Big Hollywood and international film and TV shoots have been held in Spain for decades, from “El Cid,” “Lawrence of Arabia” and “The Good, the Bad and the Ugly” to more recent standouts such as “The Crown,” “Game of Thrones,” “Venom: The Last Dance” and “Kaos.”
While filmmakers often have the final say in where their film will be shot, and producers are often concerned with the bottom line, location managers almost always serve as the icebreaker when it comes to shooting in a foreign territory. They’re the first ones to assess the viability of locations, scout the logistical viability of a country and meet with the locals that will contribute to production.
Related Stories
VIP+
The Xbox Games That Should Expand Microsoft’s PlayStation Embrace
So what is it that attracts these professionals to Spain, and why do they continue recommending the country as a shooting location for their foreign shoots?
Popular on Variety
The easy answer is that it could be cheaper to shoot in Spain than in the U.S., but that hardly tells the whole story. Spain has been a popular filming location under vastly different forms of government, evolving tax regimes and a period before 2015 of no tax incentives at all. One consistent lure throughout all those years, however, is the country’s incredible range of natural and man-made shooting locations that can stand in for just about any climate, time of year, natural setting, or metropolitan cityscape in the world.
What’s more, Spanish landscapes and cities are diverse enough to stand in for many other shooting locations where filming would be too expensive, dangerous or altogether impossible.
“I’d say more than 75% of the incoming requests we see are looking to use Spain as another location,” says Palma Pictures CEO Mike Day, whose company has brought hundreds of foreign shoots to Spain over the past three decades.
Prolific location manager Naomi Liston (“Avengers: End Game” “Dungeons & Dragons: Honor Among Thieves”), who helped bring the “Game of Thrones” production to Spain, says the country’s wide range of landscapes makes it attractive for foreign producers with specific needs.
“The diverse range of architecture from ancient to ultra-modern coupled with the diversity of landscapes is what makes Spain such a versatile and attractive country to film in,” she explains.
Regardless of how alluring a potential filming location may be, it’s only useful if shooting is allowed. Liston says the Spanish government’s willingness to work with foreign productions to solve logistical problems is another major mark in the country’s favor.
“Spain works incredibly well with its main hubs in Barcelona and Madrid, fantastic crews and a huge willingness from the government level down to make it work. On ‘Game of Thrones,’ the Alcázar in Seville had never been closed for filming, yet they were willing to make it work for us and understood the benefits that filming tourism can bring to a region.”
Miglet Crichton (“Perfect Sense,” “The Eagle”), supervising location manager for Netflix’s “Kaos” – which shot scenes in several parts of Spain and used the streamer’s Sequoya Studios soundstages – agrees.
“Spain boasts a great diversity of locations, and the weather is a reliable asset for most of the year,” she says, adding that Spanish travel infrastructure is another critical asset foreign productions appreciate. “In particular, the trains were a great way to get around the country. We were often working out of two or three cities at a time, but such is the quality of transport; it was straightforward to oversee the filming.”
Day adds that in addition to its strong travel infrastructure, Spain’s position as a leading European tourism hot spot creates other advantages for visiting shoots.
“You can go to lots of different corners of the country and find great hotel and apartment infrastructure, restaurants, and all those kinds of things that make the country an easy sell to decision-makers,” he says. “When the question is posed, ‘Do you want to spend six months in Spain?’ the answer tends to be a very positive one.”
In addition to Spain’s natural and man-made aesthetic advantages, the country also boasts several LED soundstages that can stand in for more spectacular or hard-to-reach shooting locations. Netflix has an impressive LED screen set up at its Sequoya Studios in the outskirts of Madrid, and Orca Studios operates a virtual production facility in Gran Canaria, one of the largest of Spain’s Canary Islands.
While some may see LED screens as the natural enemy of location managers or anyone who makes a living working for foreign film shoots, Day says that’s probably not the case.
“I think the more infrastructure that is available in Spain to incoming producers, the better for the country. Whether that is studio infrastructure, technology, crew, suppliers, all those things marry into one attractive cocktail to international decision-makers,” he argues.
Based on their experiences shooting in Spain, Crichton and Liston both say that Spain sits near the top of their lists when new projects come across their desks.
“[Spain] is rarely far from my thoughts when I read a new script, especially when a foreign location is described,” says Crichton. “I’d feel confident that Spain would always offer up great options for any number of foreign location doubles.”
“Havingscouted for such a wide range of genres from sci-fi to medieval and knowing the country so well now, I will always put Spain and the Canary Islands in the mix,” Liston echoes.
