Former movie recruiter welcomes new Arkansas law

Janie Glover says it is about time Arkansas decided to get back in the game in terms of recruiting film and movie production to the state.

Gov. Mike Beebe on Friday (April 3) signed HB 1939 into law, creating incentives for digital product and motion picture productions. The Digital Product and Motion Picture Industry Development Act creates a 15% rebate on all qualified production expenditures in Arkansas, according to a statement from the Arkansas Economic Development Commission.

An additional payroll rebate of 10% will be granted for certain cast members and technical crew in the production who are full-time residents of Arkansas. In order to qualify for this new incentive, a production company must spend at least $50,000 within six months in connection with one project.

As vice president of the Fort Smith Chamber of Commerce in the 1980s and 1990s, Glover was instrumental in facilitating the filming of The Blue & The Gray (1982, TV movie), Biloxi Blues (Matthew Broderick, 1988), Frank & Jesse (Rob Lowe, Bill Paxton, 1994) and Tuskegee Airmen (Laurence Fishburne, Cuba Gooding Jr., 1995).

And as part of an active Arkansas effort in the 1980s and 1990s, Glover traveled frequently to Hollywood to meet with producers and other movie officials.

Arkansas was one of the first states in the nation to offer an incentive to film and television productions in the early 1980s. It was known as the “nickel rebate,” a 5 percent rebate, but had since expired.

Glover said state officials have been “very lacking in what they do” to bring movies to the state in recent years. She said the lack is because most Arkansans don’t realize the film and movie industry can be a huge economic development boon to the state.

“They (movie production crews) use every single product we have in our communities. They use our laundries, use all of our camera shops, they hire a lot of people to work as extras, … they stay in our hotels, eat in our restaurants, use our caterers,” Glover explained. “I don’t think people understand what kind of good deal this can be for the state.”

Glover said the filming of Tuskegee Airmen saw that crew buy “loads of used tires” for scenes showing a plane fire. The Frank & Jesse filming saw loads of dirt being purchased to cover Main Street in downtown Van Buren.

“I would very much welcome that we do something more to recruit movies. I don’t know all the details on that (new law), but I have to think it’s better” than what they have been doing, said Glover, who is retired from the chamber but is a board member of the Travel Council of the Arkansas Hospitality Association.

State officials said the new law will put Arkansas back in the movie-recruitment game.
 
“This is a defining moment for the digital production and motion picture industry in Arkansas,” Christopher Crane, Arkansas’s film commissioner, noted in the statement. “So many individuals and groups with an interest in growing the industry worked together on the creation and support of this incentive.”