Agency overview | |
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Headquarters | 153 Halsey Street, Newark, New Jersey, US |
Agency executives |
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Parent agency | New Jersey Economic Development Authority (Tim Sullivan, CEO) |
Website | www |
The New Jersey Motion Picture & Television Commission is a U.S. state government entity that promotes and facilitates film and television production in New Jersey. [2]
As the birthplace of American cinema prior to Hollywood, New Jersey has long held an attraction for producers, both for its locations and the tax credits offered by the state, which are granted by its parent agency, the New Jersey Economic Development Authority. [3] [4] The film commission's offices are located in the Gibraltar Building on Halsey Street in Newark.
The NJMPTC's chair is Batman film producer Michael Uslan, who was appointed in 2016. [5] [6] In 2024, Emmy award-winning showrunner, director and television producer Joe Crowley was appointed as the executive director. [7]
The film commission was created in 1976 by Governor of New Jersey Brendan Byrne. Its first chairman was Pulitzer Prize-winning playwright and screenwriter Sidney Kingsley. [8]
Governor of New Jersey Chris Christie suspended filming-related credits in 2010, but in 2011 the New Jersey State Legislature approved the restoration and expansion of the tax credit program. The program offered 20 percent tax credits statewide and 22% in urban enterprise zone, to television and film productions that met the standards for hiring and local spending. [9] [10] The tax credit was lower than that of other states offering similar incentives. [11] [12] A controversy arose in 2011, when the governor threatened to veto the payment of tax rebates to the production company of Jersey Shore , a program he and others felt negatively portrayed New Jersey. [13] [14] [15] Ultimately, Christie vetoed legislation for the program's renewal and it lapsed for several years. [16] [17]
When Governor Phil Murphy took office, he instated the New Jersey Film & Digital Media Tax Credit Program in 2018 and expanded it in 2020 and 2023. The initial benefits in 2018, prior to expansion, included a 30% tax credit on film projects and a 40% subsidy for studio developments. [18] [19] [20] [21]
A number of new production studios, such as Netflix Studios Fort Monmouth and Lionsgate Newark Studios are under development.
Murphy signed legislation in January 2023 increasing the state's digital media content production tax credit to 35% of qualified expenses purchased through vendors in the southern part of the state (Atlantic, Burlington, Camden, Cape May, Cumberland, Gloucester, Mercer and Salem counties). [22] [23]
New Jersey offers one of the few diversity credit programs among the states. The tax credit includes a 2% or 4% diversity bonus for productions that hire creatives and crew who are women and/or persons who identify as the following ethnicities: Black, Native American, Latino, of Spanish cultural origin regardless of race, or Asian. [24] Choose NJ has marketed this feature to attract more Bollywood productions to the state. [25]
In 2023, New Jersey launched its Film Ready Program, encouraging more municipalities to become "film ready." [26] The program, overseen by the commission, is a five-step certification and marketing initiative that prepares towns to handle film and TV production more efficiently and safely as designated film-ready communities. [27] The program aims to attract more production companies to the state, as filmmaking is said to have contributed significantly to the local economy in New Jersey, bringing in over $650 million in 2022 alone. By becoming a "film-ready"-certified community by the state, municipalities make it more likely to obtain increased local spend by visiting productions. The towns additionally are said to gain publicity for tourism and local businesses by appearing in movies and television shows. [28] [29]
In 2023, two South Jersey counties, Gloucester and Camden, founded the South Jersey Film Office Cooperative to work with the commission to facilitate filming and the resultant economic activity in the area. [30] The Union County film board in North Jersey also facilitates local filming, and other counties and the city of Newark have similar officies. [31]
In 2020, the commission was nominated for an LGMI award for Outstanding Film Commission by the Location Managers Guild International.
New Jersey is a state situated within both the Mid-Atlantic and Northeastern regions of the United States. It is the most densely populated of all 50 U.S. states, and is situated at the center of the Northeast megalopolis. New Jersey is bordered on its north and east by New York state; on its east, southeast, and south by the Atlantic Ocean; on its west by the Delaware River and Pennsylvania; and on its southwest by Delaware Bay and Delaware. At 7,354 square miles (19,050 km2), New Jersey is the fifth-smallest state in land area, but with close to 9.3 million residents as of the 2020 United States census, its highest decennial count ever, it ranks 11th in population. The state capital is Trenton, and the state's most populous city is Newark. New Jersey is the only U.S. state in which every county is deemed urban by the U.S. Census Bureau with 13 counties included in the New York metropolitan area, seven counties in the Philadelphia metropolitan area, and Warren County part of the heavily industrialized Lehigh Valley metropolitan area.
Newark is the most populous city in the U.S. state of New Jersey, the seat of Essex County, and a principal city of the New York metropolitan area. As of the 2020 census, the city's population was 311,549. The Population Estimates Program calculated a population of 305,344 for 2022, making it the 66th-most populous municipality in the nation.
WNET, branded on-air as "Thirteen", is a primary PBS member television station licensed to Newark, New Jersey, United States, serving the New York City area. Owned by The WNET Group, it is a sister station to the area's secondary PBS member, Garden City, New York–licensed WLIW, and two class A stations: WMBQ-CD, and WNDT-CD. The WNET Group also operates New Jersey's PBS state network NJ PBS, and the website NJ Spotlight through an outsourcing agreement.
The New Jersey Network (NJN) was a network of public television and radio stations serving the U.S. state of New Jersey. NJN was a member of the Public Broadcasting Service (PBS) for television and the National Public Radio (NPR) for radio, broadcasting their programming as well as producing and broadcasting their own programming, mostly relating to issues in New Jersey. With studios in both Trenton and Newark, NJN's television network covered all of New Jersey, plus parts of Pennsylvania, New York, Connecticut and Delaware. The radio network primarily served several areas of New Jersey that were not covered by Philadelphia and New York City public radio stations.
