Hello, everyone, an welcome back to Potomac Station Coffee House for another episode of our podcast.

We have a great show tonight.

Don't wait!

I am so excited.

But first I'm Valerie, that's David, and this is our Gen X Pittsburgh podcast.

Tonights guest.

Oh my God.

Dawn Keezer, the executive directo of the Pittsburgh Film Office.

She'll be joining us in just a couple minutes.

What's your favorite Pittsburgh film?

My God.

Well, God, there are so many because I was an extra in some of them.

Unlike you, who's afraid to be in front of the camera.

Do not like.

Do not like, not afraid.

Do not like.

Where are we right now?

In front of two cameras.

Right here is the reaso I worked in radio for 25 years.

And now I'm a printer right now.

Yeah.

That's right, that's right.

You know what?

Being an extra is so much fun because you get there and, you know, you get in makeup, you get in wardrobe, and then you sit and you wait for three hours, and then you go out on set and you come back and you wait a little bit, and then it's your time.

It is so much fun.

I will be an extra Dawn any time you need an extra, I will be there for you, I promise.

I love it so much.

But what's your favorite Pittsburgh film?

Oh my gosh, I. Well, you know what?

My son was in Jack Reacher, so I really like that movie.

I like them all.

Oh, my God, there's been so many.

I like them all.

You like them all?

You said all the.

All the films.

I like there's so many.

There are so many.

Oh my God.

Dogma.

Striking distance.

Inspector Gadget.

Inspector Gadget.

Yes.

Nobody remembers Inspector Gadget.

I remember Secretary Gadget, I did.

I know I actually have a list, but the list.

It's.

It's hundreds and hundreds of TV, right?

Film and streaming services.

Do you remember the vampire movie?

Where?

When?

Before the cultural district could bought Liberty Avenue?

They they used it for Eddie Murphy.

No.

Innocent Blood, thats right.

Innocent Blood.

Yeah, yeah, that' the first big film I remember.

I was living downtown at the time.

Well, my friend, my my friends and I would do extra work to, to, you know, just for extra money.

And, you know, you're always hoping for a break or to meet a movie star that would like you and you'd get married.

But that never happened.

But you know what I mean?

It was always so much fun being in that Hollywood like that, that action, it was really cool.

Yeah, yeah, bu it's more about being an extra.

I mean, Dawn has changed Pittsburgh.

She's brought Pittsburgh on the map.

Definitely.

The economic growth that she's brought into the city is something extra special.

And I can't wait to to learn more.

Yeah.

Who would have thought.

I'll start with The Deer Hunter, right?

Yeah.

Nobody knows that.

Yeah yeah yeah, yeah.

Well, somebody told us that their favorite Pittsburgh movie was Deer Hunter.

Oh, yeah?

Who was that I can't remember who that was.

Bill van.

Right?

No no, no, no, I don't remember.

Remember Anyways, we'll go back with you.

I have to do some research on our own show.

Figure it out.

Right.

Welcome back to the Gen X Pittsburgh Podcast.

We're here with Dawn Keezer.

Hello.

Hi.

Thank you so much for being here with us tonight.

Thank you for having me.

We appreciate you coming in.

We know you're so busy going to Harrisburg trying to get some more films coming to Pittsburgh.

You have a podcast.

So.

And I know you're involved a lot with your son's school activities.

Thank you for being here.

I'm glad to be here.

Thank you for having me.

Yes.

Of course.

Would you, before we get into the film office?

Sure.

Could you talk a little bit about yourself?

I know you're not a native Pittsburgh, right?

You came here in the 90s.

Can we talk about this?

Because I've been here 31.

Yeah.

That means you're new here.

Pittsburgh.

I want to know when it counts.

Right?

Like, yes.

I'm not native.

I was not born here.

Okay.

I fully admit that.

But I would think after, I don't know, I think after ten years, you ge to call yourself a Pittsburgher.

Sure.

I just thin we should come up with a number.

I'm an Air Force brat.

My dad was in the Air Force career military, so we lived everywhere.

I went to California in seventh grade.

So that was middle school.

High school.

And then I went to UC Berkeley to college.

My first real job out of college was selling television advertising.

Oh, yeah.

Personal injury attorneys.

Wow.

Oh, wow.

You know those 1-800?

Have you been injured?

Yeah, that was me.

Yeah, I actually came to Pittsburgh for six weeks during that job, so I was.

I was here before I started doing film office, chamber of Commerce things.

Okay.

In California, there's a film office in every single county, so there's 56 of them.

Most of them are either paire with a convention and visitors bureau, or they're paired with a chamber of commerce.

So I was in Merced County was my first one, which is where I grew up.

Merced counties clai to fame is theyre the gateway to Yosemite national park.

Okay.

The gates are an hour away.

Takes a minute to get there.

t's very agricultural.

There is a UC there now.

University of California, Merced But when I was growing up, it was a very agricultural.

So I was the director of tourism, public affairs, fil commissioner for Merced County.

That lasted six months because I was living at home with my parents.

So then I moved to Santa Cruz, where I became the director of public affairs, film commissioner, director of tourism for Santa Cruz County, where I took visitors to the mystery spot and to the Santa Cruz Beach Boardwalk, which was where we shot the movie Lost Boys.

Yeah I also had to take sportswriters deep sea fishing and don't ever need to do that again.

So I wore a lot of hat and I was there for five years.

And then I got to Pittsburgh i October of 94 when I got here.

