Ambitions for Norristown movie studio scaled back

This was supposed to be the Hollywood ending for Norristown's decades of hard times: the construction of a big-time movie studio bringing money, hundreds of jobs, and glamour to revitalize the city.

But life hasn't followed the rags-to-riches script unveiled two summers ago.

Although a $10 million state subsidy was awarded to the project last year, groundbreaking on Studio Centre Norristown has been repeatedly delayed, and the ambitions of the project have been downsized even before construction starts. The promised 100,000 square feet of film-studio space has been cut drastically, with more of the site given to less-exciting retail and office purposes, including a grocery store and a fast-food restaurant.

At the run-down Logan Square shopping center where signposts tout the coming studio development, the promises of a glamorous overhaul have become less bedazzling as the months pass idly.

"I think we all believe it's still going to happen," said Cathy Lawrence, the Norristown council president. "It's just going to happen on a smaller scale."

Studio Centre's developers say construction could start this summer, at an eventual cost of about $100 million - sharply up from the $55 million development cost cited when the project was unveiled in 2007. And then there's the recession.

"It's been a bloodbath out there," said Patrick Kelley, a partner in the Studio Centre project.

Despite the daunting times, developers said that their retooled plan had the project on track and that the California production company Raleigh Studios was on board to run the Norristown facility.

Raleigh, which operates film studios in Hollywood, Budapest, Hungary, and Baton Rouge, La., and just announced a similar project in Detroit, did not return a call.

Kelley and developer Charles Gallub said Raleigh's staff helped revise the Norristown plans around both demand and experienced film professionals' needs. What was originally discussed as 100,000 square feet of studio space and 80,000 feet of supporting uses - from carpentry to catering - is cut, the developers said, by about a third.

"We've had to look at the scale of the project and see what made sense," Kelley said.

Documents filed with Montgomery County in December say the project would construct two new buildings with 45,000 square feet, though Kelley said the planned third studio isn't included in the filing. Norristown officials have asked Develcom, Gallub's company, for an explanation for the revisions, which the company is scheduled to present in March.

Kelley and Gallub said current plans are for Studio Centre to open with more than 60,000 square feet of sound-studio space - enough, they said, to produce feature films, commercials, and other projects. Kelley said another 65,000 square feet will be used for related work.

"Our first plans were much more conceptual," Gallub said.

The new plans also show the supermarket and fast-food restaurant added to the lot. Those elements are far less glamorous than the Hollywood visions the studio plans originally evoked.

Lawrence, the Norristown council president, still hopes the revised project will be a boon for her borough even if a lower fraction of the property gets used for film purposes.

That considerable studio space is still in the plans still comforts boosters of the "Phillywood" dream of an East Coast filmmaking hub. Studio Centre is as important to them as it is to backers of Norristown's revival.

"The sooner those guys get those stages up and running, the happier I'm going to be," said Sharon Pinkenson, executive director of the Greater Philadelphia Film Office.