Craigdarroch Castle is just one Victoria landmark that will be featured in the upcoming horror movie, The Boy 2, starring Katie Holmes.
The Hollywood actress is in town filming the sequel to 2016’s The Boy, a horror movie that starred Lauren Cohan and was largely set in the picturesque Craigdarroch Castle.
The movie revolved around an American nanny who is shocked to learn that she’s been hired to care for an English family’s son, a life-sized porcelain doll. After she breaks a strict set of rules, frightening events make her question whether the doll is truly alive.
Here’s the trailer from the sequel of the Boy:
As Victoria lacks a dedicated studio space, The Boy 2’s production team is allegedly building sets in a Douglas Street building that used to be a Canadian Tire, a popular spot for filmmakers who stop by the island.
Filming of the movie is expected to wrap sometime in April.
While many film productions use the old Canadian Tire building, the lack of studio space is not an unnoticed concern by Victorians.
A record breaking year for the island
According to the Vancouver Island South Film & Media Commission, Victoria’s film industry boomed in 2018.
Last year, the city saw a record breaking $21 million in direct spending by studios, surpassing the previous record of $18 million in 2015. In total, 25 films and shows were shot in 2018.
But the island’s growing screen presence has brought challenges of its own.
“Several people at this point have investigated the possibility of building a studio here,” said Victoria film commissioner Kathleen Gilbert. “We’ve seen over the past two years that several groups have looked at this but at this point no one has been successful.”
“But there’s certainly an appetite for it.”
The film commission believes that a dedicated studio space would benefit Victoria’s film industry by attracting bigger productions.
One issue that the former Canadian Tire space faces is its low ceilings. Many studios have a standard 40 foot tall ceilings so that films can build large sets, but the Douglas Street space only measures half of that.
“With a feature film that’s when you start attracting the $80 – $200 million shows… But we can’t do that with a space with 20 foot ceilings [and you need] enough parking for their circus,” said Gilbert.
Besides a bigger studio space, the film commission says that more production crews are needed to match the growing industry.
“We’ve got about two and a half crews now, but we need to double that at least,” Gilbert said.
The film commission hopes that the province will help fund the emerging island industry and support training opportunities for people who want to start careers in film production.