Did I read that you weren't really a big film junkie growing up?

I'm not a film junkie.

No.

Wow.

I like movies, I'll go to the movies.

I can't tell you who won the Oscar in 1922.

I don't care, I don't care who won the Oscar last year.

And it was someone that actually filmed in Pittsburgh.

Right.

The Film Office is an economic development agency, and it's really about the jobs.

And it's really amazing to be able to sell our 11 county region and make sure people are working in the craft they want to work in and get to practice the arts that they wanted to practice, while they're able to have family sustaining jobs and continue working.

So that's what we do.

But I like the movies.

It's just like, I don't I'm not one of those people that can tell you 1957, although I will tell you because you spoke about it.

The first movie in Pittsburgh is The Perils of Pauline, and that was 1914.

We argue that's the first movie in Pennsylvania.

Those people in Philadelphia say there was 1 in 1913, but they can't prove it.

So we're we're in 1914.

It's Perils of Pauline.

Yes.

So you're like you're like the sales person for southwest Pennsylvania, bringing in TV shows, films and streaming services.

Is that part of.

Correct.

And we usually when we'r referring to Netflix and Amazon and the rest of them we just call them all this TV.

Okay, I had this conversation last week because someone asked me about how we're tracking them because we keep track of how many people called for, how many features and who filmed here and all of those things and said.

Where's the streaming?

I said, oh, we just put them under TV because you watch them on your TV.

It's very low tech.

Okay, the film office is huge.

I have a full time staff of five and that includes me.

So trying to keep track of all these things.

So for ease, we call it TV.

But yes, I describe my job as outside sales.

What is a typical da in your life like when there is a film potentially coming when one is here?

Give us a little snapshot of that.

Well it's interesting, my day is never typical.

You know, a I told you guys what I got here.

I drove from Harrisburg today.

I don't go to Harrisburg every day, but basically it just depends on what's happening.

Most of our clients live in Los Angeles so there are three hours behind and we deal with the clients on the ground.

First, Mayor of Kingstown is here.

They're finishing their fifth and final season.

Their call time today, I believe, was at 8 a.m.. So we checked the call sheets.

We make sure we know what neighborhood they're filming in today.

We usually know ahead of time, but it's important we know where they are today.

Fun fact when we're really busy, we had five shows filming simultaneously and we helped the community.

So if someone came and blocke the entrance to this coffee shop and they couldn't get in their door and they called our office, we would call and fix it.

So someone called and there was a truck blocking a road that was in the way.

And I picked up the phon and called the show and I said, hey, you guys have parking, you can't do this.

And they're like Dawn and I kep talking and they're like, Dawn!

And I kept talking like, we're on a stage today.

I called the wrong show, so I had to learn like let's go look at the call sheet, see who I'm calling, because we've gotten to the point we were so busy that we had multiple shows, which was pretty fun.

But essentially, we're helping people locally who call who may be trying to do their first movie, who have a question about how to get a permit.

We speak with community groups who want to have more filming in their communities.

We speak with community groups who don't want any filming in their community.

Most of those are on the North side.

Yeah, they get a little cranky because it's beautiful over ther and they had a lot of filming, but essentially I'm usually not in my office.

I spend a lot of time o my phone would be a typical day, and we're running calls.

And the key to this industr and how the film office has been successful is the relationships we've built with the communities, with our elected officials, with leadership.

So we're always talking, trying to figure out what's going on, knowing what's happening in the world and just really trying to make sure we're continuing this conversation.

So I remembe this was maybe two decades ago when Pittsburgh was really sort of jumping into, or at least trying to jump into modern film production and television.

Right.

And I remember the quote was I think it was when the Jacksons miniseries filmed here, and they said, the best thing about Pittsburgh is that it could be anywhere.

I don't know that that's the compliment.

They meant it to be right.

And is that still the case?

Do people film here?

Because Pittsburgh can be, you know, blend into the background and look like every city?

Well what we like to tell people is we can look like anything in the world.

As long as you don't need a beach or a desert.

Two things we're missing for the beach we send them up to for fun.

We did The Warrior, which was a ultimate fighting cage fighting, whatever movie we turned the century three mall into Iraq so we can d the desert takes a lot of magic.

You lay out all the camo netting and you put some tanks in some strategic places and you have the desert.

But prior to film tax credits, which we will talk about, I'm sure the key was locations.

People would come here because of the locations they were trying to double for something else.

And in our heyday, which was the early 90s for TV movies, we did Oksana Bauil and played Ukraine.

We've done Paris, we've done San Francisco.

I get in trouble for talking about how we do New York better than New York.

But the fun thing about in Pittsburgh is we'll close the street for you in New York.

They don't.

So if you watch stuff is filmed in New York, you'll start seeing the cars shifted even though it's the same scene, like they're still writing in the car.

But wait a minute that it was read before.

Like when you really start paying attention because they never will shut down to traffic, so it makes it easier.

Sally Fiel did her directorial debut here.

It was a show called The Christmas Tree.

They needed Rockefeller Center.

We did that at Mellon Square Park.

Oh, cool.

So locations matter.

Location, location, location.

Exactly.

So yes, it still matters.

It's just not the number one deciding factor of why anyone comes here anymore.

Okay, let's talk about tax credits.

I know it's a huge thing for Pittsburgh.

Can you explain how we just need more?

We need more, we need more.

It's all about the money.

