News: Rotherham as a filming location provides economic boost

Rotherham has scored plenty of the action in the first year of operation for Screen Yorkshire's Film Office. Just this week parts of the borough were used for a new teen drama being filmed for Netflix.

Since it opened for business in November 2018, the Film Office team has handled over 360 film and TV production enquiries and has received wide praise from key industry figures.

As the first port of call for producers looking to film in Yorkshire, and needing specialist advice and help, the Film Office supports international, domestic and regional productions. Its work spans feature film, high-end TV drama and childrens' content as well as factual, entertainment, comedy, corporate and advertising campaigns.

27 high-end TV productions and 14 feature films have filmed in Yorkshire in the last 12 months, generating over 1500 days of work for regional crew. The value of filming activity to Yorkshire and the Humber is substantial with budgets for high-end TV dramas and feature films averaging between £10m and £20m per project. The regional figures are released following last week’s news from the BFI, revealing a record-breaking year for film & HE TV, which is the fastest growing sector in the UK.

For Rotherham, productions include the big screen feature, Downton Abbey, the drama, Gentleman Jack for the BBC, and psychological thriller, The Feed, for Amazon Prime, which all made use of the breathtaking backdrop of Wentworth Woodhouse.

Other recent filming in the borough includes the much-anticipated Everybody's Talking About Jamie which used Swinton Academy, and Zero Chill, a Netflix teen drama whose production crew set up base at Herringthorpe Stadium last week (pictured below).

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Sally Joynson, chief executive of Screen Yorkshire, said: "Just do the maths and you'll understand the scale of the business and the economic clout that comes with it. The Film Office is a critical, expert, component in driving this business to Yorkshire and in its first year alone has demonstrated just how valuable a resource it is."

For Gentleman Jack, the long gallery at Wentworth Woodhouse was used as a grand house in Hastings for an emotional flashback scene. The impressive marble saloon was transformed into a merchants offices.

Phil Collinson, producer on Gentleman Jack, said: "Screen Yorkshire's talented bunch are a brilliant mix of local knowledge, passion for the job and intense creativity. We simply couldn't have made the show in Yorkshire without them."

Based on the musical of the same name, Everybody's Talking About Jamie is set to be released in October. Jonathan Butterell, the film's director said: "Yorkshire is home. Like its people, Yorkshire is robust, straightforward, rugged, diverse, and downright bloody gorgeous. Everyone should film here."

Screen Yorkshire website

Images: BBC / HBO / Tom Austen

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News: Wentworth Woodhouse on the BBC again

One of the UK's most important Grade 1 listed country houses, Wentworth Woodhouse in Rotherham, has been back on the BBC this week, featuring in Gentleman Jack, an exciting new drama written by Sally Wainwright.

The Wentworth Woodhouse Preservation Trust (WWPT) has developed a masterplan to secure the future of the mansion which has already featured in numerous big screen and small screen productions. Handing over state rooms and gardens to filmmakers is an important means to raise the profile (and much needed revenue) of the property which for many years has been in relative obscurity.

Gentleman Jack is a Lookout Point production for BBC One, co-produced with HBO. It was filmed in Yorkshire with support from Screen Yorkshire's Film Office.

Set in 1832 West Yorkshire, Gentleman Jack is inspired by the true-story and coded journals of Anne Lister (played by Suranne Jones), and follows her attempt to revitalise her inherited home, Shibden Hall. Most notably for the time period, a part of Lister's plan is to help the fate of her own family by taking a wife.

In episode one, which aired on Sunday May 19, the long gallery at Wentworth Woodhouse is used as a grand house in Hastings for an emotional flashback scene. Seated at the stunning feature window, and with special effects changing the gardens to the west front into the seafront, a heartbroken Anne Lister learns that one of her aristocratic targets for marriage has accepted the marriage proposal of an army captain.

The long gallery is now used to host weddings!

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Shibden Hall was joined by other Yorkshire filming locations including Sutton Park (near York,) Newby Hall (Ripon) Bramham Estate (Leeds), Fairfax House (York) Broughton Hall (Skipton), Harewood House Estate (Leeds), Treasurer's House (York), Oakwell Hall (Birstall), St Peter's Church (Sowerby), Halifax Town Centre, Lawrence Batley Theatre & Queens Street (Huddersfield), Little Germany (Bradford), Wentworth Woodhouse, Ripponden Moor Holy Trinity Church and City of York streets. Production offices were based at Studio 81 in Leeds.

Phil Collinson, producer, Gentleman Jack, said: "As a proud Yorkshireman I was thrilled to come home to work on Gentleman Jack.

"This is an ambitious show filmed on location all over this glorious county. Everywhere we went we were supported and welcomed and the brilliant, mostly local crew worked tirelessly and with great skill. Screen Yorkshire too played its part in facilitating a very friendly environment for us to film in. I can't wait to come back and do it again."

