TV and Film Crews on Dauphin Island
Dauphin Island is becoming more of a TV star these days. Earlier this month Dauphin Island was the focus of a segment for a Mobile, Alabama installment of the Antiques Roadshow. Film crews visited Dauphin Island to capture footage in the Audubon Bird Sanctuary.
In a story this morning we learn that Dauphin Island will be a part of two more upcoming television shows and a French documentary. ABC's "Nightline" news program and Food Network's "Good Eats" program crews were both on the island recently to film segments for their respective shows, along with an independent French documentary crew creating a film having to do with Dauphin Island.
TV, music video crews descend on south Alabama
Feature film production, while never exactly so commonplace in Alabama that a community's residents wouldn't consider the arrival of a film crew something special, has slowed lately in these parts.
See the article on Page 3D, about why Alabama film director Tonya S. Holly feels compelled to make the majority of her next movie in Louisiana, for some insight into the why of that.
Meanwhile, TV and video production crews have not stayed out of the state. PBS' "Antiques Roadshow," for example, left Mobile this month with enough footage to generously fill three episodes of the show's 11th season, which will air after January of next year.
Meanwhile, Lisa Young, a spokeswoman for the Dauphin Island Sea Lab, said cameras from ABC's "Nightline" news program, from Food Network's "Good Eats" program and from an independent French documentary crew have all been on the island during recent weeks shooting footage for various productions.
The attraction there seems to be the scientific expertise to be found at the Sea Lab. "Nightline" interviewed Sea Lab executive director George Crozier about coastal development, for example, and the French independent documentary company Gedeon Programmes pointed its cameras at Monty Graham, a senior marine scientist at the Sea Lab who has earned attention for his study of jellyfish. A "Good Eats" crew went on board the Sea Lab's research vessel R/V A.E. Verrill shooting footage for an upcoming installment.
There are a number of things attracting other productions to Alabama's Gulf Coast region. Nashville-based music video director Eric Straton likes both the available locations and the assistance provided by local community leaders and businesses. He has shot three country music videos in Mobile and Baldwin counties.
The third, featuring up-and-coming country music artist Zachary Hunter, was shot here only this month. Look for it on such music video outlets as cable TV's Great American Country channel later this summer, when Hunter's Aspirion Records single "Two Lonesome Hearts" is released.
"You couldn't find a more cooperative film office in the country than you have in Mobile, to be honest with you, and I have worked with a lot of them," Straton said from Nashville Wednesday. "That makes you feel like the community is glad to have you. The community of Fairhope, too, has always been extremely responsible to our needs and has been helpful."
Straton also appreciates that there are places in Alabama that "can almost look like anywhere except for New York."
For his recent video, for example, Straton found rural highways that "look like Texas, with lots of flat, long, lonesome roads."
"I plan to return...and film as often as I can," he said.
In fact, expect him back in a few months when he begins production on an independent documentary about the Confederate Navy.