Pennsylvania has $10 million film tax credit program.

Which, if that was our money, none of us would be sitting here.

Right?

Like, it sounds like a whole lot of money.

Pennsylvania is super lucky.

And I say that with all sarcasm.

We have two production centers, Pittsburgh and those people in Philly.

So we have to share the mone and then some work takes place throughout the rest of the state.

But the two centers, which is where the bulk of the crew, the bulk of the vendors are is Pittsburgh and Philadelphia.

We have $100 million.

It's taken us a long time, 15 year to get us to $100 million, which so how the tax credit works will do that.

The easy version, it's you have to spend 60% of your budget to qualify to receive 25% tax credit.

It's kind of like a 25% off coupon at Macy's.

This isn't money we would ever have spent in this region if we weren't giving them that 25%.

What they have to spend tha 60% on is Pennsylvania business.

Pennsylvania people, and they buy or purchase has to be from Pennsylvania.

So we're getting that money back into the economy.

They hav there's an application process.

It has to be approved before they start filming.

So it's a real draw to get someone here because you're giving them back 25% of what they're spendin once they meet the requirements.

So we have $100 million.

New Jersey just went to $900 million.

New York is at $800 million.

California is at $500 million.

Georgia is uncapped, meaning they never run out of money.

West Virginia is uncapped.

They never ran out of money either.

So we haven't stayed competitive in this process.

And the industry is very incentive dependent.

So the first question now is not can you look like New York?

Is there any money left in your tax credits?

Right.

And once they're gone, becaus they operate on a fiscal year.

So our New Year's Day is July 1st.

We're very excited tha the coffers will get refilled.

But we just we haven't stay competitive.

But what can we do?

Like wha can we write to our congressman?

What what can the people of Pittsburgh do to get more film here in the city to increase the tax credits is to speak with your local legislators.

And we have a lot of support o both sides of the aisle is just there seems to always be other priorities in the Commonwealth's budget, and we haven't been able to get past the 100 million.

And if I remember correctly, the goal was to try to get to 3 million, at least immediat 300 million, 300, 300 million.

Yeah.

Well, because if you look at a show like Mayor of Kingstown they spend roughly $150 million in the six months that they're here.

Those are 800 paycheck on that show every single day.

Right.

They earned a $24 million tax credit.

Yeah.

The money goes very quickly.

Yeah, sure.

There's a show called Task for HBO.

Its second season.

It's filming in Philly.

They have a $49 million tax credit spread over a three year span of time.

So the numbers are large because the spend is large and trying to make sure we can keep that going.

So when you see your local legislators, you just tell them how important it is, because what I've learned is having the hear it from people who aren't directly involved in the industry carries a lot more weight than them listening to me.

Yeah, sure.

Because at this point I sound like a broken record, which is okay.

I think that one of the things that's so cool about the Pittsburgh Film Office and like you said, it's sort of a development.

It's a sales job, right?

Is that you do sort of work within this infrastructure of the former industrial capital.

We were right.

I think your offices are still at the Carey Blast Furnace.

Is that correct?

Oh, no.

No.

Okay.

You're downtown now.

Okay.

And we film at the Carey Furnaces a lot because it's really the only steel mill we can actually use, right?

Because they don't let you into the active ones.

They seem to think it's a safety issue.

Right?

They want everyone to steal toed boots.

I don't get it.

But, yeah, we're out there.

But.

But you also are working to acquire, I don't know if that's right word.

The old airport to become a center, right?

Were marketing the airport.

as a as a potential locatio for filming because it's closed.

Right.

Which, you know, I love the airport.

The airport has been great partners to us.

And Christina Cassotis and I are friends, and they're always more than willing to work out letting us film there.

But it's really great to close, to film in a closed airport.

Yeah.

There's no people in the way.

There's none of the suitcases unless you want them.

Right.

I was in there a month ago.

They've taken all the signage down, which is amazing because now it can be anywhere USA.

I mean, there's a closed Dunkin Donuts, there's a closed Starbucks, there's a closed diner.

It's 440,000ft of space.

It has 60ft ceilings.

You can do anything in there.

And there's a closed subway.

And they told me, you know, the subway can't move.

I said, I don't care, right?

The door is open.

The door was closed.

The door is open.

You don't know if it moved its movie magic.

So we're marketing that as a potential location.

We have hopes o somebody might want to do more permanent type filming in there, but at this point it's just an amazing resource.

Just like SC Pittsburgh is our closed prison, which is the reason Mayor of Kingstown is here.

And when you ask about the day I went to prison last week and the joke was, If I'm not out by noon, come find me, it means I got locked int one of the wrong, wrong rooms.

But it's we have these amazing, unique locations that other people don't have.

So if we have the incentives.

The second question is what else is here?

And that's why we want to talk about all these different locations that will draw other projects here.

Well the nice thing about Pittsburgh for your industry is that there's always a war of tearing anything down when it closes.

Right?

So it's everything's always open for, for a long time.

Yes.

Because when they first announced they were going to tear down SCI Pittsburgh, everyone got very nervous.

And I was like, I think we've got five years.

We're okay.

Yeah.

So we'll see what they ended up doing.

What was the first movie you brought in?

Diabolique.

Okay.

Oh yeah.

Yeah, yeah.

Diabolique.

Sharon Stone, Raul Julia, whoever else was in that.

That's a fun on because it's based on a French film of the same name.

So, see, this is wha I can sound like a movie person.

