Mount Sugarloaf ready for its closeup

[ Originally published on: Friday, September 19, 2008 ]

DEERFIELD -- The view from the summit of Mount Sugarloaf -- always a favorite for visitors to the area -- will soon be seen by many more people than usual & on a movie screen.

The observation tower at the Sugarloaf State Reservation is being used as a set for 'Edge of Darkness,' an upcoming film starring Mel Gibson.

Visitors to the summit, as well as passersby, can see a construction crew working to turn the tower into Hollywood's version of an observation tower. Production crew workers began erecting a 40-by-60-foot building on the east side of the tower's base just after Labor Day.

Department of Conserva-tion and Recreation officials say the state reservation will be closed for filming the first three days of October as well as until noon on Saturday and Sept. 27, and Oct. 4. There will be no access to the tower until around Columbus Day, said a park spokesperson, when shooting is finished and the set is removed.

Visitors can hike or drive to the summit and enjoy the view -- without big screen lighting -- as usual, until then.

Chris Fortson of Swanzey, N.H., an employee at nearby Yankee Candle Co., says he hikes the trail to the summit almost every day on his lunch break. Like many people in the county, he said he had been wondering about the construction.

As to the movie, 'I want to see it. And I don't even know what it's about!'

A member of the crew who has read the 'Edge of Darkness' script said he couldn't give away any details, but did say the summit building is one of the film's key sets.

Directed by Martin Campbell (director of the recent James Bond reboot 'Casino Royale'), 'Edge of Darkness' is a thriller that explores politics and big business in the commonwealth. It is being shot in various areas around the state through December.

The producers are also planning to film in other local venues, including a farmers market in Hampshire County and other locations in Northampton.

Gibson plays a homicide detective in this adaptation of the 1985 BBC miniseries -- a six-episode political thriller that follows Yorkshire Police Inspector Ronald Craven as he unearths 'an international conspiracy involving environmental terrorism, plutonium and the Knights of St. John,' according to a BBC Web site.

The script is by William Monahan, a former Easthampton resident who wrote the Martin Scorsese blockbuster 'The Departed' and is the author of the comic novel 'Light House,' which is set in New England. Producers include Graham King, BBC Films and Michael Wearing, according to Variety magazine.

At least two tractor-trailers of structural steel and other building materials were unloaded at the base of the mountain last week and have been moved to the summit to modify the existing observation tower and create a framework for lights and cameras.

The movie's producers and state officials were unavailable at press time to discuss how much, if anything, the state is being paid for use of the park.

Thanks at least partially to tax credits that are making it more attractive to film in Massachusetts, eight movies already have been at least partly filmed around the state in 2008.

 

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