Syracuse film company is ‘staking their claim’ in the film industry
Courtesy of Alexandra O’Hara
American High, a Syracuse-based film production company, began producing films in 2017 with the goal of telling stories about the coming-of-age experience.
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Will Phelps and his staff at American High, a Syracuse-based film production company, realized in 2015 there was a lack of coming-of-age movies in the film industry. So Phelps and his co-founder, Jeremy Garelick, paved their own path. They spent two years gathering scripts, and they created a film studio out of a run-down high school in Liverpool.
“We had all these scripts under our belt, and we started shooting them,” Phelps said. “So it’s always been the game plan.”
American High has been working hand-in-hand with the Visit Syracuse Film Office, which specializes as a point of contact for film productions within central New York to grow the local film industry. Although neither organization expects to see an influx of major film production in Syracuse, both want to improve local production facilities to attract more filmmakers.
“Whatever needs to be filmed in Syracuse, we try to be a one stop shop for production and resources,” said Eric Vinal, the vice president of film, television and entertainment for the Visit Syracuse Film Office.
Because of the Syracuse area’s diverse landscape, film productions can use downtown as a placeholder for a major city setting or travel a few minutes out of town to a rural landscape, Phelps said, which is another reason for the rise of filmmaking in the area.
Phelps and Garelick created American High with the intention of bringing to screen coming-of-age stories from filmmakers who previously haven’t had the chance to do so. Since 2017, the studio has produced eight films, all made in the Syracuse area. On several of these projects, the studio worked with established actors like Pete Davidson and Vince Vaughn.
The studio’s focus on coming-of-age films is based on the co-founders’ appreciation for growing up and their hope of providing these stories to viewers.
“When you are a teenager coming of age, everything has level 10 stakes to it, whether it’s asking someone you like to a dance or trying to cover up the fact you crashed your parents’ car,” Phelps said. “It delivers a heightened movie, and that is what we like about coming-of-age movies.”
As one of the top employers of film crews within the region, American High actively tries to work with local companies and values strong relationships with the community. The production company hires vendors and businesses in the area to help with shoots and trains local crews through Syracuse Studios.
Beyond working with local companies, the studio also provides opportunities for Syracuse University students. Phelps and Garelick make an effort to get students exposure to film sets by hiring them as production assistants and offering other jobs to recent graduates.
“American High really put us on the map. They have brought in crews, and they really exploded this kind of film scene to where it is,” Vinal said. “They helped build this infrastructure to where it needs to be to attract more projects.”
Phelps and Garelick chose Syracuse for American High because of the region’s versatility of locations for film sets. Lucy Messineo-Witt | Asst. Photo Editor
But there still remains a lack of filmmakers who do their post-production work in the area. One reason for this is that post-production work has become remote since the pandemic started. But American High plans to expand to conduct all post-production in Syracuse, Vinal said.
Though a variety of tax credits are available for productions that film in the upstate and central New York regions, the Syracuse area just recently became able to hold multiple major filming productions, Vinal added. In 2019, Onondaga County saw almost $30 million spent on film productions, which brought more than $20 million to the community.
Though the Visit Syracuse Film Office plans to develop new facilities, there are currently only two public facilities available for use. The Visit Syracuse Film Office is focused on growing its post in the community.
“It’s about job creation. It’s about getting people into hotels, having them invest in local businesses and homes here and it really just attracting more economic impact for our region and community,” Vinal said.
Published on May 13, 2021 at 1:01 am