So they made this French film in the 50s called Diabolique.

It was set at a school in the French countryside that had nothing around it.

For a full seven acres.

It sat on a seven acre piece of property and you saw no other buildings.

And they filmed at Sant Philomena schools in Squirrel Hill, surrounded by houses and that community.

They were amazing.

We covered their houses in camo netting so you couldn't see there were houses.

They covered up that swimming pool, the crew T-shirt, because a lot of times they'll make t shirts during the show was She Wants What?

Which was in reference to ou Meadville native Sharon Stone.

But we filmed that in the heart of Squirrel Hill, and that was Diabolique.

So that was pretty fun.

Yeah.

What was your impression coming into the city in 1994?

You said you'd been here for a very short time before that, but did you come in going, what am I going to do with this?

Well how are we going to market this?

When they called me the first time, when we first started talkin about me coming to Pittsburgh, I was in a fight with my bos about my budget, and I was like, that's it, I'm leaving.

Right?

You know, it's kind of funny.

And then I started talking to Pittsburg and I asked, does it snow there?

And they said, well, yeah, I go, yeah, next, because I took me a long time to get to live by the beac and I wasn't going to do that.

And then I came to Pittsburgh.

There was 154 people that applied for my job.

Wow, wow.

They interviewed 20 people on the phone and they flew five of us in.

Wow.

And when they offered me the job, that was really exciting.

And then they told me they had no budget and that was fun.

And I said, yeah, I don't.

Famous last words, I don't fundraise.

And I went back to Santa Cruz and wish them well.

And then six months later, everything was in place and I came back.

And you know, Pittsburgh is amazing and the neighborhoods are what really make it right because it looks so different and you get a whole different vib no matter where you are.

Right.

So my first house was out into the sale because I was panicked, because I got here in 94 and I think the big blizzard was 93.

That's right.

When the turnpike closed.

That's right.

So I was convinced I had to be walking distance to the grocery store.

So I lived above the Edgewood Town Center, and they let me have my six month old golden retriever, because trying to find a house with a dog to rent was just about it back then.

But yeah, that was my first test.

Then I moved into the city in Highland Park, and now I'm out here in the suburbs, out here in Mount Lebanon.

But yeah, so it's really interesting that the film office has kind of grown and evolved with the city, because if you think back to when Striking Distance was here, right?

And Bruce Willis had all that bad press for talking about swimming in the rivers and how much he hated it.

And now there are people that have no idea that at one point are rivers were polluted and there were still mill that were, you know, clogging up the air.

It's just remarkable.

And I think the film industry has really grown up with it.

I think it's grown up with it.

I think it's helped tell the story of a more positive place for southwest.

Look, Pittsburgh become amazing and it was alway had the potential to be there.

But our history is important.

We built the world from here, right?

And that all mattere how we got to this point today.

But every time you see that image of Pittsburgh on the screen, be it small or large, it starts changing the people's perception.

If we just get the NFL to quit doing the anvil beating at the beginning of every Monday Night Footbal game, we'd be in a great place.

You guys spoke about Inspecto Gadget earlier.

It's so funny.

I've spoken about this movie every day this week.

It's only Tuesday but my week started on Sunday.

But we keep talking about Inspector Gadget.

It's.

But that movie is 91 minutes long.

Yeah, it was prior before nine over 11, so helicopters were allowed to film lower.

So it's 200ft above the downtown.

Yeah, it has some of the best footage of it really does I know that.

Yeah.

And we were the only city in the entire world that closed of bridge for 30 days, right?

They couldn't do it anywhere else.

Now, what's fun i we got a lot of press for that.

The Hollywood Reporter, variety going.

They closed a bridge for 30 days and we just giggled because we all kno there's the sixth Street bridge.

Seventh Street bridge?

Yeah, I closed the sixth one.

We got two more right down, but they didn't tell that part of the story.

Yeah, we closed bridges.

We use airports, we use them do prisons.

It's all just put it together.

What's the difference between making a movie back in the 90s as opposed to today?

How has that changed?

Oh, I think it's much more technical.

These guys I was on I was at Mayor of Kingstowns set last week I took a legislator for a set.

And the amount of monitors and the amount of equipment that each crew person has to hold on to.

So the script supervisor is someone who follows the script and make sure that they're following the script and will call out, hey, Don, you messed that up.

Or you know, and make sure that you'r wearing your yellow baseball hat and your black t shirt for that scene, for that piece of property you shoot out of order, you shoot out of order.

Yeah.

So the script supervisor was sitting there.

She has an iPad and an iPhone.

She's following along on both.

In the old days, it was paper.

It was a ruler It was multicolored.

Yeah, yeah.

And that happens in every single department.

And in the 90s, you know, Pittsburgh, we had a lot of crew.

We've quadrupled the size of our crew base.

There's 5000 people that work in this industry on a full time basis here in southwestern Pennsylvania.

So we weren't as big back then We were doing a lot of movies.

But when it's busy, we do a lot more.

Yeah, yeah.

My brother.

Your brother?

Yeah.

My brother.

I think he was weed eating at the prison, I swear.

What are the challenges outside of the tax credit of getting more movies here?

What does Pittsburgh have to do to attract more?

It's the incentives.

It really it's a financial decision.

The thing that people forget is the studios are all publicly traded companies.

And the big studios Netflix, Amazon, Apple, they're all technology companies.

Their entertainment division of their big budget is like this much, right?