Wentworth Woodhouse was used for previous productions shown on the BBC including King Charles III, Jonathan Strange and Mr Norrell and Billionaire Boy. It is also used for ITV's prime-time drama, Victoria.

On the big screen, Wentworth Woodhouse was used for scenes at Buckingham Palace in Darkest Hour, in which Gary Oldman won an Oscar playing Winston Churchill. In Mike Leigh's biopic of JMW Turner, the marble saloon stood in for London's Royal Academy of Arts.

Wentworth Woodhouse website

Images: BBC / HBO

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News: Wentworth Woodhouse back on the BBC

One of the UK's most interesting and important Grade 1 listed country houses, Wentworth Woodhouse in Rotherham, is back on the BBC this week, featuring in the TV adaptation of King Charles III from the Olivier Award-winning play.

The Wentworth Woodhouse Preservation Trust (WWPT) recently concluded the acquisition of the largest privately-owned house in Europe for £7m and is working on plans for a sustainable business case for its secure future.

Featuring in numerous big screen and small screen productions has been important in raising the profile (and much needed revenue) of the property which for many years has been in relative obscurity.

Described as "an inventive future history drama," King Charles III is adapted by award-winning playwright and television screenwriter Mike Bartlett, whose previous work includes Doctor Foster.

With Prince Charles ascending to the throne, the Monarchy's future is under threat. Protests on the streets and his family in disarray, Charles must grapple with his identity and purpose, to decide whether the Crown still has any real power.

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A co-production of the BBC and Masterpiece, in association with Drama Republic, the drama reunites many of the creative team behind the original play, including director and fellow Olivier Award-winner and Tony Award nominee, Rupert Goold. The late Tim Pigott-Smith returns to the title role of Charles.

Filming took place at the end of 2016 and publicity shots show the royal protagonist in the atmospheric Marble Saloon at Wentworth Woodhouse which previously had a staring role in the BBC's grand TV production of Jonathan Strange and Mr Norrell.

Buckingham Palace and Kensington Palace were recreated at Wentworth Woodhouse, Newby Hall in Ripon and Harewood House near Leeds.

Wentworth was also used in Billionaire Boy, the fourth BBC adaptation of a David Walliams novel and in ITV's prime-time drama, Victoria, which became the channel's highest rated drama of 2016. Series two is currently being filmed.

Oliver Chris who plays William in King Charles III said: "The set for the play was very beautiful but sparse and a huge amount of audience imagination was needed. In the TV version we have brought it into the real world and filmed in some of the greatest houses in Britain."

The drama airs on BBC Two on Wednesday May 10 at 9pm.

Images: BBC / Savills

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News: Research ranks Rotherham low on resilience

Research by Experian for the BBC ranks Rotherham as being particularly vunerable to cuts in public spending.

Rotherham is placed 310th out of 324 areas in the "resilience rankings" and sits amongst other former industrial areas such as Middlesborough, Barnsley and Barrow.

The research ranks local authority areas and is influenced by a number of factors regarding business, community, people and place.

Examples of the data include the number of businesses in resilient sectors, long term unemployment, working age population and houses prices and is assembled from Experian's own databases and publicly available sources such as ONS, DWP, DCSF and the Land Registry. The time range involved for the data is 2005 to 22nd July 2010.

Rotherham is ranked 308th overall under the business theme due to factors such as low job density, businesses in vulnerable sectors (engineering and vehicles, construction, metals, minerals and chemicals and other, mainly public, services), and high numbers of business insolvencies.

Rotherham has much better rankings for businesses that export, the number of new business start-ups and the number of foreign-owned companies.

The results are unsurprising, given that despite transformational economic growth, Rotherham's economy has not fully recovered from the previous downturn and the huge job losses within the coal and steel industries.

Although the gap was closing, Rotherham is still behind the national average in terms of employment rate, business starts, higher skill levels and job density and the area suffers from high levels of deprivation and worklessness.

The survey broadly assumed that engineering and metals businesses were classed as vulnerable and a spokesperson from Rotherham Council said: "South Yorkshire, and in particularly Rotherham are expected to be major beneficiaries in the demand for precision forged, machined and engineered components.

"Rotherham's Advanced Manufacturing Park (AMP) will be the base for the £25m Nuclear Advanced Manufacturing Research Centre (NAMRC) with Rolls Royce and will also host the UK's only Knowledge Transfer Academy for Nuclear Engineering.

On recent success, the spokesperson added: "During 2009-2010 Rotherham Investment and Development Office (RiDO), the regeneration arm of Rotherham Council, tracked 573 investments into Rotherham, which lead to the creation of 3,084 jobs and safeguarded a further 2,914. So far this year, RiDO has already tracked 230 investment successes, leading to the creation of 800 new jobs and safeguarding 375."

BBC website
Rotherham Investment and Development Office

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