$86 million film studio planned for former MGM Grand casino (Detroit: real estate, 2009)

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$86 million film studio planned for former MGM Grand casino - Detroit Business News and Information - Crain's Detroit Business

The vacant Detroit building formerly used as MGM Grand’s temporary casino will be transformed this year into an $86 million Hollywood-style digital animation and visual effects studio directly employing more than 400 people.

The Detroit Center Studios is a partnership between Wonderstruck Studios L.L.C. owned by film and video game deal-maker Michele Richards, a Detroit native, and Los Angeles-based real estate developers SHM Partners.

The state today awarded the project a 12-year, $16.9 million Michigan Economic Growth Authority tax credit and an $11.7 million infrastructure credit under the state’s new film incentive laws.

Detroit also is considering property tax abatements.

The deal calls for the studio to begin operation this year, with 413 direct and 287 indirect jobs.

Terms and financing were not released.

The site is owned by MGM, but it’s unclear if the film studio will buy or lease the facility, which will include sound stages, offices, screening rooms, a commissary, editing bays and other film infrastructure.

“It will be everything a filmmaker needs to come to Michigan and be well taken care of,” Richards said, adding that the project expects to use “every square inch” of the MGM site.

MGM bought and extensively renovated an old 75,000-square-foot Internal Revenue Service building along the Lodge Freeway to house its temporary casino until the new gaming facility opened in October 2007.

The film facility is being modeled on Los Angeles Center Studios, a SHM Partners project that turned an old Unocal headquarters into a modern studio, she said.

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$86 million film studio planned for former MGM Grand casino - Detroit Business News and Information - Crain's Detroit Business