I am writing today to announce the closure of the New Mexico Independent. After three and a half years of operation in New Mexico, the board of the American Independent News Network, has decided to shift publication of its news…
While environmental activists played their part yesterday during demonstrations at the capitol building, going so far as to dress up as solar panels and to sing the tune of “You Are My Sunshine,” their counterparts, the anti-cap-and-trade contingency who has…
Roughly one quarter of University of New Mexico students are unimpressed with the state’s flagship public school, according to a survey that questioned college students about their higher education experiences.
Unless you’ve been living under a rock without cable or satellite TV — or without any news in any form — you probably know that the Land of Enchantment is now Hollywood on the Rio Grande.
I would say we’re “Tamalewood,” but there are those who object to making light of the state’s new, glamorous industry and, of course, the ethnic connotations that particular description conveys.
No matter, the point is the same. Ever since ex-Gov. Gary Johnson — a libertarian-minded Republican — and the 2002 Democratic Legislature agreed on a package of tax incentives to lure movies and TV shows here, the actors and the crews that keep them company have steadily adopted New Mexico as a second home.
Last year’s Academy Award-winning best picture — “No Country for Old Men” — was filmed in several New Mexico locales — and the names of many locals are on the film’s closing credits.
A recent Ernst and Young study documented 30 movies produced in New Mexico in 2007, and they generated more than $250 million in spending.
There’s a great debate over how many jobs can be traced directly and indirectly to the state’s foray into movies and TV, but one figure cited by a local film booster puts the 2007 sum total at 9,210 jobs.
Gov. Richardson liked the idea of luring movies and TV to New Mexico so much that he expanded the incentives package — increasing what had been a 15 percent film production tax rebate to 25 percent. The Democratic governor also led the charge to relax state sales taxes on the industry, and he added a program to subsidize the training of New Mexico residents in so-called “advanced below-the-line” crew positions — a subsidy that amounts to a reimbursement of half of the trainees’ wages.
But the crowning jewel of the incentives package is the loan program, in which “qualifying” feature films or TV projects can get up to $15 million per project at the sweetest of sweet interest rates: 0 percent.
Somewhere on the order of $50 million in public funds go to pay for the aforementioned incentives, and that figure could well climb higher.
Earlier this week, I ventured to Albuquerque Studios, a 20 acre-plus site with eight enormous stages — each one resembling an airplane hanger — to interview The Albuquerque Journal’s arts and entertainment writer Dan Mayfield for tonight’s episode of New Mexico In Focus.
An edited version will appear on the KNME broadcast, but you can watch an unedited version of that interview above. As you’ll see, Mayfield is a wealth of information — this is his beat after all — on the history of the state’s generous incentives program, how they’ve worked in practice, and what the future holds for the state’s burgeoning entertainment industry.
Later in the week, I moderated a debate of sorts with state Rep. Dennis Kintigh, a Roswell Republican, and Jon Hendry, the business agent for IATSE 480, the local union for New Mexico film technicians. Both were interviewed separately as a previously scheduled panel of four imploded just hours before we were set to go.
I’m still not exactly clear why, but basically some interviewees didn’t want to be in the same room with others.
Kintigh, a freshman lawmaker, was the author of a bill that would have repealed the state’s tax incentives — and in the interview, he defends his proposal. It was an unsuccessful proposal, killed in the House Business and Industry Committee by a lopsided margin.
Hendry, on the other hand, is a staunch defender of the incentives — and he mounts that defense with his trademark Scottish accent.
Check out an edited version of those two interviews to the right.
Hendry also responded to the controversy that surrounded an altered version of a legislative analysis that he distributed to lawmakers before the committee vote. At the time, many lawmakers said they felt misinformed — and Hendry has since appologized.
Sound like the makings of a suspense-filled drama flick — filmed, of course, in New Mexico? Santa Fe resident Alan Arkin could play Kintigh and Sean Connery could play Hendry?
Maybe the project could even qualify for some tax incentives.
I can see those smirks staring at this computer screen right now — but just keep in mind that everyone thought “Slumdog Millionaire” was headed straight to DVD.
