The Okanagan is a lush area in inland British Columbia that markets itself as a summertime vacation destination. But this fall, a film set in the Okanagan might shoot in a location that makes for an unlikely stand-in: the Yukon.

Sean Williamson of Shavick Entertainment in Vancouver was one of the producers included on a familiarization tour organized by the Yukon Film Commission earlier this year. As a result of that tour, he is tentatively planning to return to the Yukon to shoot the feature film Peachland.

Peachland, pencilled in for a September start, is ‘a small-town picture placed in the Okanagan in B.C.’ about a woman coming of age. If all goes well, Williamson says, Whitehorse will step in as the small town.

‘We would shoot exteriors in Whitehorse as if it were a small town in the Okanagan.

‘September they tell me is quite sunny and we’re not expecting snow and we’re not going far north – we’ll be shooting in the southern tip of the Yukon. If we were shooting on two feet of snow, well, we wouldn’t want to be shooting the picture there,’ he says.

The deciding factor, as always, will be financing. And, with its tax rebate on labor, the Yukon is an attractive destination.

‘The Yukon has an enhanced tax rebate that would be significant in helping us move the production up to Whitehorse. Right now we’re budgeted for the lower mainland [of B.C.] and the Okanagan. We could switch to the Yukon because of the tax rebate. If it only covers the cost of travel, we wouldn’t move.

‘There would have to be a financial gain above the travel expenses. We’re running the numbers now. It’s by no means set. We’ve just sent the script, we have to look at the finances and see what the return would be.’

As Mark Hill, manager of the Yukon Film Commission, emphasizes, the Yukon has no provincial sales tax and the 35% tax rebate on labor is easier to use than a tax credit. ‘It’s much more user-friendly [than a tax credit]; people get paid a whole lot faster, which reduces the costs of carrying bridge funding. A lot of Canadian filmmakers find it very attractive because it lowers the budget,’ he says.

‘So if 30 or 40 days after wrapping you can put in the application – and the application’s really straightforward, you don’t need an accountant – 30 days after we get it we can cut you a cheque.’

In addition to the rebate program, introduced in 1998 and scheduled for re-evaluation this year, producers are given up to $15,000 in travel expenses to help them bring up additional crew.

‘There was a company that ran a budget here last year compared to the [filmmaking] ‘zone’ in Vancouver and it was cheaper to shoot here,’ says Hill.

The Yukon’s popular image as a permanently snow-bound wilderness works in its favor, at times – the pilot of Due South was shot in the Yukon, in part to take advantage of out-of-season snow – but it also limits the appeal of the territory as a location in the minds of many producers.

‘There’s a lot of people in Canada who don’t know what’s here. There’s a snow shoot for a commercial on a snowy road right now [at a location an hour and a half out of Whitehorse], but I’ve got friends out playing golf as well. We have emphasized the snow for specific marketing reasons and it’s an easy niche to grab, but our weather is pretty comparable to Vancouver.

‘We weren’t on the map [before the rebate] because without the incentive program it was too expensive to shoot here unless you needed snow. Once people come here they tend to go, ‘Oh, there’s more here than we thought.’ ‘

And although the Yukon industry is not yet in a position to provide a complete crew, Hill says the province has more in the way of resources than usually found outside the major production centres.

‘We have a lot more crew and infrastructure than you tend to find outside film zones [such as Vancouver]. As soon as you go 60 miles outside of a film zone, you might as well be in the middle of nowhere. If the choice was between downtown Vancouver and downtown Whitehorse, you’d choose Vancouver. But as soon as you step out of the [centre of population] it is probably easier to shoot here than in most of the other regional places in Canada.’ *