Lights, Action, Long Beach Island, NJ

Long Beach Island, NJ has its eye on the silver screen, and it could be ready to give Hollywood a run for its money by becoming part of a statewide network of communities that have been certified by the Film Ready New Jersey Program.

The Film Ready Program was established in 2023 by the New Jersey Motion Picture and Television Commission (NJMPTC) as a pilot program in Somerset County. Its goal was to help prepare NJ communities for on location film production.

The program consists of a five-step certification process that covers everything from permits to public safety standards and filming fees. So far fifty-eight towns and municipalities across New Jersey have completed the certification program. Long Beach Township, NJ and Tuckerton, NJ are near to completing the program with more LBI towns and municipalities sure to follow.

Savannah Beaulieu, Deputy Borough Clerk for Tuckerton, NJ, said their Economic Development Committee is excited about the program. They have been actively pursuing completion of the program to become Film Ready certified.

“We are in the last minutes of getting certified as Film Ready,” she said. “We have a few more steps to complete and we are very thrilled.”

Regina Lotito, Director of Parks & Recreation at Long Beach Township, NJ said her department has been on top of things getting everything in place to become Film Ready.

“We’ve completed the online application for permits and all of the ordinances are in place,” she said. “We passed it the first Monday in May. Everything will be online at the end of the year on our website (longbeachtownship.com /online forms /special event forms /filming permits). In June Municipal Clerk Danielle LaValle and I went to one of the Film Ready workshops up in Eatontown, NJ.  We now have a liaison which is me. The next step will be to submit photos of the township, and we have picked some spots of locations we will want photos of.”

Jon Crowley, executive director of NJMPTC admits the five-step process for certification might initially seem daunting, but it doesn’t have to be.

“It’s simple and if you want, all of it can be done by us for free,” he said. “Our staff is there to help every step of the way. We’ll take photos of the municipality. We will make sure your business is uploaded to our NJ database. Maybe the hardest part is writing the ordinance, but we also have a sample ordinance a town can use. You don’t have to write it from scratch.”

Crowley said the program creates standardized, streamlined requirements for each town to put in place in order to become ready to be marketed to studios like Netflix and other production companies. The program also means less red tape for production companies looking to film in the Garden State.

“We take the guess work out of it,” Crowley said. “We’re trying to make it consistent and easier not only for municipalities throughout the state but for filmmakers as well. If you are a production company with a certain budget point you need to know how long it will take you to get your permit and whether a permit is going to cost $150 a day or $500 a day. When you come to the New Jersey Film Ready database you will know what to expect.”

“The Film Ready Program has been very supportive,” Lotito said. “We like the fact that through Film Ready we have a state resource to turn to so that when we have questions we can call them up. If there are any issues later, they can become intermediaries between the producers and the town.”

Birthplace of the Film Industry

Movies have always been filmed in New Jersey. More than a century ago, in 1910, Thomas Edison helped launch the motion picture industry by building the first film studio in West Orange, NJ. By 1920 considerations such as climate and cost led to New Jersey’s movie making industry mass migrating to California.

Industry tracker ProdPro  data shows that today California is rapidly losing ground in the movie industry because of high costs, over regulations and climate uncertainty.

 New Jersey is now one of the most in demand film locations. The filmmaking industry in the Garden State is blooming and growing by leaps and bounds.

 “We’ve moved from #7 as the best place to film in the nation,” Crowley said. “Now we’re nipping at the heels of the #3 position.”

The filmmaking industry has been good financially for New Jersey.

“Television and film production, between 1978 and 2024 has contributed $5.4 billion dollars,” Crowley said.

In turn, New Jersey has been good to production companies with its film-friendly policies.

Generous film tax incentives offered through the Film and Media Digital Tax Credit Program are structured to attract production companies to New Jersey by offering tax credits of up to 40% for their expenses. The program is designed to keep filmmakers in New Jersey, and it seems to be working.

In 2025 Netflix began construction on a 500,000 sq ft, 12-sound stage production facility in Fort Monmouth NJ. Lionsgate is starting work on a studio complex in Newark NJ and Paramount has plans for studios in Bayonne, NJ

Filmmakers find New Jersey appealing because it offers a diversity of landscapes and change of seasons. It’s a one stop shop of infrastructure and landmarks. From big cities to shore communities each town comes with its own unique character and charm.

In addition to tax credits and diversity New Jersey also has a ready, willing and highly qualified pool of professional talent for production companies to draw from which includes set designers, electricians, construction, hair and makeup artists and more.

Long Beach Island, NJ has its own workforce, infrastructure and diverse locations to offer. Film and television production companies find this very attractive.

“We’ve been getting a lot of calls about filming here in the township,” Lotito said. We knew from producers who had reached out to us that a lot of them will be interested in filming here. They especially like the wintertime because of the quietness and the different scenes they can get.”

For production companies, time is money. A diversity of locations and infrastructure available in one spot is an important consideration when choosing where to film. On Long Beach Island a film maker can find anything from midcentury ranch style homes to Victorian era homes or a luxury beach front property that are only minutes away from each other.

