PEORIA — Jonathon and Nikki Romain have long had a vision to bring a new film and content studio to Peoria.
Years ago, the couple who founded and operates the nonprofit entity ART Inc. teamed up with state Rep. Jehan Gordon-Booth, D-Peoria, to secure funding — $300,000 via a state grant — to bring such a facility to Peoria. Then came the waiting.
Like many items allocated in a state budget, it can years before the money is ever actually released. This was the case for the Romains.
The pair spent those years looking at different properties that could fit the vision they had for their studio, but because they did not have the state money in hand, they could not move on anything. That is until November of last year when they finally got the money.
ART Inc. purchased 1819 SW Adams St., the former furniture store across the street from the old UFS Outlet, earlier this month for $850,000. With that transaction, ART Inc. finally had the future home of its film and content studio in hand.
“This has been a long time coming. We were awarded the capital grant as part of the capital bill, at least five years ago, and so we have gone through a series of iterations determining what we were going to do in terms of space,” Jonathon Romain said.
The building will be turned into a “public facing” production studio that will incorporate workforce development, life skills and a “changing of the narrative” in the Peoria community.
“What we want to be able to do is use this platform to help raise awareness to some of these destructive concepts to start injecting some positive things and a more appropriate way to move forward for young people,” Jonathon said. “And having young people be a part of that is extremely important for us.”
Those attending programs at the studio will learn how to make films, build sets and all of things “involved in creating any kind of video content, audio content.”
Film making is part of the ART Inc. wheelhouse, Jonathon said. Nikki studied music and theater at Columbia College in Chicago.
“Nikki was in California for almost 10 years as an actress, as a singer she toured northern Italy with a choir, so she is so deeply rooted in this world, it made a lot of sense for this to be our natural progression in that direction,” Jonathon said.
The studio will have affordable public access, the Romains said, making unlike anything else that could be found in the Midwest outside of a larger city.
“Something that is affordable for the average person that is trying to get into this industry to be able to utilize a professional space like we have and to be able to afford to do that,” Jonathon said.
In addition to the state grant, ART Inc. was also awarded a $100,000 grant by Impact Central Illinois to buy camera and lighting equipment for the new studio.
The building itself is in “move-in” condition, Jonathon said. The only work that needs to be done is specific to turning it into a production studio, which will all come out of the money in the state capital grant. The studio should be done within the next year and a half.
Nikki said ART Inc. is planning to have a fundraising event at the space in November, the details of which are still being worked out.
“It was like a few pounds had finally been lifted off our shoulders when those funds were finally released,” Jonathon said.
The Romains’ plan fits into a bigger vision that Gordon-Booth has for Peoria. She sees the city becoming a “major player” in the film space, riding on the back of Illinois’ generous tax credit for filmmaking.
“I am excited because the real play I envision for community, the real play is, I want to see Peoria become a major player in the film space,” Gordon-Booth said. “Illinois has one of the best film tax credits in the country, and I want to position Peoria to be in the game. Right now, Peoria is not in the game. What Nikki and Jonathon are doing is one step of many steps. I intend to work with other partners in our community to ensure that the creatives in this community have the opportunity to stay in the community and maintain their passion.”
Peoria is “fly over country” in the film space, Gordon-Booth said, and the Romains’ film studio is the first step toward putting Peoria on the map in filmmaking.
“There are some opportunities that we are just not taking advantage of,” Gordon-Booth said. “We have a lot of creative folks in this community, particularly, if you want a thriving and growing community, one of the signs of a thriving and growing community is what does your art space look like? Peoria has a thriving arts community, but the arts community is vast. It’s not just art that sits on a wall and the world we live in today; content creation is king.”
This article originally appeared on Journal Star: ‘Long time coming’: Peoria nonprofit buys building for new film studio
Reporting by JJ Bullock, Peoria Journal Star / Journal Star
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By JJ Bullock, Peoria Journal Star | USA TODAY Network
