In 2019 Screen Scotland released the results of its first Economic Value of Screen Sector in Scotland report, which quantified the overall economic footprint of the screen sector in the country from that year.
The report revealed the industry contributed almost £568 million to Scotland’s economy. Despite the setback of the Covid pandemic, the industry is more valuable than ever, with the country becoming an attractive player in high-end TV and film productions. A recent example is the success of the Amazon Prime series The Rig, which was filmed in its entirety in Scotland and will return for a second series. So, what’s the reason for this new influx in large-scale productions?
“There is something in the concept of ‘build it and they will come’,” explains Screen Scotland Executive Director Isabel Davis.
Screen Scotland, established in 2018, is the national body that drives development of all aspects of Scotland’s film and TV industry, through funding and strategic support. The group is part of Creative Scotland and delivers these services and support with funding from the Scottish Government and The National Lottery. Davis cites the country’s new studio spaces as being key to the recent increase in productions.
“Following the global launch of The Rig series one, the first production into Edinburgh’s FirstStage Studios, this second commission is a massive vote of confidence,” she says.
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Along with Leith’s FirstStage Studios, Screen Scotland, working as a conduit between production and national stakeholders, highlights the new Glasgow Kelvin Hall studio, The Pyramids in Bathgate and Cumbernauld’s Wardpark Film and Television Studios as vital infrastructure for sector growth.
“We were working in conditions that saw the UK as a whole be a very attractive destinations for US-financed large-scale high-end TV and films,” Davis explains. “Scotland wasn’t able to take its full chair at the table and it wasn’t able to take on as many shows as elsewhere in the UK because of that key factor of studio stage space – the ability to shoot indoors.
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“We had historically contributed and competed on the basis of location shooting – because our landscape is so beautiful and versatile that’s what people would come to Scotland for, but they wouldn’t stick around because they couldn’t film the interior shots, the anchor piece for any production. And so, our economy was always only chasing those location pieces.”
Recent TV and movie productions to have filmed in Scotland include Warner Bros’ The Batman and (the recently shelved) Batgirl, as well as Lucasfilm’s fifth Indiana Jones film and Tetris from Apple TV+, Good Omens (at The Pyramids) and Anansi Boys (FirstStage Studios immediately after The Rig). Another main reason for this recent boom can be attributed in part to the ‘Outlander effect’, and the success of the Sony/Starz TV show’s success having been based here since 2012.
Since its inception, Outlander has been filmed in Cumbernauld’s Wardpark Studios, Scotland’s first purpose-built studio. It has given impetus to training the next generation of behind-the-scenes Scottish talent.
“Outlander could easily be seen as proof of concept of what can happen when you have studios in Scotland,” Davis says. “Now we have not only FirstStage studios in Leith, which came online in 2020 but arguably was enough to take another space in Scotland.
“The Pyramids in Bathgate have been used intermittently for big productions such as Trainspotting T2 and Outlaw King. The Pyramids, which were bought by London and Regional, have given Scotland far greater stage space and there are plans in place to build another five or six stages at the site. That will be off the back of the perdurance Leith’s FirstStage studios has in productions such as The Rig.
“We’re definitely seeing a cumulative effect of greater confidence from the big production outlets in the industry and the major film studios in coming to shoot in Scotland.”
Not only did shows such as Outlander exemplify what Scotland was capable of in terms of production value, but that Scottish-based crews could develop world-class skills.
Screen Scotland points to skills programmes as being of equal importance in appealing to large-scale production companies. The group works hand in hand with industry to develop skills, jobs and the crews to serve studios.
Davis says: “We’re a growing economy and there’s more growth to come, if we get the conditions right and continue to invest in studio infrastructure, skills, talent and development, and get more homegrown work coming through – work that is represented by Scotland for Scotland.
“The more we’re able to invest in skills, the bigger impact we can have. “We could do with more crew, as everyone could, and we can always do with more money.”
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Davis is confident in Scotland becoming a more attractive player in appealing to large-scale productions, particularly for shows with recurring opportunity such as The Rig.
In fact, Davis says Screen Scotland is anticipating the country’s Gross Value Added (GVA) reaching £1 billion a year by 2030 across the areas they are serving.
“We know that figure can only happen through a doubling of production spend, which won’t happen without further growth in stage space, and, critically for us, the crew base in Scotland – we’re not going to get there without skills development.
“We’ve set ourselves a pretty ambitious target for 2030 knowing it takes a while to build stages and longer even to build people, but that’s where we’re headed.”
Screen Scotland is currently working on its new economic values report for the next full year of production, but considering the new studio infrastructure in place there is large potential for growth since the 2019 report.
Davis adds: “If you look at the BFI [British Film Institute] numbers on spend, the value to the UK economy of high-end TV and film is growing around 10% year on year.
“You don’t need to be an industry specialist to know that we’re consuming more content and that the quality of that content and production value is growing enormously.”
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