Greater Philadelphia Film Office

Inmates call it "The Terrordome. " The city considers it so run-down, outdated, and hard to manage by modern prison methods that it intends to close the place when a new prison now under construction opens later in the year. Movie people, though, love Holmesburg Prison. It has that prison look. "The wall is very interesting," Bob Vazquez, technical adviser for the movie Up Close and Personal, explained last week as he made preparations for filming scenes inside and outside the 97-year-old prison in Northeast Philadelphia.

THE MOMENT Sylvester Stallone hit the steps of the Philadelphia Museum of Art in the original "Rocky," there was no denying that this city was more than ready for its close-up. Who could have known that that indelible shot of Rocky Balboa, the ham-and-egg club fighter played by Stallone in the iconic 1976 film, climbing the steps and doing an exultant dance as the lights of the Ben Franklin Parkway sparkled in the predawn, autumnal air would mark a seminal moment in Philadelphia's pop-culture history.

Filmmaking doesn't create smog or traffic jams. It does create jobs and revenues. Between 1992 and 2000, movies such as 12 Monkeys and The Sixth Sense generated 4,390 jobs and pumped $229 million into the local economy, says a draft of an economic impact study commissioned by the Greater Philadelphia Film Office (GPFO) due to be released by the end of the month. With a $487,000 annual budget in 2000 the film office helped generate 1,818 jobs, $4.7 million in city and state taxes, and $37.7 million in local spending.

Don't expect staggering, flesh-eating, virus-revived corpses to add millions to Philadelphia's economy this summer. Blame uncertainties about state tax credits for filmmakers, says the head of the Greater Philadelphia Film Office. World War Z , about the aftermath of a zombie armageddon, may be set in Philadelphia, but star Brad Pitt will be shooting his action scenes this August in Glasgow, Scotland. This week, crews reportedly began preliminary work there, prepping for fake storefronts, planning for importing U.S. cars.

Everybody into the pool! Sister stations CBS3 and CW57 recently joined NBC10 and Fox29 in a deal by which they share routine video. The arrangement, known as Local News Service, saves money because each station does not have to send a camera crew to mundane news conferences and ribbon-cuttings. News execs optimistically also point out that it frees crews for enterprise work. There's another side effect: CBS3's blue-and-yellow chopper now serves all three stations. NBC10 and Fox29 were the first in-market competitors to test the arrangement in summer 2008.

Sundance swag usually runs more to luxury trinkets than Eagles caps, but not in the Philadelphia Industry Lounge, where the film industry's prime movers had a chance to sample the city's wares. Knocking back Bluecoat gin and chowing down on Tony Luke's cheesesteaks, they mingled amid flat screens showing off the city's versatile locations and brochures touting tax incentives for local productions. "I've always been jealous of the New York Lounge," Sharon Pinkenson, executive director of the Greater Philadelphia Film Office, said while gearing up to watch Sunday's Eagles game with several dozen invited guests.

Baltimore gets the Inner Harbor, Camden Yards and the aquarium. We get Penn's Landing, the Vet and a view of New Jersey's aquarium. Baltimore gets "Homicide: Life in the Street," which pumps $500,000 a week into the local economy (less per week than a major movie might bring in, but for a far longer period). We nearly had "Philly Heat. " "Homicide" executive producer Tom Fontana, who also did the pilot for "Philly Heat," a drama about firefighters that was set in Philadelphia and starred West Catholic's own Peter Boyle, said he was surprised when ABC didn't pick up the series, which was shot here two years ago. "I love Philadelphia.

The Philadelphia Civic Center may be dead as a doornail as far as conventioneering is concerned, but it may return to life as the largest soundstage in the country. Mayor Rendell has given the go-ahead to the Greater Philadelphia Film Office to pitch the once-bustling facility to film and TV makers on the West Coast as a great place to make sitcoms and movies. And Sharon Pinkenson, who heads the film office, has done just that, spending last week touting the virtues of the Civic Center and Philadelphia to a host of moviemakers in Los Angeles.

If you're walking in Center City this weekend, near 16th and Market streets, don't mind the FBI helicopters overhead or the sounds of gunfire. "Don't be concerned, it's just a movie," said Sharon Pinkenson, executive director of the Greater Philadelphia Film Office. And it's not just any Hollywood movie. The feature is a Bollywood production - straight from Mumbai, India. It marks the first time a major Bollywood film production has shot on the streets of Philly. Thus, the men shooting blanks are not "SWAT agents" and the helicopters will be made over to appear as FBI aircraft.

Passersby couldn't help but gawk as the camera crew got ready for one more take. Just in time for the lunch-time crowd, the corner of State and Monroe Streets had been recently transformed into a miniature Hollywood set, with lights, cameras, actors and extras. Actress Yvonne Fisher stood in the middle of the intersection with Scrapper, a terrier mix who was to be the hero of the day. On cue, Scrapper - appearing in the role of "Boomer" - lunged across the street, pulling Fisher behind him. Boomer's mission was to get his mistress to the News Spot in time to buy her Pennsylvania lottery ticket.