And they don't care.

It's all about the money.

So it's making sure that we're a financially good decision.

We're 30% cheaper than the other side of the state.

We're far cheaper than most of our competition because most of the talented crew that live here, they work here, they're able to hire them.

They're not having to put them up.

They're not having to pay them.

You know, it's havin everyone here is really helpful.

Having a soundstage would be helpful.

Yeah.

We haven't built anything fo the industry at this point yet, but the industry goes in cycles, so it's kind of hard to get up enough momentum to get some of those things.

And that's something that you would I mean, the film Office wouldn't be responsible for, for building a sound stage.

You would work to, to incentivize people to build that here.

We've been trying.

Yeah, we've been trying.

It just we haven't quite gotten you know, it ends up being a loss leader much like a convention center.

They rented a defici for the publicly supported ones because you're bringing them in.

So they spend the money in the region and then they leave.

And, you know, it's kind of hard to get those things done.

Sure.

Yeah, right.

That's why we were down in Rankin, though, because we've been trying to do that down in Rankin.

Okay.

That makes a lot of sense.

That's 57 acre space there.

And you know it was a lot of interest in it.

And then the industry slowed down again.

So we'll see what happens.

What was your hardest sell to get a movie to come to Pittsburgh?

Oh, probably.

Where did you go, Bernadette okay.

With Kate Blanchett because she wanted they wanted to make that movie here, and we didn't hav enough tax credits for them, and they left, and they had jus they had been here on Last Flag Flying, which was also Richard Linklater's film.

And so they had packed up and gone to Georgia and we tried and we tried and we tried and was like, okay I can't come without the money.

But then thankfully, on of our other films dropped out.

So I got to call Richard Linklater and say, hey, can you come back?

And they were they literally were in the office to sign the deal on the soundstage in Georgia.

And they're like, hold on we're going back to Pittsburgh.

So we bring them back.

So that was the hard part wa just getting them to come back.

Yeah, our hardest location was getting them to shut the Fort Pitt Bridge.

When she rides in the back of the truck on Fault in our Stars.. Yeah.

Yes.

Yeah.

She ride in the back of the pickup truck.

Getting that through the state was a challenge, but we got it done.

And yeah, I mean, you've had some huge successes though as well.

And you're talking about.

I guess the the willingness of Pittsburgh.

I work downtown when it was transformed to Gotham.

Right.

And that was amazing.

I still have snow in a can right from, from when that was filmed here.

That was really amazing to see Pittsburgh transform into somethin completely different on screen.

Dark Knight Rises was amazing.

And the fun facts on that is it did not receive a tax credit.

They didn't qualify.

Wow.

So if you go back to you got to spend 60% o your budget to get a tax credit.

They filmed in five countries.

This is $250 million film.

They filmed for a total of 21 days here in Pittsburgh.

They spent $12 millio in the 21 days they were here.

And they dropped the unemployment rate in Allegheny County One full percentage point.

Wow.

They put 10,000 people in their winter clothes and put them in Heinz fields and paid them minimum wage to be an extra, much like you wanted to be.

And that droppe the unemployment rate one full.

Well, that's amazing.

And we had no complaints.

Downtown Pittsburgh for 21 days, we were shedding streets where you're throwing snow.

I mean, we cleaned up snow for six months.

It was crazy because it's not real snow.

It doesn't melt.

It's a little tiny pieces of paper.

But yeah, that was a great experience.

And they were they were really overjoye with the footage that they got.

So you talk about how you are salesperson for the the region.

Right.

And so I'm wondering, do you work with a lot of the other development offices here in Pittsburgh.

So you know, whatever to try to get more businesses.

You all coordinate.

Hey, we're going to go to to Harrisburg and and try to get more money brought into the city.

Do you work like that with th other development offices now?

Well.

The reason this works is because we all work together, right?

You know and we have great relationships.

You know, I can call the county executives office and ask for help.

I call the mayor's office and say, hey, can I close the bridge for 30 days?

The Inspector Gadget thing.

Originally, they said, can we close your bids for three days?

And I was sitting in a meeting in LA and very confidently said, sure I can close up for three days.

I didn't call anybody.

Then can we close it for five?

And I went, yeah, we can do that.

When it got to 14 days I called Mayor Murphy's office and said, hey we're talking about doing this.

And then it got to 30.

So we all worked together on that standpoint.

We don't all go to Harrisburg together.

We meet, we have conversations.

But you know, if you look at what some of the other ones are doing, there are very focused on different industries.

The film office itself, we really focus.

It's a very small niche industry and we know who they all are, but we work together.

We just don't hang out that short.

Yeah.

What has filmmaking in Pittsburgh meant to you personally?

What has it meant to you?

What it's meant to me now is the a number of people who have been employed.

Yeah.

Like I'm getting really worried because there's no work coming right now.

Mayor of Kingstown is going to wrap and everyone's going to be unemployed again.

Yeah, Covid was super hard when everyone had to go home.

The whole world shut down, but our crew had to go home and then we were the first ones back.

So the thing I'm most proud of is the relationships we've created with our local union crew.

Because in the beginning if you're bored, go Google it.

They were out to kill me.

I said mean things about them They said mean things about me.

And now we're the only film office in the country that gets direct payroll deposits from our union crew.

Wow.

We created a one of a kind workforc training program called create PA, where we have union crew actually teach the classes.

They get union hours.

