Local filmmakers 'scrambling' to recover from last year's Hollywood strikes

Filmmakers in southwestern Ontario are calling for more support from the province as those in the industry struggle to find work. 

Last year's Hollywood strikes had a trickle-down effect on everyone in Canada, from directors and producers to grips and stagehands – even in smaller markets like London, which in 2022 began to market itself as an attractive location for visiting companies to film scenes for movies and TV.

"Many of my colleagues that I work with here in London are on the verge of not being able to pay rent," said Kevin Labonte, who has been working as a jack of all trades on local film sets since 2020. "They're either having to take jobs that won't give them the flexibility to work on a production at the same time, or they just have to quit the industry altogether." 

Before the strikes, Ontario's booming film industry held promise for London, bringing opportunities for people to perform as extras or rent out their property as sets. For Fanshawe College film program grads like Labonte, it meant gainful employment without having to leave for more established hubs like Vancouver or Toronto. 

But the strikes put a halt to that momentum. They then resolved at a particularly challenging time in late November when production times are generally slower to begin with. The long-term repercussions remain to be seen, but this spring appears to be especially slow for people hired out by larger parent companies based in the United States.

"I know union productions took a pretty big hit after the strike, and especially after COVID," said Christopher Evans, a London-based producer, director and owner of Sevens Studio. "Everyone's kind of scrambling to get back on their feet." 

That doesn't change London's potential for locations, infrastructure and talent, said Evans. He'd like to see that potential pushed forward through better tax credits to incentivize bigger productions to shoot in the region.  

That would make sense, said Film London's Andrew Dodd, as the strikes revealed just how much Ontario's film and TV industry depends on those U.S. productions. 

The province already offers a robust rebate on productions in northern Ontario through its Northern Ontario Heritage Fund Corporation (NOHFC) that meet its eligibility criteria. Now, Dodd said, there are groups forming in the eastern and southwestern parts of the province that would like the same for international productions with a domestic component in their regions.  

Change tax credit rule, Film London says

The Ontario Film and Television tax credit offers an additional 10 per cent for those who shoot outside of the GTA, he said, but that only applies to domestic production and not international. 

"That's something that I've heard industry experts claim that's something we should lobby toward changing," said Dodd. "We could see a tremendous influx of international productions coming to other regions of Ontario if the wording in that tax credit rule were changed."

It would also help to support more local and independent productions, he added, after the surge he expected to see during the strike didn't pan out. 

"Film and TV is a massive industry and it doesn't just impact the creative types. It leans almost more toward the manufacturing side of the creative industries more than perhaps any other.  So many people are trades people, they're electricians, they're contractors, they're security detail, they're drivers, they're in the catering industry," said Dodd. 

"All of these people can benefit from an increased film and television industry all throughout Ontario."