New Mexico tribe transforms old casino into movie studio
TESUQUE PUEBLO, N.M. (AP) — A small northern New Mexico Native American tribe has opened a movie studio in a former casino that it hopes will lure big productions.
The Tesuque Pueblo recently converted the building near Santa Fe into a movie studio campus called Camel Rock Studios with more than 25,000 square feet (2,323 square meters) of filming space.
The tribe's lands feature stunning desert and the iconic Camel Rock formation in the red-brown foothills of the Sangre de Cristo Mountains and tribal officials said outdoor filming can take place on 27 square miles (70 square kilometers) of the reservation.
The tribe with about 800 members decided to open the studio after scenes from the Universal Pictures western movie “News of the World” starring Tom Hanks were filmed last year in the Camel Rock Casino, which closed in 2018.
Universal's use of the casino for filming helped convinced tribal officials decide to transform the empty building into studio space, said Timothy Brown, president and CEO of the Pueblo of Tesuque Development Corporation. Also influencing the decision were investments in New Mexico movie studios by Netflix and NBCUniversal in recent years, said Tunte Vigil, Tesuque Pueblo’s business development associate.
The tribe's governor, Robert Mora, Sr. "thinks this is a great opportunity for the pueblo to get into this industry,” Vigil said. “The market is really open right now, and the (tribal government) wants to bring different businesses to the pueblo.”
No productions are happening now and none are planned for the immediate future because the pueblo and most of New Mexico remain under strict COVID-19 business restrictions. But Brown said that that hasn’t stopped potential productions from contacting the pueblo and asking to reserve...
