Dude, "Lone Ranger" uncooly nabbed for pot brownies

Yes, The Lone Ranger is mostly filming in New Mexico, but at least Texas got to arrest Armie Hammer, who stars as the masked man, for trying to bring pot brownies into Mexico from the Lone Star State.

'Lone Ranger' starts New Mexico shoot in February

It looks like big-budget The Lone Ranger with Johnny Depp as Tonto will be almost entirely a New Mexico shoot, according to this New Mexico newspaper report and this report that says filming will be in Albuquerque, Santa Fe and elsewhere through August. No mention of any Texas shoot despite earlier scouts in the Marfa/Alpine area. Also no mention of Louisiana, which had been in the filming mix.

Elizabeth Gabel, a casting agent in New Mexico, has more info, including that extras will first be used in March.

Also of interest, this site lists some cast names I hadn't seen before, including Tom Wilkinson, Dwight Yoakam, Barry Pepper and Timothy Hutton. Armie Hammer is the Lone Ranger.

It also appears the working title (which could just be an attempt to lower the film's profile while shooting) is Silver Bullet.

'Lone Ranger' lives, but not in Texas

Jerry Bruckheimer has managed to revive Johnny Depp-starrer The Lone Ranger with its budget tightened, ahem, from $260 million to $215 million.

There were rumblings earlier of a joint New Mexico-Texas shoot for this tale of a TEXAS Ranger, then talk of Utah, but the final words is New Mexico and possibly Louisiana. Why? Do you even need to ask?

Here's what Bruckheimer told The Hollywood Reporter:

"We found that Louisiana gave us a better tax incentive than New Mexico -- that was another $8 million. We're still shooting in New Mexico, and we might [also] go to Louisiana. We're asking New Mexico to come closer to the Louisiana incentive.
We dropped our California location not because they didn't offer a tax break but because it was another production office that we had to open. Every time you have a new location, you have to use crew time setting it up for you. There are a lot of expenses."

Early rumblings had the film shooting some in the Alpine-Marfa area, which goes completely unmentioned here. Granger was also scouted for train scenes, probably because they were shot there for True Grit.

Disney kills 'Lone Ranger'

Apparently disagreements with producer Jerry Bruckheimer over the budget led Disney to pull the plug on the Johnny Depp-starrer Lone Ranger that may or may not have been about to film partially in Texas (or New Mexico? or Utah?). Shades of The Alamo and Pearl Harbor, both Disney projects where the studio sought and got major budget cuts that many have blamed for turning those films into boring messes.

Lone Ranger was set to film this fall and had scouted West Texas in the Alpine/Marfa area. Word also filtered out of studio shoots in New Mexico, and at one time there was serious talk of shooting in Utah.

'Lone Ranger' now looking to Utah shoot

UPDATE: LONE RANGER IS OFFICIALLY DEAD AS A PROJECT!

UPDATE: These decisions are still forming apparently, with a lot of studio work in New Mexico looking likely (along with the Utah shoot?) and some train shots in Texas.


Despite early casting reports that Disney's Lone Ranger starring Johnny Depp as Tonto would land in Texas and New Mexico, extremely reliable sources in the know say it will go to Utah. And it's a decision based entirely on the incentives that state will offer. Texas just plain doesn't offer enough.

Jerry Bruckheimer tweeted this past week that he was heavy into preproduction meetings on the project, and apparently this location decision was the result.

Of course, this means the film's Texas may better approximate the television series that ran from 1949-56 and filmed in Kanab, Utah, and California, thus keeping the myth of that particular Lone Star State alive.

'Lone Ranger' another Texas-New Mexico project?

UPDATE: LONE RANGER IS OFFICIALLY DEAD AS A PROJECT!


I've got confirmation of scouts both in Texas and New Mexico for Disney's Lone Ranger starring Johnny Depp as Tonto. This casting call actually says both states are in the mix.