“North Beach, Loveladies, and High Bar Harbor on the north end have public access points that make it easy for filmmakers to reach the beach,” Lotito said. “Our Town Hall, built in the 1980s, can also provide the period look a film may need. And Hideaway Bay offers a wooded trail leading to the bay.”

Independent filmmaker Dave Kaltenbach said there are so many different locations to take advantage of here on the island. “I’ve done documentaries, corporate videos and I just can’t say enough,” he said. “New Jersey offers filmmakers a variety of things and so does Long Beach Island. Here on LBI we have everything covered. And don’t forget. Off the island we have the Pine Barrens.”

Pay to Play?

Commercial filmmaking on the island means municipalities and townships will need to develop ordinances which include permit fees.

As a filmmaker, Kaltenbach admits he has mixed feelings when it comes to municipalities charging filmmakers permit fees.

“I’ve been shooting on LBI for 40 years and I never had to seek permission,” he said. “I used to be a run and gun type of guy and didn’t get any approval. When I was shooting my feature film Bridge to Nowhere in Barnegat Light, NJ I had 5^th street all blocked off and nobody complained. I had a crane up in the air, I was shooting from telephone poles. But I know now that if I were going to shoot a full-length feature movie on the island, I wouldn’t be able to do that. Having permit fees cuts into your budget as a film maker but today I would never go behind the veil and risk having a cop take my equipment away and arrest me because I didn’t have permission. Sure, the municipalities absolutely make money charging fees but in the end it’s good for a film maker and it’s good for local people as well.”

Lotito admits she was concerned that the permit fees originally decided upon by the township might have been a little on the high side.

“When we made those fees, we did not know the best processes,” she said. “We are going to look at the fees again this fall.  In our ordinance we have a paragraph that allows the mayor and commissioners to decide on the fees, and I even have the ability not to charge a filmmaker at all. We also know producers like to come to a town that has ordinances in place and knows what they want or don’t want in their town. We can’t fight it. Film and television production is here and we felt let’s do what we need to do to make things easier for all of us and to be very clear on what Long Beach Township’s wants and needs are.”

Christine Rooney, Managing Director of the Lighthouse International Film Festival believes permit fees are an area where certain considerations must be made, “A lot of filmmakers coming into our area are low-budget indie film productions,” she said. “So, there is a lot of give and take as to what you can charge.”

Turning Boroughs into Back Lots

No doubt about it. Benefits abound for Long Beach Island, NJ towns certified as Film Ready. Certification means money flowing into municipalities.

Businesses, retail establishments, restaurants and residents on Long Beach Island also stand to cash in when their community becomes Film Ready.

Independent filmmaker Brendan Walsh said municipalities and communities stand to make out financially from permit fees.

“The Vision Card was just short of a million-dollar budget, and we hired cleaners and car repairs and catering. We ate on the island; we stayed on the island. We had our actress Julianna Margulies stay at the Hotel LBI in Ship Bottom.”

Read: NJ Filmmaker Brendan Walsh Hits the Beach

Rooney said it pays to have producers and directors come and film on Long Beach Island.

“This is a very friendly place to come and film,” she said. “When award-winning filmmaker and producer David Baram came here to do his film Bullet Catch he brought in a real professional crew, location scouts, people from LA but he hired a lot of local extras from here, rented out The Gateway Restaurant and Lounge, the Surflight Theater and he housed people for almost a month at the Engleside Inn. There was a lot of economic activity going on here. Film production companies need everything from hotel bookings, rental lodging, drycleaners, drivers, chefs, caterers, hairdressers, cleaning services, transportation, construction, makeup artists and security.”

Two’s Company but More Municipalities Should be on Board

Crowley said he isn’t sure why more municipalities on the island to date have not yet become Film Ready.

“You should all be certified,” he said. “A town doesn’t want a production company to come here and then never come back because they didn’t have a good experience. And just as importantly you want the good experience for the municipalities as well. You want to be able to say that was great! The crew was nice, well-behaved, they spent a lot of money while they were here, and we will gladly have them back again. That’s the win when both sides say let’s do this again.”

Lotito feels lack of manpower may be one of the reasons why more municipalities on Long Beach Island haven’t signed on yet to become Film Ready.

“In Long Beach Township we have someone available to deal with all of this,” she said. “It’s hard for smaller municipalities when you don’t have a dedicated person to gather all the information necessary. When you have a town where one person is doing nine jobs it can become difficult. There is a lot of information to go through. We’re very lucky that three years ago the mayor and the commissioners decided to have a dedicated recreation department and that I would be able to assist with these types of things.”

And That’s a Wrap

Television and filmmaking production companies see New Jersey as a sought-after production location. Municipalities and towns on Long Beach Island. NJ are beginning to recognize that the time has come for its chance at a starring role.

“We’ve had people reach out to us,” Lotito said. “I don’t know if we’re actively going to seek out film companies, but when they are ready, we are here if they want to. I don’t think we are going to have to do much more. I think that they will find us. And they already have to an extent.”

Contact Information

New Jersey Motion Picture and Television Commisson

Film Ready New Jersey Program

https://www.nj.gov/njfilm/commission.shtml

Instagram @njmotionpictureandtv