Don't expect staggering, flesh-eating, virus-revived corpses to add millions to Philadelphia's economy this summer. Blame uncertainties about state tax credits for filmmakers, says the head of the Greater Philadelphia Film Office. World War Z , about the aftermath of a zombie armageddon, may be set in Philadelphia, but star Brad Pitt will be shooting his action scenes this August in Glasgow, Scotland. This week, crews reportedly began preliminary work there, prepping for fake storefronts, planning for importing U.S. cars.

Gov. Corbett's proposed state budget might be cutting back in such areas as education, but it should help four major movies to shoot in Philly - two by M. Night Shyamalan and still hush-hush projects from Universal and Paramount - plus a bevy of indie films. Observers expressed pleasant surprise that Corbett this week offered $60 million in incentives to woo filmmakers who can employ local crews and spend money in the state. "We're overjoyed that [he] clearly understands that film tax credits generate jobs," said Sharon Pinkenson , executive director of the Greater Philadelphia Film Office.

HARRISBURG - After a week in an unnerving limbo - with thousands of jobs and multimillion-dollar movie productions at stake - the state's film industry is rolling again. Film industry officials were notified last week that tax credit applications approved by former Gov. Ed Rendell were being held up for review by Gov. Corbett's administration. On Thursday, Corbett spokeswoman Kelli Roberts told The Inquirer that roughly $49 million in tax credits for 60 film, television, and commercial productions will be granted.

Everybody into the pool! Sister stations CBS3 and CW57 recently joined NBC10 and Fox29 in a deal by which they share routine video. The arrangement, known as Local News Service, saves money because each station does not have to send a camera crew to mundane news conferences and ribbon-cuttings. News execs optimistically also point out that it frees crews for enterprise work. There's another side effect: CBS3's blue-and-yellow chopper now serves all three stations. NBC10 and Fox29 were the first in-market competitors to test the arrangement in summer 2008.

At the Sun Center Studios in Chester Township yesterday, a "film-production party" and a day of workshops gave Philadelphia's aspiring filmmakers and screen writers a rare chance to mingle with Hollywood veterans. That's why Bucks County filmmaker Scott Randolph brought along 18th-Century re-enactors Justine Walters and a man who gave his name only as "Gen. George Washington. " The costumed actors helped Randolph pitch his latest project, a documentary called "America's First D-Day" about Washington's crossing the Delaware.

When cameraman Garrett Brown chased Sylvester Stallone up the Art Museum stairs in 1975 to bag the signature shot of Rocky (1976), Philadelphia was not on Hollywood's radar. "We hadn't a clue how to host a movie," recalls Brown, a longtime resident of Society Hill. Directors complained of city ineptitude. There was no agency to scout locations, issue permits, or announce that electricians were needed. "Filming here was eccentric and inconsistent until Sharon came along and sorted us out. " That would be Sharon Pinkenson, since 1992 the executive director of the Greater Philadelphia Film Office, which is celebrating its silver anniversary.

THE MOMENT Sylvester Stallone hit the steps of the Philadelphia Museum of Art in the original "Rocky," there was no denying that this city was more than ready for its close-up. Who could have known that that indelible shot of Rocky Balboa, the ham-and-egg club fighter played by Stallone in the iconic 1976 film, climbing the steps and doing an exultant dance as the lights of the Ben Franklin Parkway sparkled in the predawn, autumnal air would mark a seminal moment in Philadelphia's pop-culture history.

How did Philadelphia get to host filming of Friday Night Lights , the critically praised, Texas-shot, DirecTV/NBC series about a high school football coach? Connections. Producer Nan Bernstein said writers wanted to use an "industrial Pennsylvania city and thought Pittsburgh, but we had an aggressive shooting schedule. " Bernstein simply reached into her playbook. She coproduced the CBS series Hack , which was shot here from 2002 to 2004. Tuesday's work at Temple University and Frankford High was a trip home as she greeted some of her old crew.

Six years ago, the old beaux-arts movie theater on Bryn Mawr's main avenue was a leaky mess. "It rained plaster, and it actually rained into the theater, too," said Juliet J. Goodfriend. "The roofs all had to be restored. " But time, an infusion of money, and a single-minded woman have made all the difference. The 84-year-old former Seville theater, which morphed into a multiplex in the 1990s, was resurrected by Goodfriend in 2005 as the Bryn Mawr Film Institute. It has just logged another milestone: The state has given the nonprofit a $2.5 million boost toward the final stage of its restoration.

NBC has green-lit Outlaw , the Jimmy Smits legal drama that was shot around Philly and at Resorts in Atlantic City in March and early April. But the series, in which Smits plays a Supreme Court justice who quits to go into private practice and right various wrongs, will be produced in California - not here, as initially proposed. Pennsylvania tax credits - which the legislators had cut from $75 million to $42 million in the current budget - have all but dried up. After The Dark Fields , the Robert De Niro-Bradley Cooper movie shooting through late next week, there is zilch on the horizon, says Greater Philadelphia Film Office head Sharon Pinkenson , who has started relobbying state officials to restore the incentives, which she says more than pay for themselves in local spending and provide work to thousands of people.