Last week, the new horror movie "The Monster" was filmed in New Haven's Wooster Square neighborhood, joining the rapidly growing list of Connecticut-made movies.
Overseen by the director behind the "Saw" franchise and bolstered by Oscar-nominated talent, "The Monster" began shooting in the Danbury area early this month and has since moved into New Milford and New Haven. The team shot in front of a row of brownstones on Chapel Street last Tuesday. After Thanksgiving, the cast and crew will return to Danbury.
Founders of Chair 10 Productions -- the production company behind "The Monster" -- Jonathan Black and his wife Laura moved from Los Angeles to Connecticut during the COVID-19 pandemic to plant familial roots. A film industry veteran, Black soon realized that Connecticut had a very competitive tax credit for film productions. Since then, his goal with Chair 10 Productions has been to market Connecticut as a viable place to shoot movies over the usual suspects, such as Los Angeles and Georgia.
"We're working on building back Connecticut and having multiple films shoot here,"
Black said, "to really bring the entire state together -- to provide educational opportunities, job opportunities, build the industry, lobby for great tax credits and build the infrastructure of the state."
"The Monster" is the Blacks' most recent project. It will employ New Haven's brownstones, Tarrywile Mansion in Danbury, the Danbury airport, The Summit and restaurants such as Foundry Kitchen and Tavern in Sandy Hook as background for the film. Black has confidence these locations will share the particular beauty of Connecticut while accurately replicating the film's New York City setting.
The benefits of filmmaking go both ways.
"[Some lawmakers] don't understand the economic impact," he said. "Not only the jobs but hotels, restaurants and rental cars. All the other aspects of what we bring to a community. We are spending millions and millions of dollars in a community that otherwise might not see that."
Black anticipates employing around 150 people through the duration of the shooting. Chair 10 Productions will also launch their new program Veterans in Entertainment in Connecticut in conjunction with the filming with the goal of employing several veterans on set.
Finally, Black wants to provide jobs and internship opportunities to local students like those at the University of New Haven, the University of Connecticut and Yale. He consistently stressed the importance of local pathways to success in the film industry.
The movie is an edgy thriller that Black likened to "Frankenstein." According to IMDb, the film follows two millennial scammers "who flip NY apartments they don't own." Their con proves successful until "an apartment owner with a dark secret flips the game on them."
Written by Jonathan Bernstein and James Greer, "The Monster" is directed by Darren Lynn Bousman, venerated for his work on the "Saw" franchise. Djimon Hounsou, Oscar-nominated for his work in "Blood Diamond" and "In America" will star in the film, supported by Lauren LaVera who recently acted in the "Terrifier" franchise.
This is not the first of Chair 10 Productions' projects. The movie will join a gradually accelerating body of Connecticut-made films such as Summerhouse -- shot this June in Danbury -- and Holly Jolly -- a Christmas movie filmed in Bethel last year.
Along with Chair 10 Productions, Connecticut director TJ Noel-Sullivan is intent on localizing filmmaking. He, like Black, pulled back from Los Angeles to direct his first feature film "Midas" in the Hartford area.
"Connecticut right now has the best of both worlds where there is a creative community that supports and uplifts and inspires but there is also a non-film community that helps keep us grounded as storytellers," Noel-Sullivan said.
He praised Connecticut's unadulterated authenticity rather than the superficiality he found in the oversaturated Hollywood industry. In contrast to film industry workers forced to reside in Los Angeles, those who have chosen to remain in Connecticut truly prize the community they have found in the Nutmeg State.
COVID-19 and the transition to Zoom have allowed prior norms to be remolded, Noel-Sullivan added. Directors and filmmakers can now live in their preferred area without completely neglecting Hollywood.
In Connecticut, he started The Hartford Film Company, which is dedicated to guiding blossoming filmmakers. With a recent expansion into an in-person office, Noel-Sullivan is even more optimistic about the possibility of tangible change in local filmmaking.
"I'm a big believer that work inspires work," Noel-Sullivan said. "If I'm working on something and I'm hitting a creative rut and then I talk to someone like Jonathan and he tells me about what he's doing -- that is the inspiration to keep working on stuff ... There's an energy being built."
Noel-Sullivan is currently working on two feature-length films in the Hartford area with the priority of hiring local crews. He believes that talent and enthusiasm are ubiquitous in Connecticut: they only need to be tapped into.
As the Connecticut film industry continues to flourish, both directors stressed the importance of the state government in nurturing the change rather than smothering it. While the state has been friendly towards the film industry, Black and Noel-Sullivan both expressed hopes that the tax credit could be increased or tweaked to benefit films with local crews. Additionally, Connecticut could benefit from targeted marketing campaigns to bring in talent and projects, they said.
"I'm hopeful in the long term [the current surge in Connecticut movies] will have an impact on the narrative," Noel-Sullivan said. "I'm a really big believer in the perception of narrative being shaped by what we watch. Why do we think LA and NYC are so cool in our heads? Oh, it's because I watched this one movie and this character makes it seem so cool. In the long run, I'm optimistic that we will keep producing movies here and have a similar effect."