Three film productions will split North Carolina’s film and entertainment grant money for the first half of 2015. This is the first year for the state’s new, smaller incentives program for movie and TV productions. Lawmakers have set aside $10 million for the first six months of this year.
Commerce Secretary John Skvarla announced Friday the CBS series Under the Dome, which films in and around Wilmington, will get $5 million, a yet-to-be titled project from Lionsgate that will film in Western North Carolina is eligible for $4 million, and a movie about a college basketball team starring former U.S. Senator Fred Thompson to be filmed at Davidson College will receive up to $1 million in grant money.
The state legislature did not renew an incentives program that, through the end of 2014, had offered a 25 percent tax refund to film productions up to $20 million per project. That program paid out $61 million in 2013. Lawmakers are still deciding on the amount of the film grant for the next fiscal year, which starts in July.
