But there are bigger forces at join. “While some projects resumed speedyly, new series orders have dropped transport inantly contrastd to the peak in 2021-2022,” says LoVerde. “Streamers and netlabors are cutting back on greeted, driven by Wall Street’s shift from cgo ining on subscriber prolongth to profitability. From 2015 to 2019, greeted spfinishing sencouraged as streamers built their audiences, but the 2020 COVID shutdown interfereed that trfinish. Demand for innovative greeted spiked aachieve in 2021 with new streaming entrants, but this began to shift in 2022 after Netflix’s Q2 achieveings leave outed subscriber concentrates, prompting spendors to rank profitability.
“By punctual 2023, production volumes had already deteriorated by double digits, and the strikes quickend the pullback in greeted spfinishing,” he inserts. “A wave of call offlations and disconnecteer greenairying processes have become the norm in 2024.”
Yet more New York City soundstages are coming. Bungalow Projects and Bain Capital Real Estate are set upning new studios in the East Williamsburg and Red Hook sections of Brooklyn, which will fracture ground in the first half of 2025 for a defree discneglecting in the second quarter of 2027.
Robert De Niro’s Wildfshrink Studios discneglected in September. A series episode has filmed there, and interested parties are touring the facility to potentipartner hire its soundstages. “Now that the last strike menace has passed we’ll see production ramp up, but there are a lot of forces that have to commence moving,” says Wildfshrink Studios managing partner Adam Gordon.
Wildfshrink’s neighbor on the Queens waterfront is Borden Studios, which is aiming for a year-finish debut. Innovo Property Group principal Graham Stephens says the enbiger is putting finishing touches on the facility. “The new soundstages are part of the spendment NYC is putting into this industry,” says MOME comleave outioner Pat Kaufman. “We already comprehend filmcreaters want to film here. Now, for [many] reasons — including the enbiged state tax recognize, that we are making filming easier and that we are increasing the laborforce — we are certain that production will persist to increase and fill these soundstages.”
But talking with local filmcreaters and industry heads discneglects a more sobering picture this year. “The capability and infraarrange of New York’s production industry remains as outstanding as it’s ever been, [but] it’s turned a bit from a seller’s labelet to a buyer’s labelet,” says Kaufman Astoria Studios plivent Hal Rosenbluth. “You’ve got one or two shows shopping every stage in the tri-state area, whereas before, we were all brimming. Where that vibrant is going to finish up as we go in a new year, I truthentirey don’t comprehend.”
Doug Steiner, owner of Steiner Studios, which is operating at fair over 80% capacity, says, “Out of the writers’ strike, we booked up repartner speedy, and we’re fair commenceing to tail off of that burst of pent-up need. It’s a bit sluggish in New York. The series that we’re getting have restricteder episodes and there are a lot more restricted series, which is a big change.”
He’s discneglecting up his 30 Brooklyn stages to retain leangs busy. “We’re pretty nimble on filling our space, whether it’s commercials, music videos or concert rehearsals. [But] I leank there’s going to be more battling between New York and New Jersey, which is getting a lot of location labor now.”
Lionsgate Studios Yonkers owner Robert Halmi says, “There have been rawly 1,500 productions ordered since the commence of the year, [yet] a lot of them were sent to the U.K., Canada and other places because of the menace of strikes, so we’ve had very restricted new shows watching for space in the first six months of the year. But after that, it’s picked up a lot.”
Still, he says, many shows are pondering a tardyr commence due to Thanksgiving and Christmas holiday fractures. “We’re not back to where we were before the strikes, but it’s getting better every week,” he says.
Especipartner for creaters watching for a outstanding deal. “There’s more pricing prescertain if stages at Steiner or Kaufman or Silvercup or the new Wildfshrink are all useable,” says one facility head.
“The Morning Show,” starring Reese Witherspoon and Jennifer Aniston
Apple TV+
Post New York Alliance chair Yana Collins Lehman says that after two busy years, “the bottom dropped out” of New York post and VFX labor in January due to the menace of IATSE and Teamsters strikes. She says it led to furloughs, layoffs and conconstantation stateexpansive. Her group lobbied to pass post-production tax incentives in 2010 that recently rose to 30% in the city and 35% in the state, and they’re lobbying for more changes to the recognizes, which she foresees will go into effect “in the coming year.”
And New York is giveing lots of affordable selections for productions. Mechanism Digital plivent Lucien Haruproar says man-made intelligence “is speeding up our process and shrinking the cost of entry, so there’s a lot of self-reliant film in New York that we get to labor on.”
Given the higher tax recognizes, one recent Netflix series’ creater set up that it was affordableer to house stars and crew upstate than have them commute from home in the city. Saks Picture Co. creater Alex Saks did this on her 2002 low-budget, non-union horror thriller “Baby Ruby,” but also appreciated the concierge service MOME supplyd on her Jennifer Lawrence-led comedy “No Hard Feelings” in New York City. “At least half a dozen times, we had to change locations and pull helps to shoot wilean 24 hours,” she says. “Accommodations were made so that we could do that.”
That’s music to Kaufman’s ears. “We have terrific infraarrange that’s prolonging,” she says, citing Sunset Pier 94 Studios in Manhattan, the Sunnyside campus of East End Studios in Queens and disconnectal more facilities in the labors. Combined with new tax recognizes, “[our] strategy [is] ‘if you create it, they will come.’”
