30,000 SF sound stage
MIDDLETOWN – What started out a century ago as a railroad car repair
shop with its 60-foot ceiling, is being transformed into a movie sound
stage that is expected to place Middletown in the center of filmmaking
in the new Hollywood on the Hudson scene.
Israel Eisdorfer of Monroe, whose family has owned the building for some
30 years and rented it out to various tenants including a company that
packaged ice melt, teamed up with Eric Michaelson of Warwick, who owns
a sound stage in New York City.
This newest venue is the largest sound stage in New York State, at over
30,000 square feet, said Michaelson.
Michaelson and Eisdorfer in the planned sound stage
“There are not a lot of sound stages available in New York State,”
Michaelson said. “There is a tax break in New York State of
30 percent, which is what is attracting all the business from Europe,
Los Angeles, the US coming here because for every dollar they spend, they
get 30-cents back in tax credits, or if they go to counties north of us,
it’s an additional 10 percent boost – 40 percent. A lot of
people want to shoot in New York, but there’s no place to shoot
in. These old buildings; there are very few, and to build something like
this now is just excessive in terms of cost.”
Michaelson has begun to reach out to filmmakers and so far, Netflix and ABC Television have inspected the facility as a possible venue to shoot movies.
The operation is expected to infuse large sums of money into the local
economy in terms of materials to build sets to other supplies, food, gas
and whatever else is required when making a movie.
