The Town of Irricana has been overrun by zombies – the community is providing the backdrop for a new Netflix series, Black Summer, which will be filming in the area in the following weeks. “It’s a run-and-gun, shotgun-blast-to-the-face, run-for-your-life type of TV series,” said Jason Wan Lim, the series’ line producer. Alberta Film Projects and Wan Lim helped convince the makers of the Syfy show, Z Nation, to film the prequel series in Alberta, rather than at locations in the United States or Ontario. As a result, the production has opened up jobs for a Calgary and area crew. “Besides the handful of Americans and creative controllers on the show, I’ve hired everybody from Alberta,” said Wan Lim, who also works with a business partner in L.A. Filming starts in Irricana July 23, and will continue for about a week before moving to a school in Calgary, and then for a couple weeks in Beiseker. Wan Lim said Irricana has been very welcoming. “[The people of Irricana] have been super receptive,” he said. “We’ve knocked on doors and they’re almost invariably open to us…we did a tech survey today, and I don’t think they were properly expecting what it was we were bringing around in their homes. We had an entourage of 35 people, with directors, a production team, first assistant directors and all the department heads.” Alberta has had a sputtering history with film in relation to the country – the province still lags behind British Columbia, Ontario and Quebec in money made in the film industry, according to a report by Canadian Media Producers Association. In its 2017 report, the total volume of production in Alberta was estimated at $308 million, while British Columbia and Ontario were both almost $3-billion industries. The report also noted the Alberta industry employed 2,270 full-time equivalent workers in production in 2017, or 6,550 when accounting for spin-off from actual production. Wan Lim, who’s based out of Calgary, plans to try to bring the production back to the area for multiple seasons. He said he hopes the production has a positive impact, even if it’s through recognition. “I’m a local,” he said. “I come from the indie world. I’ve boot-strapped productions from $250,000 all the way up to three-quarter of a million, and this is a significant jump up in the scope of production for me. But it’s been great working with all the unions and people here – I look forward to bringing more projects to town.”