I'm a union signatory now, so we've really worked together to have this industry.

We're all friends, we work together, and we're all pulling the boat in the same direction, which is why you've seen the increase in the work and you've seen the success.

So that's the thing I'm most proud of.

So it's really we've created a family.

So that would be what it means to me at this point.

So in terms of new work, what wags the dog, are you going out and talking to production studios and producers and filmmakers or are they calling you?

I mean, I know it's both, but.

So right now you're talking about being nervous, right?

So how are you looking to alleviate that?

What happens?

I'm making a lot more outbound phone calls than I was for a while.

I was being very yeah they were calling me every day.

It's like more calls coming in than ever.

Was going out for a while.

But again, it's cyclical.

And the industry overall is starting to constrict a little bit.

Since the strikes from three years ago, they discovered leaving town, they leave the country and they're like, hey, it's kind of nice over here.

They'll come home.

But it's with all these mergers, you know, Paramount, Warner Brothers are going to merge.

They bought Disney and Fox but each other.

So it's less companies making less products.

So trying to make sur we're still staying in that mix.

But essentially we rea the trades, we talk to people.

We're always if we hear rumors, you know, we keep talking about Inspector Gadget.

It came up because there's an Inspector Gadget 2 that's being talked about with Will Ferrell.

Oh, so we've already, you know, called them saying, hey, you want to come back?

Tom Hanks has another movie with Muriel Heller who directed him here in A Beautiful Day.

So we called Mariel.

We called Tom Hanks.

People were like, hi, we're here.

What do you need?

So we do that a lot.

We have a librar that has 50,000 digital images that represent all of the 11 counties.

That's amazing.

It's helpful, especiall when if they need a courthouse, we send them 11 courthouses, and we're constantly adding to that library and constantly making sure the photos are up today.

Yeah.

What is the strangest, weirdest request a producer has sent to you?

Oh, the ones I can talk about publicly.

They treat us like Ticketmaster a lot.

I get a lot of Steeler tickets requests.

Sure.

Yeah, yeah.

I got a request for Cuban cigars that became sort of a game because we've gotten the everything they wanted.

He goes I bet you can't get Cuban cigars you know, they're illegal.

But somehow they found their way to Pittsburg and they were delivered to set.

It's usually locations.

The movie unstoppable, which was directed by Tony Scott.

Denzel Washington starred.

We had to move a train ca across from Ohio to Pittsburgh, which seems like it would be really easy because you put it on the train tracks and you bring it here.

But the railroads had decided someone had told them the entire movie was a knock on the railroad industry, and that it ended with the train blowing up and there was dead babies on the tracks.

And it was like this horrible, horrible thing.

And so none of the major railroad companies would actually help us.

So we had to figure out how to get this multi ton train car across the highways with all the appropriate permits.

And that was probably the hardest, strangest thing we had to do.

But we got it done.

Even when they got pulled over by the Pennsylvania State trooper.

And it was 6:00 in the morning and I was in California.

And the officers like these permits are not the right permits.

I'm like, okay, you see on that line, I had to call the Penn State Police like it was a whole thing.

But we got the train car here and Unstoppable is great if you haven't seen it.

And then my favorite part about Unstoppable was all the railroad execs begging to come to the premiere.

Because it turns out they're heroes.

Not bad guys at the end.

And I know that also there's.

I'm assuming, anyways, that you d a lot of the producer comes in, he says, we need this this, right, whatever this is.

And so I know you have people who actually go out and look for a house that has this many windows or this many doors or, or a building that looks like this.

Right.

How do you keep that library?

I mean, how do you how do your people know where to find these things?

Well, we have the library, but we also have I think we're up to 14 now, location scouts and managers who really know where all the locations are.

But typically we get a scrip or we get a location breakdown, and if it's not broken we break it down and it'll say, I need a greenhouse with a purple dog out front and with a white picket fence, whatever it is.

And I need a courthouse and I need a bowling alley.

Well, you guys build something specific to show in a picture for them.

No.

Okay, we will not for they'll build it for show.

Right?

But a lot of times they can make it work.

They'll double it.

They may want the exterior of a coffee shop, but this may not wor because that pipes in the way.

So they'll do the interio of a coffee shop somewhere else.

So they just match all those things up.

But we break it down.

We'll send them what's in the library first.

Okay, if none of that works, then we'll hire one of the location guys to go out, guys or girls to go out and start filming and send us another package.

So once they've seen those location photos, in the old days, it was al Kodak printed out photos we had.

I'd tell them, okay, you'll have it in 24 hours.

Now we can do it, you know, 24 minutes, right?

So it's much quicker.

Turn around and then they'll fly in.

We pick them up at the airport we make sure they have a hotel.

We put them in a van.

We show them all the stuff they need to see locations, location.

It's all about the yes.

Yeah, that's a common thing in the film industry.

But our library, it's photos that aren't you know, sometimes magazines will call going, can we have photos of this?

Like, these aren't magazine photos, right?

I've got all the alleys of downtown.

Yeah, we did the movie Kingpin.

I have every bowling alley in southwestern Pennsylvania.

Yeah, my favorite wa someone needed a strip club next to a gas station and I sent it out to the board and a few other people that were on the Film Office mailing list early on in my time here, and I had ten people call me and tell me wher the strip club was next to the.

The Cricket.

Exactly, and people don't ask me that.

Yeah, we work with the tourist promotion agencies in all 11 counties.

Okay.

