THERE'S NO BUSINESS LIKE SHOW BUSINESS [ldots].

• Author: PETERSON, ERIC
• Position: Statistical Data Included

IN COLORADO, ANYWAY, WHERE FEATURE FILM DOLLARS HAVE DROPPED MORE THAN 80% IN FIVE YEARS

Movies and politics have always run in Harold McCormick's blood. Born into show business in 1918, he owns and operates Canon City's Skyline Theatre to this day. He also served for 32 years in the Colorado Senate and House of Representatives, retiring in 1992.

McCormick's career hit one of many highs on July 1,1969, the day Colorado established the first state-sanctioned film commission in the United States. As a state representative, McCormick had written the film commission bill and pushed it through the Legislature. Two days later, True Grit premiered. Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid opened later in the year. Both movies were partly shot in Colorado. "They were tigers," McCormick said of the original film commission.

Thirty-one years later, the production of acted entertainment in Colorado is at an "all-time low," according to Phil Garvin, president of Denver's Colorado Studios, and a Colorado Motion Picture and Television Commission advisory board member. According to commission reports, feature film spending in Colorado dropped for the third straight year in FY 1999, down to about $2 million from more than $11 million in '97 (see sidebar).

The effects of the decline reverberate beyond $9 million, however. Visiting movie crews are unique boons to local economies, leaving dollars behind in many pockets, and film locations often evolve into vacation hotspots. "Boy, that's good for tourism," said McCormick of Colorado's appearances in major motion pictures, "and this is a tourism state."

"The reason we're at an all-time low is because Canada's at an all-time high," Garvin said, citing favorable exchange rates and a 30% difference in taxation. "The production that left California that was going to the various states is now going to Canada."

While a big piece of this puzzle lies north of the border, observers acknowledged other factors at work. The decline of Westerns in favor of action films is one. Hollywood's newfound ability to digitize sweeping landscapes on a soundstage is another. The Colorado Motion Picture and Television Commission also has received its share of the blame, mainly for not bringing enough big-budget features to Colorado.

Garvin said that gauging the commission's recent effectiveness or ineffectiveness is difficult, because it has landed no big projects. "This doesn't mean (the commission) didn't try," he observed. "It just...