Hollywood Invasion

1. So we finally figured out this movie-wooing thing. What made the state get its act together? How a revelation on Beacon Hill—and a little push from Chris Cooper—touched off a gold rush.

By Geoffrey Gagnon

Illustration by Sean McCabe

It’s a weird thing, a state official beaming with pride while describing a public nuisance, but such has been the effect of Hollywood’s crush on the Hub. “You can’t get a cup of coffee in this town right now without tripping over wires or bumping into trailers,” says Nick Paleologos, the gregarious head of the Massachusetts Film Office, whose job it’s been to unfurl the mighty welcome mat that’s brought a record six movies (and some $120 million in total revenue) already this year. So clogged has Boston been with filmmakers that during the first week in September, when Bachelor No. 2, The Pink Panther 2, and The Women all began production, crews shooting in the Back Bay kept crossing walkie-talkie signals. In a city where only five movies were filmed in the previous seven years, these are new and pleasant problems.

Before Paleologos, who’s served as a state rep and producer, took over in February, the film office had been shuttered since 2002—a plug-pulling meant to end years of legendary Teamster shenanigans that had helped make Massachusetts a “celluloid pariah,” as one report put it. During those dark days, some unlikely compatriots arrived at the same conclusion: The only way to lure Hollywood back was with generous tax rebates. Among the first to take up the cause was not an officeholder, but rather actor Chris Cooper, who lives in Kingston. “My wife and I were curious as to why nothing was filmed here anymore,” he says. “I mean, I’ll admit it’s a selfish thing for me to want to see more films shot in Massachusetts. It just seemed like a good idea.”

Cooper shared the thought with former state Representative Tom O’Brien, whom he’d met a few years earlier at a South Shore library. In early 2005, O’Brien started drafting a proposal with fellow legislator Brian Wallace, who had his own tough-luck insight into the entertainment business: He’d written a Boston-set book, Final Confession, that had been optioned by producers who told him that were a movie version ever to be made, it’d have to be shot elsewhere. Meanwhile, Newton-based director Sam Weisman (of George of the Jungle fame) also joined the lobbying effort.

The resulting law took effect last year and gave filmmakers a 25 percent rebate on money spent in Massachusetts, as well as a pass on state sales taxes. This spring lawmakers went back to extend the life of the incentives and scrap a $7 million cap on the rebate—a move designed to lure big-budget projects. So universal was the support for the rejiggering that it sailed through Beacon Hill with ease, unimpeded by the acrimony stalling other legislation this year.

The governor signed the law on July 20. “Once he put ink to that, the lid blew off,” Paleologos says. Within hours, Columbia Pictures agreed to film the Paris-set Pink Panther sequel here. It was a meaningful coup: “Pink Panther 2 has nothing to do with Boston. Not one scene,” Paleologos says, whereas the few movies previously shot in Massachusetts usually had plots that demanded they be here—and even those were doing the bulk of their filming elsewhere. For The Perfect Storm, the state netted a paltry 2 percent of that film’s $140 million budget. The Departed spent only 7 percent here; most of its “Boston” action, depressingly, was filmed in New York.

Given his background, Paleologos is no stranger to foot-dragging and empty promises. But he says both have been uncharacteristically absent in the push to bring Hollywood to town—even the once difficult Teamsters, under boss Sean O’Brien, are hell-bent on reinventing the state’s image. “What has occurred here,” Paleologos says, “is nothing short of astonishing.”

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