Are we looking at a repeat of True Grit, which split filming between the two states with a slight edge to Texas to qualify for Lone Star State filming incentives? Looks that way. The casting call also indicates an October start to filming. Armie Hammer of The Social Network will portray the Masked Man.

For more on the project and recent scouts, read here.

Johnny Depp plays Tonto; world ends

The Mayan calendar ends on Dec. 21, 2012. That's also the date Disney has schedule the release of Lone Ranger, the film starring Johnny Depp as Tonto (the story is about him, not the masked man this go around). Oh, and as I told you before, they're scouting Texas locations...

UPDATE: LONE RANGER IS OFFICIALLY DEAD AS A PROJECT!

UPDATE: Our source Carla confirms filmmakers recently scouted White Sands, New Mexico, as well.

Texas film incentives survive; 'Lone Ranger' lurks

UPDATE: LONE RANGER IS OFFICIALLY DEAD AS A PROJECT!


My column from today's Dallas Morning News.

SHOT IN TEXAS: Legislature approves $30 million in film incentives

By JOE O’CONNELL Special Contributor

Published 09 June 2011 04:48 PM


The Texas film-incentives program appears to have survived the
legislative session, but with a lot less cash to throw at potential
projects like Johnny Depp’s Lone Ranger.

The incentive program, which is aimed at attracting film, television
commercial and video-game projects to the state, will have $30 million
to spend in the next two years. That’s exactly half of what the
Legislature approved two years ago. Another $2 million will fund program
administration and a state film archives program.

“It’s a big victory and something that we’ll have to build back up on in
the future,” said Don Stokes, president of industry lobbying group the
Texas Motion Picture Alliance. “At least it keeps the program alive at
this point.”

Most film-industry leaders are keeping their lips tight about the
allocation, perhaps concerned about unlikely changes to it during the
Legislature’s special session. But it could have been worse: An original
plan had two-year funding at $10 million and at one point the Senate
considering cutting all film-incentive funding.

The funding uncertainty kept at least one unnamed network television
series pilot from filming in Texas, Stokes said. North Texas did land
two pilots — Dallas-set Good Christian Belles , which will shoot as an
ABC series primarily in Los Angeles, and TNT’s version of Dallas, which
the network has yet to pick up as a full series.

The incentives program has been less successful competing for feature
films with other more incentive-rich states such as Louisiana and New
Mexico. The next big-name film in Texas may be a remake of The Lone
Ranger , with emphasis on the character Tonto to be portrayed by Johnny
Depp. The Disney film is expected to have a fall shoot and has been
scouting locations in West Texas, Austin and the small town of Granger
where much of True Grit was shot in 2010, Gary Bond of the Austin Film
Office confirmed.

The alliance group estimates the incentive program has generated more
than $600 million in new in-state spending and 56,000 jobs since it was
first funded in 2007.

“These incentives will keep our crew and talent working in Texas and
economically impacting our entire state,” said Waxahachie-based talent
agent Linda McAlister. “Talent live and work all over Texas, not just in
the metropolitan areas. The money is filtered throughout the communities
through production as well as individual spending.”

The Legislature clearly wants to see bottom-line results. The Texas Film
Commission has until November 2012 to come up with a 10-year plan for
the film industry to “grow beyond its traditional funding.” That
includes asking cities to get involved financially and asking colleges
and universities to bolster crew training.

“Our goal is to leverage the assets we have in the state — our talented
crews, infrastructure and location variety,” Stokes said. “We can do it
all in Texas.”

Last year the incentive program was instrumental in attracting a lot of
television series to the state — The Good Guys, Chase and Lone Star in
North Texas and My Generation and Friday Night Lights in Austin, but all
of those shows have since closed shop.

To keep either television or films from gobbling up much of the
incentives allocation, the legislation requires no more than 40 percent
of funds go to either TV, film, video games or commercials and
industrial films.

“We want to make sure all segments of the industry have a chance to grow
and prosper under the program,” Stokes said.