Michael E. Uslan is an American lawyer and film producer. Uslan has also dabbled in writing and teaching, he is known for being the first instructor to teach an accredited course on comic book folklore at any university.
Christopher James Christie is an American politician and former federal prosecutor who served as the 55th governor of New Jersey from 2010 to 2018. A member of the Republican Party, he was the United States Attorney for New Jersey from 2002 to 2008 and a Morris County commissioner from 1995 to 1997. He was a candidate for the Republican presidential nomination in 2016 and 2024.
Hollywood East is a term for the multiple efforts to build film industry agglomerations on the East Coast of the United States. Recently, the term has been applied to the growing film industry in New England, particularly in Massachusetts and Connecticut, that served as home to the production of over 140 major motion pictures and television series between 2000 and 2013. It is a reference to Hollywood, California, the center of the American film industry, located on the west coast of the United States. The term as used in New England was popularized in the press in 2007 as film and television productions migrated to the east coast to take advantage of the region's scenery, culture, character, and tax incentives put in place by several state governments.
The Heights or Jersey City Heights is a neighborhood in Jersey City, New Jersey, located atop the New Jersey Palisades, along the west side of the Hudson River. It is bound by Paterson Plank Road on the north, Highway 139 on the south, Hoboken on the east, and the Hackensack River on the west. and Penhorn Creek on the west. Its postal area ZIP Codes are 07307, and portions of 07306.
Runaway production is a term used by the American Hollywood industry to describe filmmaking and television productions that are intended for initial release/exhibition or television broadcast in the U.S., but are actually filmed outside of the immediate Los Angeles area, whether in another country, another U.S. state, or in another part of California.
The official history of motion picture production in the U.S. state of Michigan dates back to the beginning of the Post–World War II baby boom. As of March 14, 2013, the Michigan Film Office website contains a list of 319, filmed in Michigan titles, beginning with This Time for Keeps, starring Esther Williams and in 1946, followed by Anatomy of a Murder, starring Jimmy Stewart and Lee Remick in 1959. Contemporary nationally known works filmed in the state include the drama Conviction (2010), starring Hilary Swank and Sam Rockwell, Kill the Irishman (2011), starring Val Kilmer and Christopher Walken, HBO's series Hung was filmed, and is set in, Detroit, and the Discovery Channel's Motor City Motors (2009), formerly Monster Garage (2002-2006). Originally slated for Minneapolis, Minnesota, Clint Eastwood's film Gran Torino (2008) was filmed in the Detroit area.
LIFT Productions was the first concerted private sector effort to combat "runaway production" of film and television from the United States. In the 1990s the U.S. market lost over 100,000 production-related jobs, as motion picture and television programming increasingly became manufactured offshore. The outflow of work was in large part due to lucrative incentives offered by Canada, its provinces, and European Union members.
The California Film Commission (CFC) was founded in 1985 by then California Governor George Deukmejian to act in an economic development capacity for the state. It is a part of the California Trade and Commerce Agency, formerly the Business, Transportation, and Housing Agency. Its purpose is to enhance California's position as the location of choice for motion picture, television and commercial production.
Movie production incentives are tax incentives offered on a state-by-state basis throughout the United States to encourage in-state film production. Since the 1990s, states have offered increasingly competitive incentives to lure productions away from other states. The structure, type, and size of the incentives vary from state to state. Many include tax credits and exemptions, and other incentive packages include cash grants, fee-free locations, or other perks.
There is a long history of television and film in New Jersey, which is considered the birthplace of the movie picture industry.
The film industry in Louisiana has grown dramatically in recent years largely due to the state's 2002 tax incentives aimed at attracting film and television companies. The success of Louisiana's film industry caused the state to be nicknamed "Hollywood South" or "Hollywood on the Bayou".
NJ PBS is a public television network serving the U.S. state of New Jersey. The network is owned by the New Jersey Public Broadcasting Authority (NJPBA), an agency of the New Jersey state government which owns the licenses for all but one of the PBS member stations licensed in the state. NJPBA outsources the network's operations to Public Media NJ, a wholly-owned subsidiary of New York City–based The WNET Group, the parent company of Newark, New Jersey–licensed WNET and Garden City, New York–licensed WLIW. In addition to PBS programming, NJ PBS airs shows distributed by American Public Television (APT); the network also produces and broadcasts its own programs, mostly related to issues in New Jersey. NJ PBS' operations are based in Englewood, New Jersey. Its anchor studio is located at Gateway Center in Newark. Master control and some internal operations are based at WNET's studios in the Worldwide Plaza complex in Midtown Manhattan.
The Virginia Film Office is a part of the Virginia Tourism Corporation located in Richmond, Virginia. The Virginia Film Office brings jobs and revenue to the Commonwealth by marketing the state as a location for film, television, and commercial production and by supporting and fostering Virginia's in-state production industry.
1888 Studios is a proposed film and television studio planned to be built on a 70 acres (28 ha) site at Bergen Point in Bayonne, New Jersey. Its name is a nod to the year the movie camera was invented. At 22 million gross square feet, reports say it will be the largest ground-up movie studio complex in North America.
Lionsgate Newark Studios is a 350,000 square foot film and television production studio under construction in Newark, New Jersey. It is located in Dayton in the South Ward on 15 acres (6.1 ha) of land overlooking Weequahic Golf Course west of Newark Liberty International Airport.
Cinelease Studios–Caven Point, or Caven Point Studio, is a film studio/soundstage complex in Jersey City, New Jersey.
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