So we can call them and ask them, do you have an apartment building?

It looks like this.

Do you have a castle?

And then they'll send us photos too.

So we really try to kee moving stuff around the region.

So it's not all just right here, right?

So I'm having about that.

Everyone knew where it was, I didn't I'm going strip clubs in Pittsburgh.

That's a gas station I didn't Valerie.

So you've lived quite the life compared to me, I assume.

Oh m God, it's always entertaining.

What were some o your favorite movies growing up?

Oh, wow.

I don't even know.

Grease.

Oh, yeah I remember going to see Grease.

My first horror movie was Amityville Horror.

I couldn't sleep by myself for a week.

I made my sister sleep in my room with me.

I don't know wha I thought she was going to do.

I'd have to say Grease was fun.

Yeah, this is fun.

Sure.

My favorite Pittsburgh movies Flashdance, though.

Oh, sure, I will watch that every single, every time, a time, every time I know, I know.

Wonderful.

We're going to take a quick break.

We're going to drink some water and some tea and we'll be right back with more with Dawn.

What is the Gen X Pittsburgh Podcast Let me take you back.

Remember when coffee was king and pizza bagels rolled on the corner of 14th and Carson at the Beehive?

Or how about that tim you stumbled upon art all night?

How cool was that?

Or when your evening started instead of ended at 10 p.m.?

Yeah, we miss those days, too.

So we're bringing them back.

One Gen X story at a time.

Join David Brullo and I, Valerie Christoffel, as we sit down with the movers and shakers, the artists and the voices who helped shape Pittsburgh back in the early 90s.

Subscribe to the Gen X Pittsburgh podcast.

All right.

We are back in with Dawn Keezer, the executive directo of the Pittsburgh Film Office.

Do you think we utilize our rivers enough in films?

Can we do more?

Like, What's the rivers are a drawing point.

It's a little challenging to get everybody out on the river, on boats with people and you know, all the things.

If you watch Mayor of Kingstown, there's a whole boat scene in season two, because season one was filmed in Canada, because we were out of money.

So they came in season two.

They rented almost every boat at Lake Erie to go out there and handle their whole scene.

Inspector Gadget used the river.

Sweet Girl, use the river.

Jason Momoa actually jumps off PNC Park into the river.

No, you cannot really do that I'll look at the right camera.

No, you cannot do that.

If yo actually go to PNC Park, you'll see there's a big old sidewal way before you get to the river, but they like it for the views.

What people really comment most when they're here is the topography and how you get the hills and the valleys and the curves, and how the streets really don't line up and you can't ever get anywhere right.

That was pre-GPS but now you can get places but.

And do you have the support of you're talking about Murphy of all the local politicians are they all on board?

Absolutely.

Yeah absolutely.

It's how we get anything done.

You know today I would call mayor O'Connor.

And Sara Innamorato has been great.

And Rich Fitzgerald was wonderful when he was there.

And yeah, we all work together to make that stuff happen.

That's great.

Okay, so you've spent over 30 years convincin Hollywood to come to Pittsburgh.

What is something Pittsburghers ourselves don't appreciate enough about our own town?

Well, I believe Pittsburghers, and I'll count myself as one, but I don't buy into this.

One is they have low self-esteem about Pittsburgh.

So I moved here the first time in 1994, and I would have people say to me, you came here from California.

Why?

Or they would say, why does anyone come here to make a movie?

Right.

And it's those kind of questions.

So I did a period of time I was in Los Angeles and commuting to Pittsburgh once a month, and then I moved my family back in 2017, and these peopl delivered furniture to our home.

And I heard them speaking with my husband, and they were delivering a table.

And they.

You're from LA.

Why are you here?

And I came running around the corner.

I'm like, you have to stop asking that question, because wha they really need to talk about is what we have here, right People want what Pittsburgh has.

Yes.

I mean, we're sitting in Dormont.

Look at the houses.

Look at these neighborhoods.

I drove the back roads to get here.

You can't find this anywhere.

And we're still affordable.

You get for all four seasons.

You've got sports teams except for basketball.

And most people don't care about that.

And you get to wear black and gold all the time, right?

Like, there's all these things that are positives, and the people who live here don't appreciate it as much a the ones who come from outside.

And we come back.

Because I lived in New York, I lived in LA, and everyone comes back.

Yeah, I agree with that.

Yeah, I will fight anybody.

So I have several issues about Pittsburgh.

He's gonna fight.

I'm gonna si by you.

Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.

I mean, one of my biggest problems, the people say all the time Pittsburghers are.

We're such a great small Midwestern town.

Right.

And that's the start of fighting words for me, because Pittsburgh is the last northeast city, not the first Midwest city, in my opinion.

And we punch above our weight in terms of size, in terms of art and culture, because we had all thes railroad barons who felt guilty to spend all the money.

Right.

We have sports teams that are, you know, on par with everyone else we have.

Pittsburgh is the best city.

Our neighborhoods are as good as I know.

Everybody talks about, oh, you know, Little Italy in New York or and Pittsburgh has it all.

And it doesn't take a four hour ride to get from one end to the city to the other.

Right.

This is my touch point.

I don't understand why anybody wouldn't appreciate this city for what it is, because it's amazing.

But the ones who live here, they forget.

Yeah.

And they need to be reminded b those of us who come back and.

Yeah.

So.

And the views, I mean, Mount Washington, the views of the city going through the Fort Pitt.

