UPDATE: Schedules shifting for three movies, production to set up shop soon

In case you missed Friday’s eightWest, the Meg Ryan movie “Sleepless Beauty” has been moved from the first of three movies to the last of three movies.  Also, movie producer Randall Emmett told me over the phone Thursday night that they’ll be back in Michigan next week to head to Lansing and the Michigan Film Office to discuss the Michigan Film incentives and get all of their paperwork going.   Emmett also tells me that he and the Director plan to set up their production office in Grand Rapids during the first week of November.

Production schedule:

“The Gun”: Curtis ‘50 Cent’ Jackson and yet to be cast co-star
Scheduled to begin December 20th

“Jekyll and Hyde”: Forest Whitaker and ‘50 Cent’
Scheduled to begin January 17th

“Sleepless Beauty”: Meg Ryan and Ashley Tisdale
Scheduled to begin in late February

( Originally published 10/1/09)

Three more movies coming to Grand Rapids, starring Meg Ryan, Forest Whitaker, Ashley Tisdale, and Curtis “50 Cent” Jackson

Producer Randall Emmett raves about making movies in Grand Rapids

Randall Emmett is back in town scouting locations for three movie productions that  he is bringing to town for back-to-back-to-back movie shoots.    He was in Grand Rapids for the production of “Caught in the Crossfire” earlier this year.

“Sleepless Beauty” is scheduled to start shooting November 25th, the remake of the classic story Sleeping Beauty will star Golden Globe nominee Meg Ryan and Ashley Tisdale (“High School Musical”).

“The Gun”, starring Curtis ‘50 Cent’ Jackson and a yet to be cast co-star is scheduled to begin December 1st.

On January 3rd, ‘50 Cent’ will be joined by Oscar winner Forest Whitaker (“The Last King of Scotland” (2006) for “Jekyll and Hyde”, a remake of the classic movie that will be Directed by Abel Ferrara (“Bad Lieutenant” (1992) starring Harvey Keitel, “King of New York”  (1990) starring Christopher Walken).

Emmett, producer on 60 movies, including “Caught in the Crossfire” with ‘50 Cent’ that shot in Grand Rapids back in May, “Righteous Kill” (2008) starring Robert DeNiro and Al Pacino, and “Narc” (2002) says the area offers a lot for filmmakers, “when you don’t have such a crowded city, it gives you a lot of diversity and creative space to shoot action sequences, to do drama, you can almost do every genre here, wheras when you go to New York City, lets say, its a big production to close down one street…  here, the whole town is supportive.”

The financial carrot of Michigan’s Film incentives are a big factor, Emmett says “people think of Hollywood that we have a $100 million on every movie, or everybody is Spider-man, not everybody is Spider-man so some of the films we’re doing are lower budget, some of them are bigger budget and so, every movie has a framework that we have to act in and for some reason, the community really supports whatever we have whichever movie it is, so whether you’re going to an italian restaurant to do catering, or you’re going to a hotel, and you need x amount of rooms people really do make deals and it makes it easy to come here”.

Emmett says the great experience of the city is a big factor “when I go back to Los Angeles now and say I’m going back to Grand Rapids, they’re like what?  But its starting to spread now because a lot of people have been to Detroit shooting and now people hear about Grand Rapids how its this place thats very easy, there’s no traffic you can get around.”  He adds, “50 cent is my partner and when 50 got here, he loved it I mean he was the one who insisted on bringing that movie back here he really loved the experience.”

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