There’s no business like show business — even during a pandemic.
Though productions were delayed and shuttered at different points during the COVID-19 crisis in 2020, the film industry brought in a record $623 million in direct spending during the 2021 fiscal year, according to the State Film Office.
A Film Office official says the money generated by those productions poured into local economies with $623 million a more than $200 million jump in spending recorded during the 2020 fiscal year.
The state has used financial data from film, television and media productions filming in New Mexico to compile an annual estimate of how much they spend to help justify the production incentives New Mexico offers to the industry.
Among other benefits, filmmakers can qualify for 25 percent tax rebates on qualified expenses for projects shot in New Mexico. Television production companies that bring long-term series to the state can receive rebates of 30 percent.
Despite the loss of nearly three months of production time — July, August and most of September 2020 — due to COVID-19 shutdowns and restrictions, the Film Office defended its numbers for the ‘21 fiscal year, pointing to a variety of factors that allowed filmmakers to produce content. One of the biggest, an official said, was a rush to resume productions once producers to get back to business.
“Because of the production shutdown, there’s a huge bottleneck and demand for content,” state Film Office Director Amber Dodson said by phone Monday. “All the studios and streamers are hustling to not only catch up, but create more and more and more content. And you can’t fit all of that into Los Angeles or New York anymore.”
Though there were just 69 film, television and other media productions working in New Mexico in fiscal year 2021 — compared to 80 the year before — increased film production budgets mean companies are spending more money locally as well, Dodson said.
“A studio executive recently told me that five years ago, TV series were averaging about $5 million per episode,” Dodson wrote in an email. “The budgets are now approaching $10 million per episode.”
Her office estimated those productions spent 40 percent of those budgets on procuring goods and services in local communities where they film.
Dodson also said all productions that were gearing up to shoot in the state or already filming when the film industry shut down at the end of March 2020 returned to complete their projects.
Jennifer LaBar-Tapia, director of the Santa Fe Film Office, said in talking to producers she found many wanted to set up projects closer to the Hollywood hub because of the pandemic and fears of border shutdowns or other unexpected travel problems.
“Some wanted to work closer to home if need be, where they could jump in a car and be here in 12 hours if they wanted,” she said.
She said based on her own estimates and the State Film Office’s data, about $190 million of that direct spending went into the Santa Fe economy.
Octavio Marin, vice president for production and operations at Santa Fe Studios, said business is “absolutely picking up.”
The Warner Bros. TV series Roswell, New Mexico has returned to the studio for its fourth season of filming, which will last into the summer of 2022, Marin said.
He said he thinks as more companies create streaming series to feed the appetite of the stay-at-home audience that became accustomed to watching entertainment at home during the pandemic, more productions will come to the state, and quickly.
“You want to see content — dramas, comedies, horror, love stories, documentaries. That is why everybody is creating a lot of content; they need to build libraries,” Marin said. “They have more subscribers, they need much more content and that will create many more jobs [in the industry].”
The State Film Office estimated about 9,000 New Mexicans worked in the industry in 2021, earning an average wage of $56,000 annually. And about 75 percent of crew members working on productions were New Mexicans this past year.
Over the years, financial incentives from the state have driven up the number of film, television and media productions and helped earn the state a top slot in film industry popularity contests.
In January, MovieMaker magazine chose Albuquerque and Santa Fe as among the top cities for film workers.
Dodson said New Mexico’s health practices during the pandemic also played a role in attracting film companies to the state.
Industry insiders, including film union representatives, launched a task force during the shutdown that drafted a 22-page white paper on how to safely restart productions when the state reopened the industry.
The State Film Office now requires film production companies and workers to follow the guidelines, which include frequent testing and the wearing of protective safety masks for those who do not get vaccinated.
Dodson said a lot of producers have told her they see New Mexico as “a safe place” to work because of the state’s “aggressive actions to mitigate COVID-19.”
She said to date the state conducted over 133,000 tests for the virus among production company personnel.
The rate of those testing positive is at 0.13 percent now, she said.
She said there currently are 33 film, television and media productions working in the state.
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