It's all cliche to us now, right.

But but they're amazing.

I still I still get excited coming through those tunnels day or night.

It's just so beautiful.

That's right.

Yeah, but that's it.

Yeah.

Just need to appreciate that we're here.

Yeah.

Couldn't agree more.

I wrote a book about it, so.

All right, we are going to play Rapid Fire Rewind.

This is where we ask you some questions and you just have to answer them up top of my head.

Yeah.

Okay.

First one: Iron City or Rolling Rock?

Rolling Rock.

Okay.

Favorite Gen X band?

Does Coldplay count?

Yeah, sure.

Okay.

Three Rivers or Heinz Field?

Three Rivers.

Okay.

Favorite Gen X movie?

Oh, wow.

Did we make one here?

Not sure.

I don't think we did.

Unless Innocent Blood is counted as a Gen X movie.

Dogma.

Dogma.

Dogma.

But that it was so long ago.

Yeah.

I mean, it's Kevin Smith, it's Kevin Smith is Matt Damon, it's Ben Affleck.

They won their Oscar while they were here.

And then they got given cigars and set up smoke detectors at the William Penn Hotel.

But yes.

Yeah.

Well Dogma was great.

So we'll go.

Yeah.

Yeah, yeah.

Are you next?

No, you are.

Donzis and Chaunceys or Metropol and Rosebud?

Metropol and Rosebud.

It was open when I got here, so.

Excellent.

What about.

Do you have a favorite Saturday morning cartoon?

I do not.

I don't even think I can come up with one.

Im old.

So, you know, Inspector Gadget, Inspector, Inspector Gadget.

But I don't believe that was on the air when I was little.

You know what?

It wasn't a Saturday morning.

It was actually like Nickelodeon, right?

Right, right.

So, yeah, it's sad that I know these things.

Southside Beehive or Oakland Beehive?

Southside.

Thank you.

What was the first concert you went to?

Sammy Hagar.

Oh, wow.

Yeah.

In LA?

No, in Fresno, California.

Yeah.

I just had this conversation because the Scorpions are playing Vegas and I'm like, can we go?

I was in 80s kid, so I'm going to Vegas in two weeks to see New Kids on the block with my sister.

Are they playing the sphere?

No, no they're not.

I've seen Scorpions like, three times.

So we were doing this.

Yeah.

And they have a movie coming up and they have a movie.

One last thing I want to touch based on.

Oh, I'm sorry.

You have more questions?

Oh, no, we don't.

I'm done.

I have many more.

Oh, okay.

Atari or Nintendo?

Nintendo.

Never mind the last question you wrote for me.

Yeah.

So.

Yeah.

Okay.

But I do want to touch base on your podcast.

Yes.

Tell us about your podcast.

It's called Screen Perspectives.

And what we find a lot wit people who want a lot of people wanna work in the film industry, which is great.

You know, it's a fun way to make a living.

Thankfully, it's family sustaining wages for people, but people don't know how to do it.

And it's really it's an opaque curtai in front of the entire industry.

And there is no direct pathway to success.

If you want to be a doctor, you go to college, you go to medical school, you do your residency, you're a doctor.

Law school, same thing.

You go to law school, you pass the bar.

You're a lawyer.

It doesn't wor that way with the film industry.

And when you start speaking to people who work in it, and because of how small this industry is and how hands on we are with our clients, I hear a lot of the stories that other people didn't.

So two years ago, we started doing podcasts with the so we could share those stories.

So it's called Screen Perspectives.

We unfortunately don't have advertisers or supporters, so it only takes you 22 minutes per episode to listen to you, but you get to hear people's stories of how they made it and what their pathway to success was.

And then we have them usually give advice to, especially like college students and incoming people, young people that want to work in the industry.

So it's called Screen Perspectives.

It's everywhere you can hear podcasts.

And our website is a wealth of information, which is PGHfilm.org talks about our workforce training program, which will have new classe starting here in the next month.

So it's also an opportunity to get your foot in the door if it's someone's interested in working in the industry.

And who is that for?

Are those for people who have gone to school for film or these people?

It's anyone who has an interest.

We've done we have 250 graduates of create PA at this point, and more coming because thankfully we've received a couple of federal grants now that are supporting that.

So we're going to be expanding to Westmoreland and Fayette counties here shortly along with Allegheny.

But we've done here.

We've done makeup grip electric, we did a camera training, we've done production assistance and carpentry.

Well, those are all skills you need to work in the industry.

So nothing's required except for an interest and and some knowledge.

The hair, hair you have to have if we do hair again you have to have an actual license.

But we go through these training programs so they're open to everybody.

That's amazing.

Yeah.

They're having everybody.

I don't think people know about these resources.

That's amazing.

Yeah.

Great.

And we're on all the social media places so you can find us there too.

But the website has a wealth of information, and it's where you find ou when we're casting for extras, when the projects are, it's usually on there too.

So you can come be in a movie.

Wonderful.

Well, thank you so much.

Of course.

I really appreciate you being here.

Thank you for having me.

Yeah.

Thank you very much.

And thank you for joining us.

Thank you, Dawn Keezer.

Keep up the great work an we will see you guys next week.

Thank you.

Woo The Gen X Pittsburgh Podcast hosts are David Rullo and Valerie Christofel executive producer David Rullo, producer and graphic designer Kim Rullo, producer Valerie Christofel, video production and editor Brent Isaac.

Music by NeoStem.