The Kingston Film Office says production for the upcoming Paramount show ‘Mayor of Kingstown’ is expected to have generated over $2,000,000 for Kingston’s local economy.
The cast and crew of the show were in Kingston from July 26 to August 10 and again from August 25 to September 29, and the most recent Tourism Kingston report estimated there was over $2,000,000 in direct economic spend through the use of hotels as far as Belleville, extensive use of local suppliers and the usen of support facilities and labour.
‘Mayor of Kingstown’ also saw 30 Kingstonians employed in junior crew roles as well as more than 100 community members filling background roles.
The report goes on to state this estimate doesn’t include the economic impact of over 500 cast and crew members residing in Kingston for the better part of two months.
The show was created by Hugh Dillon and stars Jeremy Renner with first episode set to premiere on November 14.
The Paramount Plus project has been just one of a number of large scale film productions in the area, including most recently ‘The Lost Symbol’ on NBC’s streaming service Peacock and the feature film ‘Verona’ recorded entirely in the Kingston-Frontenac region.
Alex Jansen, Film Commissioner with the Kingston Film Office, says ‘Mayor of Kingstown’ has been a huge centerpiece to what has overall been a strong production industry.
He added that the major film production sector has actually been able to rally quite strongly in the pandemic, with Kingston and the province have seen record levels of major production.
Jansen says the pandemic and COVID restrictions have had a more significant impact on smaller productions but with those easing, that too is starting to rebound.
“COVID restrictions are necessarily quite stringent and expensive,” Jansen said.
“You’re looking at massive amounts of COVID testing, PPE, restrictions and insurance implications. It makes smaller productions harder to operate but that we’re seeing starting to rebound now.”
In total Kingston hosted ten productions in the third quarter of 2021, with the Film Office aiming to attract more end to end productions.
Jansen says that is becoming easier as Kingston gets a growing reputation as production-friendly city.
Although local productions in the city did see a significant decrease due to costs and restrictions associated with COVID-19, the Kingston Film Office managed to support fifteen local production companies in the creation of music videos last winter.
Jansen said the Film Office hopes that same initiative will happen again early in the new year.
The Film Office is also in late stage negotiations to bring the production of two feature films to the city.
