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About Town: Film studio can help city reel in movie projects
 
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Jason Farmer’s BLP Film Studios plans an 85-acre film studio lot at the southwest corner of Elvis Presley Boulevard and Holmes Road in Whitehaven, complete with sound stages, commissary, editing facilities, recording studio, a warehouse for building sets, and a hotel for out-of-town production crews. (Courtesy HBG Design)
 

Jason Farmer’s BLP Film Studios plans an 85-acre film studio lot at the southwest corner of Elvis Presley Boulevard and Holmes Road in Whitehaven, complete with sound stages, commissary, editing facilities, recording studio, a warehouse for building sets, and a hotel for out-of-town production crews. (Courtesy HBG Design)

Welcome to About Town, where we take a deeper dive into one neighborhood each week while also highlighting the latest news, developments and back stories from Memphis’ neighborhoods. This week’s focus: Whitehaven

In a previous About Town last month, I mentioned a Memphis-based company’s proposal to build an 85-acre film studio in Whitehaven.

We know a little more about their plans thanks to a subscribers-only story from Daily Memphian columnist Chris Herrington.

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Herrington reports the proposal by BLP Film Studios, led by founder/CEO Jason A. Farmer, includes a dozen sound stages, post-production studios, warehouses, workshops, offices and lodging spaces for production crews.

Check out the full story: BLP Studios aims to answer ‘a $10 billion question’

If it all comes together, the undeveloped intersection of Elvis Presley Boulevard and Holmes Road could eventually be home to the second largest Black-owned film studio in the U.S. 

That could also mean Memphis projects overlooked (or ignored) in the past, for various reasons, may reconsider their stances in the future. 

The announcement regarding the potential film studio doesn’t address all the challenges of filmmaking in Memphis. There are still several unanswered questions about the project — at least for now. The most looming one: How much the proposal will cost, and if the requisite funds are there?

BLP is also committed to a training program with the Shelby County Film Commission and local colleges to improve the city’s talent base of local crews — another shortcoming cited in the past.

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“Building it doesn’t guarantee the work will be generated, but it certainly puts the city in a much more advantageous position to attract work they’ve been trying to attract already,” Herrington said.


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